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Joe Ley, who owns Joe Ley Antiques on Market Street, has hired Village Solutions to develop a long-term plan for his property.
Connectivity will be emphasized. Like the concept plan at both the Creation Gardens site and at Gill Holland’s planned farmers’ market on Jefferson Street, reuse of the alleyways is strongly considered. Hill says Billy Goat Strut could provide a great pedestrian texture to the area and activate an otherwise underutilized space.
Broken Sidewalk previously declared that Nulu has landed.
More than any other individual part of Louisville, Nulu has emerged as the urban neighborhood in only a matter of years. The signs are all around from new businesses to new public and private development, to grand visions and green aspirations. The neighborhood that was born as a gallery district is organically transforming into a well-rounded urban place with emphasis not only on art but also sustainability, food, and community.
It seems like every time I go to or through Nulu, I see something new coming up. (Lots of rhymes in that last sentence.) Do you live in the area? What does it need, if anything?
Architect Steve Wiser sent this picture to Broken Sidewalk. The pedestrian/bike ramp is almost built on the Kentucky side of the Big Four Bridge.
From Steve Wiser/Broken Sidewalk
Now that the elliptical spiral is completely airborne, it’s much easier to imagine taking a walk or ride to Jeffersonville in peace without using the Clark Bridge with its narrow sidewalks and speeding trucks. The next step involves installing a concrete deck on top of the steel structure, which it looks like has begun on part of the spiral.
Not all of the country’s magnificent old trees were lost at the hands of early settlers. The Utne Reader points to this piece on Bruce Kershner, who chronicles the most impressive trees in New York State.
Kershner has found ancient oaks in a grove behind a school in North Syracuse, a 400-year-old tulip tree in Queens, and trees he calls “living skyscrapers” in the 25 acres of old-growth forest at Inwood Hill Park on the northern tip of Manhattan Island.
Where are your favorite trees in Louisville?
There’s a second 21c opening in Cincinnati. The Louisville hotel is indeed world class, but the expansion is ruffling some feathers further up the Ohio River.
The process of relocating more than 200 low-income residents of the Metropole Apartments to make way for a world-class hotel got off to a rocky start Thursday.
Cincinnati Center City Development Corp. announced Wednesday it had purchased the apartment building at 609 Walnut and is working with 21c Museum Hotels to transform the 1912 building into a 160-room hotel and contemporary art venue.
Under federal guidelines, residents will have one year to move. 3CDC says it’s paying for relocation costs and has hired Brickstone Properties, a division of the Model Group, to manage the moves.
Thursday’s 4 p.m. meeting at the Metropole was called by Brickstone, but affordable housing advocates arrived early to take over the afternoon agenda.
“They want you out because they think you don’t match with their plans for the Backstage district,” Josh Spring, executive director of the Greater Cincinnati Coalition for the Homeless, told more than 50 residents.
Read it all here.
The Metro Council’s Government Accountability and Oversight Committee just approved the so-called Audit Ordinance, which calls for contractors who use certain amounts of city money to say how the money was spent. The legislation is partially a reaction to Cordish’s refusal to disclose how it spent about $900 thousand in city money to renovate the bowling alley in 4th Street Live. Cordish calls the information proprietary and says it can’t reveal documents that might hurt its competitiveness.
The legislation now goes to the full council.
Here’s what we reported on today:
- Poverty Task Force Begins Work In Frankfort
- Preservation Groups Work to Move Civil War Monument
- Louisville Receives Stimulus Grant For Firehouse
- Berman Reacts to District Accountability Scores
- Clark Co. Lawyer Joins Medicaid Fraud Unit
- Plans Announced For Botanical Garden
- Bank Executive Opposes Regulating Financial Industry
- Norton/Anthem Officials To Meet
Well that was quite a day. Here’s what we reported on:
While city leaders sometimes like to compare Derby City to Portland, Oregon, there are times when it seems like Stumptown dwellers have us beat on social awareness.
The Mediavore points us to this urban foraging site where Rose City residents can search for fruit trees or other sources for do-it-yourself, hyperlocal nourishment.
Does anyone know of something like this in Louisville?
After yesterday’s flood committee meeting I had a conversation with a couple MSD officials.
MSD says no sewer system infrastructure malfunctioned on August 4th, but Chief Engineer Mark Johnson says the infrastructure under west and southwest Louisville may not have been up to par.
“These sewers were built from the 1800s to 1953 and I really can’t speak about what planning was done and what engineering went into sizing those sewers back then, but it’s obvious they didn’t realize we were going to have as dense a community in the urban areas as we have today.”
When the sewers were built, many houses didn’t have paved driveways, patios, sheds and other amenities that block water from seeping into the ground. Instead, these improvements push water into the sewers and cause overflows during heavy rains. The people who spoke at yesterday’s meeting say they’ve had water in their homes before August 4th, and it doesn’t take record rainfall to flood their houses.
Many neighborhoods outgrew the sewer system and the system wasn’t improved enough to match the growth.
MSD is working on a study that could lead to federal grant funds coming to Louisville. The money would be spent buying houses in flood-prone areas and replacing them with green space that will hold water in storms. The district is also considering upgrades to the sewer in some areas to prevent persistent flooding.
There are two important things to pick up here. First is the fact that even with improvements, it’d be difficult for any combined sewer system to handle a storm like August 4. Second is that the neighborhoods grew in small increments, so it didn’t look like there would be any sewer problems until those increments were added up on the 4th. It’s not entirely possible or helpful to blame people for improving their homes or MSD for not realizing what was happening over the last 60 years.
You could say MSD dropped the ball (plenty of folks at the meeting did) and you could say that a city’s desire to grow can’t compete with nature. You could say both of those things, but you’d be missing the point.
The problems with the sewer system seem to be problems of unsustainable growth. Infrastructure isn’t permanent; it needs constant maintenance and improvement. This only becomes more apparent as a city grows. Sewers built before the depression can’t handle a modern neighborhood’s waste or the weather events of a changing climate. Streets built for horse-drawn wagons may be charming and look great in parts of Europe, but they’re not practical for moving thousands of cars through a city. (I’m not against historical preservation, but it also needs to be sustainable.)
Sustainable development could mean making sure infrastructure is solid and efficient, then limiting how it’s used. This could be politically unpopular because it requires money to be spent and laws to be changed. But at least then you won’t have to go back in a few decades and tear down houses because the city grew too fast.
I want to clarify that none of this is a knock on MSD or Louisvillians. August 4th was a record storm and I don’t think there are any sinister intentions behind not upgrading the sewer. Money is tight and it’s hard to tell what needs to be done until it’s too late. As Councilman Tom Owen said after the committee meeting, Never before have the vulnerabilities of a combined sewer system been so exposed.
