Columbia Building will be razed for casino parking

The casino trumps the landmark. The city Landmarks Commission voted 4-3 today to let the Columbia Building on Prospect Avenue be torn down to make way for valet parking for the Higbee Building casino.

Preservation advocates rallied to try to save the Columbia at today’s 2½ hour meeting. (One attendee tweeted the meeting.)

But the Landmarks Commission staff had failed to find an alternative that made room for casino parking on that block but spared the vacant eight-story building, built in 1908.

The Jackson Administration, which encouraged Dan Gilbert to open his casino in the Higbee Building, supported the demolition. (Here’s my earlier post on that.)

The casino plans are a painful tradeoff for people who love downtown’s historic character. Losing the Columbia Building means losing a stately, century-old streetscape.

Also, the bridge that’ll connect the parking to the Higbee Building casino will slice diagonally through the historic intersection of Ontario and Prospect. Architecture critic Steven Litt recently called it the type of move that could “erode a city’s visual integrity and sense of place, even its identity.” This attractive rendering of the future casino isn’t accurate anymore, as a commenter on my blog pointed out.


The parking bridge will connect to the Higbee Building right at that attractive corner façade.


It's an awkward change to a much-beloved Public Square landmark -- one that's also going to be heavily renovated to give it that modern, high-rolling casino style.


It’s not easy to wedge a mini-Vegas into a historic downtown. Lots of preservation-minded people don’t want to make the compromise and lose the Columbia. But in this post on his Cleveland History Blog, Cleveland State librarian Bill Barrow gently and humorously encourages them to make the trade.

Update, 6/13: Steven Litt is mad. His Sunday column blasts Rock Gaming for revealing its plans little by little, making it hard to judge the casino's true impact on downtown. He calls the Columbia Building vote kabuki theater, "a form of drama in which the outcome is always predictable."

As demolition vote nears, casino’s alliance with mayor becomes clear

Should Cleveland let Dan Gilbert tear down a 100-year-old building to make way for casino parking? Urban activists are getting ready to flood a meeting at City Hall Thursday to say no. They want the Landmarks Commission to block the demolition of the Columbia Building on Prospect Avenue, a designated city landmark built in 1908.

It’s the biggest historic-preservation battle in town since the fight over the Ameritrust Tower four years ago. Preservation Ohio, the Historic Gateway Neighborhood organization, and the Cleveland Coalition, an activist group of young professionals, want to save the Columbia, which used to house Myers University and has been vacant for years.

But Gilbert’s Rock Ohio Caesars says it needs new, modern parking connected to the Higbee Building casino. And Gilbert has Mayor Jackson’s administration on its side.

A clash like this probably became inevitable as soon as Mayor Jackson nudged Gilbert to start his Cleveland casino in the Higbee Building. The mayor is a guy who values his commitments to others. So now that Gilbert’s doing what Jackson asked, Jackson won’t say no to the parking plan Gilbert says he needs. That’s why Jackson’s chief of staff, Ken Silliman, came to May’s Landmarks Commission meeting and argued for demolishing the Columbia (upsetting this writer for Rust Wire).

The activists have a point when they say a mega-sized valet parking facility at one of Cleveland’s main intersections, with several lanes of in-and-out traffic, doesn’t honor Gilbert’s commitment to fit the casino into downtown’s urban fabric. The plan will surely make Prospect Avenue near East Fourth Street unfriendly to pedestrians.

But the casino operators are trying to attract customers like this letter writer who expect easy access to the slots. So when the preservationists say the casino should use older parking, like the May Co. structure across Prospect, Gilbert’s people wave it off. They want the ultra-convenient, ultra-modern parking you see at most every casino, from Las Vegas to Detroit and Windsor.

Cleveland wouldn’t be confronting this tradeoff between its history and its future if not for the casino’s move to the Higbee Building. That’s the bigger story here. You might remember that when we voted on Issue 3 in 2009, Gilbert was saying he intended to build our little Vegas along Huron Road, kind of hanging off of Tower City. You might also remember that, at first, people called Higbee’s a “temporary” casino site.

There’s nothing temporary about the Higbee casino anymore. Gilbert calls it “Phase I” and is poised to spend $350 million on it. “Phase II,” the Huron Road casino project, has been put off until 2015 at the earliest. Cleveland Magazine columnist Mike Roberts has predicted that Phase II will probably never be built.

Jackson is committed to making the Higbee casino site work, so the pressure on the Landmarks Commission is getting stronger. Last night, city council voted to sell a parking garage near Quicken Loans Arena to Rock Ohio Caesars — which plans to link it to the valet parking operation on the Columbia Building site. Two Jackson Administration officials, sure votes to tear the building down, sit on the 11-member Landmarks Commission. The other nine members are about to feel the pressure to OK the wrecking ball.

FitzGerald argues Dolan should bow out of major downtown development decisions

This weekend, Ed FitzGerald e-mailed me his letter to the Ohio Ethics Commission about Matt Dolan’s conflict of interest with the Indians. It argues that if Dolan is elected county executive, he should have to bow out of any decisions about the casino, the RTA, Public Square, or roads, bridges, or sewers downtown -- because they all “directly and uniquely impact the Cleveland Indians.”

The casino because it’ll be a block or two from the stadium, I assume. But the RTA? Because people take the Rapid to ball games, I guess?

Dolan told me last week that if he’s elected county executive, he’ll let the county council president take the lead on Indians matters and Gateway appointments. He asked the Ethics Commission to give him advice on his plans.

But FitzGerald, his main opponent, is pushing the commission to go way farther than that. He also wants it to rule on whether Dolan should return the huge campaign contributions from his father, Indians owner Larry Dolan, “to avoid even the appearance of impropriety.” FitzGerald’s letter, written Oct. 8, pegs the elder Dolan’s contribution at $280,000. On Thursday, we learned Larry Dolan’s now given a total of $630,000.

The Ethics Commission isn’t answering Dolan’s request until after the election. No wonder: It’ll also have to deal FitzGerald’s letter, which reads more like a political argument than a request for a legal opinion. At one point FitzGerald talks about “an assessment of the appropriateness of Mr. Dolan’s candidacy and potential service as County Executive.” That’s up to the voters, not the Ethics Commission.

But politically, FitzGerald’s playing an interesting card here. He’s saying taxpayers should trust him, not Dolan, to represent their interests on downtown development issues. He’s trying to tap into the mistrust of sports teams’ political influence in Cleveland, a concern that dates back at least to the Gateway project. And he’s again reminding voters that Dolan’s millionaire family is funding the TV attacks against him.

To read FitzGerald’s letter to the Ethics Commission, click here. To read Dolan’s letter, click here.