The porn is another clue — I sincerely doubt that someone left that there when the hotel closed…

It’s not as dark in there as I had thought it would be; I was impressed with the amount of light there truly is.

And thanks for the tip to the Illicit Ohio Web site — while I can’t say much for the design (like this one is all that great right now, itself, right?), I have a lot of respect for the subject matter: it’d be cool to do exploring like this myself…

Now that I know that someone actually went in there, it’d be kinda cool to go in there and snoop around a little. Alas, the time…

Thanks!

And I have to agree with you that nothing will happen with the site for a couple of years, until the port deal goes through. However, we’ve seen City Council say many things and then finally do other things, so I’m not getting my hopes up just yet…

By the way, the airport is on a very soft landfill (1930s — it was a Public Works project, along with Municipal Stadium and the Memorial Shoreway), and nothing more than two stories tall can be erected there. The landfill itself is primarily garbage from the early half of last century, which, well, I don’t even want to think about what’s in it… ;-)

The funny thing about it is that every time the conversation of closing Burke and building something grand there comes up, the engineers get involved, and the grandiose plans go away very quietly — every time. The truth is that they can’t build anything else there but… well… an airport.

The problem with the site is that it’s not close enough to anywhere where most people want to be. And it would be a terrible retail local I think. But here’s the thing, and my point about speculation. If the Port Authority does move to the end of E. 55th that land will have great industrial value almost overnight. It’s not quite three acres of almost flat land along two major transportation routes and will be literally across the street from a break bulk point.

Right now the county has that land valued at just shy of $700,000. And that’s with a worthless shell of a building that will cost a ton of cash to bring down (and let’s face it even if you like the architecture of the building it has very few reuse options). Anyway the city can’t just take the land through eminent domain just because the owner isn’t doing anything with it. (if that were true then someone should take that airport FROM the city) There does have to be some public good that will come from it, and lining the pocket of a developer isn’t in my book of public good items. Even if there were a public good to be had in the taking of the property it could mean that the property will fall off the tax roles, which is bad as well.

I guess my overall point is that while I agree that it is a shame and waste of resources to have that hulking shell stare vacantly over the city, I don’t think that anything’s going to happen for a few years now until the whole port deal is decided. And until someone see’s an opportunity I think we’ll have to wait, after all there is a latent value in lake front property like this. (This Lakeview 2006, LLC group must agree since they paid 2.5 mil for a property valued at $925,000). Let the government look into the rest of the city. After all we can all list the wasted properties, this one will fall back into the market sooner than later compared to most of the rest of the east side.

PFFFT.

Gone.

Nary a sign that it ever existed.

You’d think this place could at least earn a similar fate.

My high school class (Aviation High, Class of 1987) had our prom dinner there at the restaurant located on/near the top floor.

But the idea here is that this highly visible eyesore has been there for a long time in a deteriorating state, right under our noses, and we as a city have done absolutely nothing about it.

Our politicians want to spur economic development — yet they ignore obvious avenues of advancement. Somehow, I don’t think ignoring this building qualifies as a valid strategy for Strategema.

This place has been empty for a very long time: Jill Zimon twittered me last night with a reminder that this building used to house one of the best Chinese restaurants in the region — something I had totally forgotten about because it has been closed for so long.

As it stands right now — and you’ll see this in some photos I took this morning that I will post in a little bit — there is no way anything could be built there unless someone puts some major work into the place. The easiest course of action would be to detonate it and scoop up the debris and bury it somewhere.