Airshow 2007

I'm getting lax on my posting, so I'll try to do better on that this week. In the mean time, here are some images from the Quad City Air Show yesterday.
The United States Air Force Thunderbirds. As someone who goes to the air show literally every year, I usually start heading for the car during the final act, because its basically the same as 2 years ago. However this year, after sticking it out through the rain and mud, we stayed through the Thunderbird's performance, and I'm glad. It was quite impressive and there were even a few maneuvers that I don't remember from previous years.

A UH-60Q Blackhawk, which hadn't made an appearance at the air show lately, and an A1 Skyraider, which I don't recall ever appearing at the QCAS before.

Jim LeRoy's Bulldog stunt plane, and of course... everyone's favorite triple jet semi, Shockwave.

A few more pictures can be found on my Flickr page.

A good afternoon to stay inside

I woke up and the air raid sirens were going off, so I happened to turn on my police scanner. The USBank at 4004 Northwest Boulevard was just robbed, so the police were flying out that way. Then all the calls for power lines down and poles on fire, and such started coming in. Its one of those days where you can really see how difficult and stressful it is to be an emergency dispatcher.

Currently the police are following a person who matches the description on I-280.
Update: It doesn't appear that that person was the suspect, but officers are considering to look for people matching the description.

LeClaire Park Expansion

This is the newly revised programmatic sketch that was presented to the council at the work session today.There aren't a whole lot of changes, just a few things that were either fixed or made a little more detailed. Also, the pier location is being left open to either align with Main Street or be aligned with the Skybridge. Approval of this has been put on the agenda for the next finance committee meeting, in order to allow the city to present this plan at the June 13th Vision Iowa board meeting.

Along with this came some preliminary cost estimates to present to the Vision Iowa folks, which can seen below. The costs were estimated using similar projects that have been completed recently, with adjustment for inflation, etc. Staff emphasized that this is simply a total dollar amount, and will involve many funding sources, including the Isle of Capri, hopefully state grants, and possibly some hotel/motel tax or other city funding sources. This info was scanned from the handout from today's work session.

Wait for it... wait for it.... Go Go Go!

Now that the casino is ready to actually talk... tomorrow (TODAY now) there is a council worksession regarding the LeClaire Park expansion. I'm pretty curious if the casino's deal is going to be decided in the next couple weeks as well. You know, since the best way to get a good deal is to decide everything in 2 weeks or less... as we've seen in the past.

Oh well. At least the LeClaire Park expansion part of it won't be all screwed up. They're basically using the preliminary sketch that most people supported when it was displayed at the last two public meetings. It leaves things vague enough to be hammered out over the longer term while Rhythm City builds its new location.


Email sent to people who went to the meetings:

Dear LeClaire Park expansion process participant:

As you may know, the City has been discussing with the Isle of Capri its preliminary plans to relocate off the Riverfront. Very recently, it has been revealed that the Isle of Capri is looking closely at establishing a gaming operation in portions of the River Center.

Given this information, it has been determined that making a presentation to the Vision Iowa Board on June 13th is feasible. In order to meet that deadline, the City Council has, on short notice, scheduled a work session to review the Programmatic Sketch presented at a series of public meetings held in late April. This work session has been scheduled for Noon tomorrow (TODAY), May 31, 2007, in the Council Chambers of City Hall, 226 W. Fourth Street. The public is invited to attend the meeting.

The Programmatic Sketch was well received and only minor revisions have been made. An estimated project budget has also been prepared as well. As the planning process continues and more design details developed, your input will be sought.

Thank you once again for your interest in this project!

RiverCenter Casino a step closer?

Isle to lease part of the RiverCenter? -QTimes

The Times has definitely gotten a lot of column inches out of writing articles about the Isle not knowing what its going to do. Hopefully they (IOC) figure it out soon, so Davenport can stop being held hostage by their indecision and start moving forward on the riverfront, the Blackhawk, and the RiverCenter.

I do think that its better for Rhythm City to build a new hotel than try and make the Blackhawk work for them. They've shown over the last decade how capable they are of operating a historic building like that. Also, I find it interesting the people from Ad Group either a. Don't know what's happening, or b. Are better at keeping secrets than Aldermen Meyer and Hamerlinck. I could definitely see their building being eyed by IOC, because the green space across from Majors doesn't seem big enough for both a hotel and parking garage.

Now we just have to make sure that our new hotel tower doesn't look anything like the hotel towers in Bettendorf.

Last night's Swing game

What a beautiful day yesterday was for a baseball game. It was a beautiful game as well. Beloit was dominating to the point of having a perfect game through several innings, but the Swing came back late, and won in the bottom of the 9th with a walkoff outfield hit with the bases loaded. Unfortunately because of the early lack of Swing offense, the game was over so early that it was barely dark enough for the fireworks.

Here's a video I took of the Swing lining into a double play.

Freight House update

It seems that in addition to missing a few things on the Boozies alley fight (see Cruiser's post), Barb Ickes also forgot to check out a few things in her Freight House column.

Here's a little piece that will probably be making its appearance in the next Council Update, with thanks to my source. I believe this was emailed to Keith as well, but I guess he only posts bad news.

Freight House Progress -- Contrary to what you may have recently read, the Freight House redevelopment project is proceeding, although the original schedule has been adjusted as the details of financing have been worked through. Developers Jeff Johnson and Bob Echols are moving full steam ahead with plans to invest in Davenport by opening Penguin's Comedy Club, a mid-priced independent restaurant (with a local flavor), and a piano bar. They have been working with their team of local designers and plan to open Penguin's in October, with the remaining development to follow by year's end. At the Levee Improvement Commission's May 9 meeting, an addendum to the lease was approved allowing three additional months to the original target open date of August 1. The reason for this extension relates to the developer's decision to seek SBA financing, and the process taking longer than originally contemplated. Another part of the financing is expected to be a City loan through the CDBG-funded CIRCL program. The use of the federal funds required there to be an environmental assessment, which recently was completed. To sum up, you will soon be able to grab a bite and laugh yourself silly at the Freight House.

In related news, the newspaper was accurate in its coverage of the lead gift of $35,000 by the Davenport Jaycees for a children's play area is planned to be constructed in late June. The Levee Improvement Commission approved a $5,000 contribution at its meeting on May 23. Jaycees volunteers will spend the last weekend in June preparing the site and setting the play structure, with oversight by the Parks and Recreation staff, as a gift to our community.

In other riverfront news, tonight' 6:00PM Swing game should include fireworks, and the forecast for game time is 75 and sunny.

Listen to Canadians talk about the QC Flames

Check out Fan960.com, Calgary's sports radio.
At the top, click on Listen Live to stream the audio online.

Right now (6:30PM) Mallards/Flames President Tim Taylor is being interviewed, and there's a lot of talk about the Calgary Flames' farm team.

Update: It was pretty interesting to hear questions and discussion about the Quad Cities, the Mallards, and the Mark from another country, sort of. They talked about Mallards fans, the $600,000 project to expand the skating surface, the name change, and the excitement of the fans, including the presence of a lot of fans at the press conference.

Here's a thread on a Calgary hockey forum with a lot of folks talking about us as well, and they seem impressed with the Mark.

Also, here's a post by Pioneer98 (bigger hockey fan than I) wondering if this means the end of the UHL on Information Swimming.

Open Thread

Lately open threads have been failing miserably around here, but here's one at least until later today.

I'm sure there will be a lot of big news coming out of the Mallards' press conference at 10:30 this morning. If I wasn't so tired I'd consider heading over to the Mark to witness the AHL announcement myself.

Swedish Olive Block

When I took this picture my intent was to use it for a "Where in the QC is this?" I even edited out the address. Then I discovered that simply Google-searching for the phrase reveals its location, so that's a bit too easy. Here's the image anyway, and the info that Google found.

Here's what Moline's downtown brochure says about it (PDF here)

This three-story Prairie School style building, designed by Moline Architect H.W. Whitsitt, was built in 1909 for the Swedish Olive Lodge Illinois Order of Odd Fellows (I.O.O.F.). Note the building’s numerous columns in relief, each topped with a decorative stone, the multi-paned windows and the dropped cornice. The street level is divided into four units and has housed a wide variety of tenants through the years. The second-floor meeting rooms and office space and the third floor auditorium were utilized by the Swedish Olive Lodge until 1988.

Anyone have any stories about this, or history with the Order of Odd Fellows? Also, none of this description really says where its located, so does anyone even know that? Maybe its a Where in the QC? after all.

New Oneida neighborhood?

Here's a map I put together of some of the stuff going on around Oneida Landing in Davenport.
If all 3 of the proposed projects become a reality, they should fit well with the existing KSTT renovation, Boat House Restaurant, and Lake Davenport Sailing Club. This mini-neighborhood could do a lot to connect downtown with the Village of East Davenport.

Sunderbruch Park Grand Opening

Here are some images I got yesterday at the opening of Davenport's newest park.

There were booths set up for different organizations, including horseback riding and mountain biking organizations. Those 2 groups are going to be some of the biggest users, and hopefully caretakers, of this park.

The grand opening/ribbon cuttings for the skatepark, the Fairmount Library, and now Sunderbruch Park have all been very well attended, and the first two have become extremely well-used and popular amenities. I'm sure that this one will be as well.

Weekend Davenport Events

Swing of the Quad Cities fireworks night
Friday, May 18th 7:00PM
John O'Donnell Stadium

Public Works Fair
Saturday, May 19th, 9:00AM-1:00PM
To be held at Public Works (I assume)

Sunderbruch Park Grand Opening
Saturday, May 19th 1:00PM
4500 Telegraph Road

Swing of the Quad Cities Family Fun Day
Saturday, May 19th 1:00PM
John O'Donnell Stadium

Family Fest 2007
Sunday, May 20th 12:00PM-4:00PM
Fejervary Park and Children's Zoo

Also on Saturday, your blog author becomes an old man, as I hit the big "25". Next stop is 30, and then you're practically dead.
Just kidding about the old man thing, folks... I had to throw in a little jibe towards the 99% of my readers who are older than I.

A week's worth of news

I was too busy to do any posting from Phoenix, but I did keep reading the news from down there. Here are a few of the things that I would have commented on if I had time:

The Aaron Howard scandal:
My first reaction was, lets wait until all the facts come out. However, when the fact that drug stuff was found came out, I pretty much gave up on the guy. He always seemed decent going to school with him, but I guess event decent folks can make mistakes. Too many mistakes can (and should) cost you your job, although I do find it funny that one of his 10 Alderman bosses had worse problems with no real repercussions. The whole thing is unfortunate for all involved.

The Mallards possibly moving to the AHL:
None of the rumor-filled articles mention whether they would keep the name, but they certainly wouldn't stay with the Aksarben Knights (Nebraska backwards) and they should learn from the Swing and stick with what fans like. Hopefully we can start a rivalry with Des Moines, and fuel it on the AbsoluteDSM forums.

The whole skatepark graffiti thing:
When I mentioned back in March that I thought we shouldn't worry about the graffiti if it wasn't obscene or gang-related, I never would have guessed that the city, and especially this council, could be so progressive to even consider the idea. The stuff about the "lights, fences, and cameras" I really don't understand though, because I thought there were already plans for lights and cameras. It was supposed to be lit sometime this summer so it could be open 24 hours a day. Anyone know if that's been changed? The problem now will be keeping them from tagging other stuff, which brings me to...

The Centennial Park/Skatepark pavilion: (same article as graffiti)
Updated at 6am: Good job council, thanks for moving forward on this.
Its time to stop spending thousands of dollars in staff time nitpicking this and just get it done. Its a city park, and very popular, and it needs bathrooms. Despite Economic genius Lynn's insistence, building bathrooms and a utility room raised above a flood plain is going to cost more than $500. Davenport has bigger things to worry about than this.

Creative Tile building renovations:
This is a great thing, and should really mesh well with what's going to be happening in the area. As I mentioned in the Oneida Landing condos post, JJ Condon is going to be looking at renovating the One River Place in addition to his 8 story condo tower. This whole area could make a really neat neighborhood, and help to connect downtown to the Village of East Davenport. If the big riverboats aren't able to dock in downtown when (if) we get a new pier, maybe at least the Oneida Landing area won't look so shabby when they let off passengers.

Also, check out this QCOnline article about guest columnist Julie Barton's move to "the big city" of the QC area. Its an interesting perspective.

QCI Returns (Open Thread)

I have returned from the smoggy inferno, and hope to post something of substance (as much as I ever do) later today.

Until then, Open Thread. You can't say there hasn't been stuff to talk about...

Downtown Cleanup

Cruiser's post reminded me to look into when the Downtown Davenport Cleanup is, and of course... its tomorrow. I knew it was while I was going to be gone, but I was thinking it was also this weekend. Here's the info from DowntownDavenport.com:

Annual Downtown Cleanup Day
Sponsored by The Starting Line
Thursday, May 10
1 hour shift between 9:00 a.m.-6:00 p.m.
Download the Volunteer Form





It's time to start cleaning up downtown Davenport and getting ready for the thousands of visitors that will be coming to Downtown Davenport starting in May. We are teaming up with Keep Scott County Beautiful and the Great American Cleanup TM to give volunteers a FREE t-shirt, garbage bags, and gloves.

All volunteers are invited to The Starting Line "thank-you party" with free beverages, hors d'oeuvres and more - at the Starting Line, 217 Brady Street, Downtown Davenport, following the Cleanup at 6:00 p.m.

If you can't make volunteer check-in, call our offices and we will make arrangements to get the bags, gloves and FREE t-shirts to you.
Call Marcy at (563) 322-1706.

Too Busy to Blog Open Thread

I'm flying off to Phoenix Thursday morning, and I have been too busy preparing for that to really write about anything since the 6th Street post. On a side note, I have been pleased with the good discussion on the last couple posts. I wasn't too busy to get out and play a little home run derby Saturday, but I've been waiting all winter for this summer's first swing of the bat.

There are a couple of posts I've been thinking about writing, but they may have to wait until I get back Tuesday.

I'm sure I'll manage to post something from the desert though.

Here's a link, just for the heck of it. I really hope Michelle Wie makes her 3rd trip to the John Deere Classic this year. The QC area is practically her second home from some of the comments that have come from her dad. Hopefully Quad City folks will get another chance to watch her play here, and thank her in person for her generosity to Travis Hearn.

East 6th Street Renewal ProjectJust Add Money

This weekend I was scanning through the local real estate websites, as I often do. I noticed that there are several properties for sale in my neighborhood, including 3 just in the block of East 6th between Iowa and LeClaire. They're marked on the map to the right. The dark blue areas are completed new residential buildings, including the Crescent, Waterloo Mills, and 4th Street Lofts, and the CityView Apartments. The buildings highlighted with the lighter blue are currently owned by the Alexander Company and marked for future residential conversion. It seems to me that these 3 properties would be a good investment with the consistent improvement in the neighborhood over just the last 3 years. In the future I could even see some kind of 3-5 story new residential construction in this area to take advantage of the view, and the proximity to downtown. If people will pay $160k+ to live behind HyVee, why not here?


Here are the properties:

414 E 6th Street      $ 6000 (Its a vacant lot)          Assessed at $2870

420 E 6th Street      $35000                        Assessed at $33300
403 E 6th Street      $74900                        Assessed at $21000 (?)

Total: A mere $115,900

One of you developer types has to have that laying around, or even some decent landlord could rent out the two houses until the area develops further. Once that happens, you'd own a serious chunk of this potentially valuable block.

Of course, since this is "the internets," one or more of these properties could already be sold, as the real estate sites tend to be slow to update. They're all listed by Mel Foster, but my links are to Ruhl, mostly because the Mel Foster website annoys me.

RiverCenter Casino?

I've been hearing rumors about Isle of Capri's possible interest in the RiverCenter for a while now, but it was always prefaced with "This isn't for the blog..." Anyway, now that Craig Malin was on TV a few days back mentioning this exact possibility, and a couple newspaper articles were written about it, I'm going to consider it public knowledge.

Rhythm City is rumored to be looking into moving their operation into one of the halves of the RiverCenter, and either renovating the Blackhawk or building a new hotel. This would keep them downtown and allow the project to be used as the local matching funds to get the CAT grant for redeveloping LeClaire Park.
As always, there are pros and cons to the idea.

Pros:

• Gets the casino off of the riverfront and keeps it downtown
• Takes the money-losing RiverCenter off the city's hands
• Possibly renovates the Blackhawk back to former glory
  

Cons:

• Instead of working to attract more conventions, we give up
• Smaller auto show, pool tournament, Festival of Trees, etc
• Can IOC preserve the Blackhawk as it should be?
  

One of the big issues for me would be which side (North or South) of the RiverCenter. The older half on the north side of 3rd Street is directly adjacent to the Blackhawk, which would allow IOC to renovate that and have their casino in close proximity. That side is also looking a little more dated than the newer, southern half. A new hotel tower and/or parking garage could also be built in the vast parking lot that currently surrounds the Blackhawk. Unfortunately, I'm hearing more about them looking at the newer half. In one of the news articles discussing this, the green space on 2nd Street across from Majors was also mentioned. I suppose this could be a site for a new hotel as well.

At first I was completely against giving up any of the RiverCenter, because I believe its a fairly short-sighted thing to do. If Davenport starts growing more like some of us think its about to, my generation could end up building a new RiverCenter-type convention hall 10 or 20 years down the line, and wishing we hadn't turned half of our old one into a casino. Currently though, only a few events per year actually use both halves of the RiverCenter, so maybe losing half wouldn't be as big of a deal. Unfortunately, I believe that IOC has proven their complete inability to take care of the historic Blackhawk Hotel, and I really don't trust them to maintain its historic integrity. I'd still like to see a new hotel tower built, and the Blackhawk turned into a 100+ room convention hotel maintaining the Gold Room with apartments/condos on the top floors, just as the city was already planning to do. Or, I'd still be fine with my previously-suggested plan to build a hotel/waterpark/casino on the parking lot surrounding the Blackhawk.

What do you folks think? (And also, will what people think matter?)

Buses, kids, and old buildings

I went to the Swing game yesterday, and had the luck/misfortune of it being "High School Day." Apparently this means kids of all ages from about a 30-mile radius take a day off of school and get bused to JOD for some baseball. It was neat to see thousands of kids packing the stadium, at least until it came time to stand in line for a hot dog. Despite having a big crowd, only 2 of the concession stands were open, so there was quite a wait to get food. However, it was great to see the home team really blow out the visitors for once, including a 10-run 5th inning. The attendance was nearly 4000, counting all the kids.

Also, if you're downtown this week, stop by the Design Center. In honor of Historic Preservation Week, they will be hosting an exhibit called "Davenport Lost." It is filled with side-by-side images of historic buildings around Davenport that have been lost over the passing years, and what those locations look like today. Pretty interesting stuff, if you're into history at all. The Design Center is located on the northeast corner of 2nd and Brady.

Where in the QC is this? #15

Update: This hasn't been the smoothest Where in the QC is this? week. MRC may have guessed correctly that this is from the old Rock Island High School, but I don't actually know. I was just driving by and thought "that would be a good mystery image." I don't know the history of this building, but I do know its located just west of downtown Rock Island behind the courthouse/jail complex. Can someone confirm what this building is? Here's an overview image. I'll try to actually know what I'm taking a picture of next time.Clue #1: I know I'm normally lazy with these, but this time the image is actually from a non-Davenport Quad City.

A hot time in the old town last night

I was able to listen to the police scanner quite a bit last night, and it was a rowdy night for everyone.

Hopefully none of you live in Northwest Davenport, because some dimwits were out breaking car windows again. Last I heard, the cops had found the suspect vehicle, but it was unoccupied. Hopefully they catch the suspects and get them (or their parents) to pay for the damage they caused.

The Guardian Angels ran into some trouble last night. I'm sure Cruiser will probably fill in the details, but it was pretty interesting to hear the stuff coming over the scanner. Keep in mind that my account is simply from police radio traffic, and that I wasn't there. I wish I had had a way to record it so I could have a proper transcript.

I heard some mentions of cops going to the 500 block of 3rd street, and the intersection of 3rd and Western. At one point I heard an officer ask for fire and medic because "another Guardian Angel is down here." And by down, he meant down on the ground. I don't know if there was another incident earlier in the night or what he meant by "another." A few minutes later another officer requested fire and medic for a person who had been assaulted (cop's words, not mine) by the other Guardian Angels. At one point a firefighter said on the radio that they were told the 2nd victim (not the GA) was ok. He didn't say who told him that, but a cop got on the radio immediately and said that was not true, and that the guy was "bleeding all over the sidewalk." That cop sounded... well, pissed.

Now, one of the things I hadn't really argued with Cruiser over was his assertion that most cops favor the GAs. There are a couple reasons I found that very believable:
1. Despite their insistence on also being fists, they are "another pair of eyes and ears" out on the streets. They can alert officers to problems, shots fired, suspicious behavior, etc, much like a neighborhood watch.
2. The cops are (mostly) not fans of Bladel, and the GAs are making him look bad. This may be cynical, but I'd suspect that its at least part of the reason.

However, whichever cop got on the radio to insist on getting the 2nd Paramedic did not sound at all pleased with the Guardian Angels, and I can only hope it wasn't any GA that told the firefighters that the guy was unhurt. Based solely on what I heard on the radio, last night's incident reinforces my belief that the GAs could be a great thing for our community, if only they didn't insist on physical intervention. I'm sure Cruiser will have an entirely different version of what happened last night, so maybe it wasn't as bad as I think.

Update: Cruiser actually beat me to it, and here's the link.

Salvation Army building renovation

Here's the site plan that MetroPlains was kind enough to give me for their renovation of the Salvation Army building in downtown Davenport. I have heard this refered to as the Riverwalk Lofts, but I don't see a final name on this plan. It also shows what could be a future Phase 2 on the east side of the block. Nothing is determined about this yet, however. I'd suspect it depends on the success of Phase 1. They hope to start construction within the year, and estimate it will take around 10 months to complete the renovation.

I know how some of you feel about limited-income apartments, but that's what the government gives out the grants for at the moment. Without alternative financing you'd have to charge $2000 a month to renovate some of these warehouse buildings. What's interesting is that market rate (expensive) apartments are actually renting faster than the tax-credit (still not cheap) apartments in the Crescent Lofts complex. Hopefully this means that a market rate apartment or condo building will be in the near future for downtown Davenport.

What people need to keep in mind is that every additional resident that moves downtown gets us that much closer to the critical mass where retail and dining starts to come in to cater to downtown residents. Once that happens, even more people will want to live near these things and downtown really starts thriving.

This could turn out to be a great site, considering how close to the downtown core it is. Once the Freight House is rejuvenated there will be nightlife across the street, more nightlife up on Third Street, and the Figge just a couple blocks away. Lets hope it does well and compliments the other projects going on downtown.

Friday Assortment

First, an image of the Centennial Bridge. Just because.

New big box store coming to former Joevan site -QCOnline
Anyone have any guesses as to what "big box store" will be replacing the blighted Joevan/Shopko/Target eyesore at Kimberly and Locust? Anything's better than what's there, especially considering how much of a gateway to Davenport that is. My guess is Circuit City.

Also, don't forget that the 2nd version of Monday's LeClaire Park planning meeting is today in the Design Center, at noon. So take your lunch break and head downtown to help shape Davenport's riverfront for years to come. Bring lunch.

Things coming up in the next few days:
A post in about the RiverWalk Lofts (Salvation Army renovation)
Possibly something about the casino's rumored plans
Maybe even a Where in the QC is this?
Hopefully some images captured on the upcoming warm days.

Good news for Moline Open Thread

Moline's Bass Street Landing eyed for high-rise -QCTimes

Jealous, why would I be jealous? Although I must say, if the Moline site falls through, I could think of a few places in downtown Davenport where this would look good.

In all seriousness though, this would be a great project for the Quad Cities as a whole.

Downtown Developments (maybe)

First of all, a lot of people have been wondering what's going on with the Forrest Block building at 4th and Brady. Many, including myself, were worried about this project falling through, especially because so little progress seems to have been made. The dumpster disappeared recently, and as I was walking home from the LeClaire Park meeting Monday night the front door was wide open and unsecured, which didn't seem like a good sign at all.

However, from Alderman Frink's blog, I paste this info:

7) What is happening to the Forest Block building?

A) The City has conditionally awarded Highland Investments $200,000 to assist in the redevelopment of the façade of the building through the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) Downtown Redevelopment Program. This program is for the removal of slum and blighted conditions in targeted downtown commercial buildings. Because the program is federally funded, we had to conduct an environmental assessment on the building. That environmental assessment has been completed and final clearance was received by the federal government approximately ten days ago. A commitment letter from the City to the company will go out later this week. The CDBG award will be contingent upon the company securing all financing for the project, which I understand the company is in the process of finalizing.

That's good news for sure. I must say that I can't think of a single building in Davenport the would make a better poster child for "slum and blighted conditions."


In other news, does anyone know what's happening in the block between 3rd and 4th and Scott and Western? There's been a lot of earth-moving, digging, demolition, and other assorted activity at the site next to the pawn shop there for several months. For a while it looked like they were tunneling under 3rd street. Nobody that I've talked to knows anything about new construction there, so is it just a new parking lot? Anybody?

Also, yesterday's QCTimes article about the Mississippi Lofts might be the article that finally convinces me to give up reading the QCTimes.comments. I don't know if the comments are coming from 8 year olds, or 80 year olds, but whoever they are they have no idea about current rental prices. (or much of anything else) It seems like no matter what the article, most of the commenters there are negative about it. The reason you probably won't ever see this blog listed on the QCTimes blogroll is because I don't want all that additional negativity over here.

Preliminary LeClaire Park Sketch

Here's what's being called a "Programmatic Sketch" of the highest ranking ideas from the public for LeClaire Park. You're going to want to click on the image to be able to read the labels. I'll try to answer any questions about what various pieces are, based on how they were explained at the meeting.

Here's a link to the city page that has both this sketch and the comment form. A link to that page can also currently be found on the front page of the city website.

Its a safe plan, in that I don't think any part of it will horrify the general public, enrage the QCTimes commenters, or otherwise galvanize people against the plan. I also feel that its a good plan that includes many different things that would help our riverfront and downtown. Its just a preliminary plan, so the guys at the Design Center are hoping to get a lot of feedback on what's good and what's bad about it. A few areas I know they want to know about would be a riverfront restaurant and where it could fit, what it would look like, etc, and also more details about what each area of the park would contain. Other things are whether the pier should line up with Main Street as the RiverVision plan shows, or line up with the Skybridge to extend that visually.

Hundreds of people are giving their input towards the plan, and this sketch shows that its being heard. If you don't participate in the process then you have no business complaining earlier, so...

Here are a few ways to let your input be known:

• Go to the 2nd version of tonight's meeting, which is Friday at noon in the Design Center
• Comment here, and the folks involved will hear the ideas one way or another
• Stop in to the Design Center and give your opinions
• Call or email Darrin Nordahl, Matt Flynn, or Steve Ahrens
• Use the automated form on the city website.

Monday morning open thread

I disappeared to Chicagoland for the weekend, so just an Open Thread for now.

Don't forget to attend the LeClaire Park meeting tonight at 6:30 in the 2nd floor meeting room of the RME.

News links & an old book

Landmarks group throws cold water on Armory plan -QCOnline
"Landmarks group needs to suggest (and pay for) a better plan" -QCI

Airport buying Flick's in $2.3M deal -QCOnline
Airport to buy Flick's -QCTimes
This seems fairly logical, assuming Flick's can find another location. The "QCI" Airport is certainly getting a lot of good news and good numbers lately.

Van Fossen pleads guilty to OWI -QCTimes
For some reason I thought this was already taken care of. Aren't DUI cases normally processed in less than 18 months? No one around the blogs seems to really think VF should remain in office, so there's hardly anything to discuss here. Resign already!

Davenport Past & Present 1858 -EBAY
I wasn't going to post this one, because I was hoping to win the auction. However, its got all day left and its already over $50, so it'll probably go higher than I can really shell out for a 149 year old book right now.

Open Thread

Mostly this thread is for people who can't follow the rules in the thread below.

Here's something I got from Darrin Nordahl of the Design Center regarding Friday's Earth Week event:

On Friday, the Design Center and Steve Ahrens (Development Director for the Levee Improvement Commission) will host an Earth Day Event at the South End of the Skybridge, between 1 and 2 p.m. This is a chance for the public to learn more about the LeClaire Park Expansion and begin to see some the ideas that were shared through the various input sessions.

Also, on Monday at 6:30 p.m. at the RME (2nd Floor), we will have another public event that reveals all the input we’ve received from the inputs sessions, as well as show a programmatic plan for discussion and further input.

An experiment

In the past, I've ranted and raved about how people think only in absolutes. A few threads down on the Battle of Bill Lynn thread, I've been accused of this myself.

Here's the problem as I see it. A blogger says something positive or negative about something, and is then categorized based on that. For example, I have defended Craig Malin on some issues. Because of that, I'm instantly labeled as a Craig Malin-lover. People speak as though I don't see any mistakes or faults of the man. Its not true, but since I defend him, I'm lumped into that "black or white" category. Sometimes there's no need for me to point out mistakes he's made, such as the recent Judge sneaking-around, because there are already 2000 people pointing that out. Other times, like with his whole "I'll give the raise to charity" thing, I've come right out and said it was foolish.

Another recent example is the Guardian Angels. I've been fairly critical of the idea because of the physical interventions. So of course I must hate Guardian Angels. However, I do not hate the GAs. In fact, I see some positives to it, and I've even mentioned them. They have energized people about protecting their neighborhoods in a way that the existing neighborhood groups have been unable to do, which is definitely a good thing. I'm not going to claim that I'm a GA supporter, but that doesn't mean I'm cheering for them to fail either.

There IS a middle ground on nearly every subject, but it seems to be missing from most online discussion.

Here's the experiment for this thread. Long time readers will recognize that I've tried this before. If you comment on this thread, no matter what you say, you need to include something from the other viewpoint. If you point out that the Skybridge is stupid, you have throw in something good about it, such as its popularity among visitors. If you want to post how much you like French Silk Pie, mention a negative (zillions of calories) as well.

I will delete posts, on this thread only, that do not follow this formula, so if you insist on being all negative (or positive, rare as that is) I'm posting an Open Thread above this one.

I'll start things off:

I have been generally displeased with Bill Lynn's words and actions since the last election, but on the other hand, he was one of the first Alderman to have a website. He was online long before Frink and Hamerlinck were even Aldermen, much less had blogs. Even better, he has an archives of his past newsletters available there. Online access is a step towards transparency.

A few reminders

I should have posted the Earth Week schedule at the beginning of the week, but I assume most of you would have seen it on Alderman Frink's blog or in the newspaper.

Today the council is touring the new PD, which will be the first LEED certified municipal building in Iowa. That's a good thing. I'm hoping the public will have a chance to tour it, or at least part of it at some point. This Saturday, those attending River Action's Fish and Fire 2007 will get a sneak peek of at least the green roof, if not the whole building. Here's the website for that event, the rest of which will be held at John O'Donnell.

Tomorrow the Design Center will be hosting an open house from 11am to 2pm. The Design Center is collocated with the City's Parking Office, at 2nd and Brady in the first floor of the MidAmerican Building. According to the Official Week's Schedule, at this event, "this department and other allied community organizations will display examples of their activities that are making our community more healthy, active and green."

Friday there will be some sort of event at the South end of the Skybridge showing off park planning and development projects. I'll try and get more info on that today.

Saturday Ian Frink is having another All-Wards meeting, this time at the Genesis Heart Institute on East Rusholme. Here's his page about the meeting.

Tuesday Morning Brooke Quote

Here's a somewhat blurry (not a lot of room for my tripod in the stairwell) early morning image of a towboat locking through.

I'm not usually a big fan of Alderman Brooke, even though he votes the way I prefer. The same could be said for Dumas, but at least Brooke does anything... Anyway, like him or not, he's not subtle. Today's QCTimes article about last night's meeting had a quote from him that caused me to burst out laughing when I read it.

“It needs a professional, a CEO, to run it, not 10 politicians elected every two years,” he [Brooke] said. “Nine of the 10 aldermen of Davenport have no experience running a business. Eight of the 10 have no real job at all. One is in jail. No other city in Iowa runs without an administrator.”

Of course, his math is a little wrong, unless he doesn't count teaching as a job. Lynn and Hamerlinck teach, Dumas has his Victory thing, and Frink has a full time job as well. There may be others. I'm also curious which one he feels has experience running a business, but all that is beside the point. The gist of what he said is correct, even if the specifics aren't. We elect random people to represent us, but they will almost never be people with the years of experience and education to run something as complex as Davenport on a daily basis.

I have always respected Alderman Hamerlinck for his accessibility, web-friendliness, and representing his ward well even though I disagree with him on most issues. However, by suggesting we get rid of the CA position, he has lost a lot of that respect from me. Saying it has nothing to do with the current occupant that we all know he so dislikes sounds eerily close to a lie. Maybe Alderman Lynn's style is rubbing off on him.

Niabi Zoo images

Some of us from the "Quad Cities" group on Flickr met up at Niabi Zoo this morning for some picture-taking. I was surprised how crowded the zoo was getting as I left around 11:30, and I'm always pleased with how much progress is made every year at Niabi lately. Here are a few quick images, and I'll add a link to the ones I post on Flickr when I get around to that. Update: It turns out that my free Flickr account limits me to 3 subsets, so here's a link to all of my Flickr shots, with the newest (zoo) ones first.The cash cow railroad was doing good business as always.
You just can't go wrong with 9" tall baby goats.A black bear finding another breakfast of fruit salad and dogfood.Construction is still underway on the Colobus Monkey habitat and the Serengeti Observation Deck, which according to the website will be the future site for giraffe feeding at Niabi Zoo. Two years ago I visited the zoo after about a 10 year gap, and was very pleasantly surprised with how much had been added. Now just 2 years later even more stuff has been, and is being added. Its yet another often-overlooked amenity we have in the Quad Cities.

Saturday Open Thread

Update to post below: Chicago will be the US bid for 2016! -SI

Frequent commenter Hoganj300 dropped me a line, hoping for some discussion on the 2016 Olympics. Its a little outside of normal QC-based discussion, but it would have an impact. That is the year that Chicago and LA are competing to be the US city to again compete against cities from around the world. Hogan was saying how much Chicago hosting the Olympic Games would help the entire Midwest, and I heartily agree. It would probably be the best and sometimes only chance for many of us to actually see the games in person, and could really show the world that we're not "flyover country."

He also wondered if this kind of an event and all the infrastructure work that goes into it could be a good chance to expand public transportation, such as Amtrak routes. I'm hoping that we have Amtrak service in the QC area long before 2016! If we do have some sort of train service to Chicago, hopefully the Quad Cities could work together and market themselves as a day trip for the visitors from around the world. Lake Michigan is great and all, but there's something about the Mississippi. Of course, that all assumes that Chicago beats LA, and then beats cities from around the world. Chicago is clearly a world-class city, and its so vibrant and bustling even without a major event going on that I imagine it would be quite a scene with hundreds of thousands of visitors from almost every corner of the world. So here's hoping for Chicago.


For those of you that don't feel like talking about an event 9 years and (potentially) thousands of miles away, this is an open thread.

New Oneida Landing news

I got an email today from JJ Condon, the developer of this condo project. The website, OneidaLanding.com, has been updated with some new renderings, site plan, and floor plans. He said that pricing should be up early next week. He also mentioned that he's looking at redeveloping the vacant One River Place at Oneida and River Drive.

Despite my misgivings about the location, something like this is a good thing for Davenport, and I think its a pretty great looking building. Check out the site for more views and such.

This stuff...

I would rather post about something else, but I know people are going to keep talking about this for a while longer. I just have a few things to say.

There are clearly people who feel wronged by Malin professionally, and post about how he is the worst thing since... well, the first ward Alderman. There are always going to be people who don't get along with their boss, etc, so I'd suspect there's some of that involved.

If Craig Malin is the extraordinarily skilled puppetmaster of corruption that he's portrayed as by some folks, why is he constantly getting "caught?" If he had these skills of deception and manipulation, don't you think he'd somehow avoid the constantly negative press and scandals? From what I've seen, he just doesn't care how things appear. This CAN be a good thing to an extent, as you don't want a public official to be constantly worrying about appearances and spin. He once said something to me along the lines that you can't spend your life worrying about that kind of thing. However... at some point he needs to see that "not worrying about how things look" becomes a problem, and starts to hurt the city.

There are 2 sides to every story, but we generally only get one when it comes to city hall scandals. It took a Freedom of Information Request to find out that the QCTimes call which supposedly caused Malin to confront Ms. Webb actually happened after she had left the building. Malin and company can't fight back the same way that people fighting against them can, because it would consist of making private information public.

This stuff does nothing but hurt Davenport. Even if Craig had been fired, there would have been no benefit. The city would have been out a half million bucks, and qualified candidates would think twice (more than they already will) about applying for Davenport positions. Then any CA we do hire will probably get hit with the same attacks that Malin's getting. So we are just continuing down the path of scandal, and Davenport's city hall being the laughingstock if the Midwest. If 5 Alderman and the Mayor want Malin to stay, then that's democracy at work, and the other 4 need to get over it.

In a whole other circus, hopefully the council gets their nerve up to kick out VanFossen if he's found guilty in his trial tomorrow.

Here are some things our council and the blogs SHOULD be talking about:

• The historic project to reshape our riverfront, WITH public input
• The ongoing study and suggestions to revitalize our older corridors
• Healthy debate over things like Prairie Heights, PEDCOR, and AT&T
• The ongoing wayfinding project that's being worked on by city staff
• A world-class art exhibit coming to Davenport in September
• Where Isle of Capri is going to go
• The circus to end all circuses that will be November '07

SoLo is back

Best news in blogging for a long time.

www.solodavenport.blogspot.com

Just Images and captions

For those of you wanting to discuss the pitiful circus we call City Hall, stick with the thread below. I'm beyond sick of all of this drama myself. Both "sides" of the council are spending too much time fooling around and not enough time helping Davenport.

I took a drive and a couple walks yesterday to check out a few things.
First I drove out to see if any construction has started on 65th east of Brady in regards to connecting it to Eastern. Nope.
My second stop, which could hardly have been farther away, was to check out the new Sunderbruch Park (formerly Southwest Park) on Telegraph Road. It definitely paints me as an East Sider, but I don't think I've been that far down Telegraph in my 24 years of living in Davenport. Aside from being distant, this is shaping up to be a great park. There's a paved bike/pedestrian trail that winds a ways into the park, and there are also dozens of dirt hiking or biking trails throughout the area. I'm definitely going to have to return with my bike and investigate Sunderbruch Park further once we get past this crazy Winter weather. Everyone who enjoys nature or lives in SW Davenport should check it out as well.I posted what is basically this same picture, although with more construction going on, last year around this same time. For some reason I just love this view of downtown Davenport.The reason I was in the RiverCenter to take that image both this year and last year was the ISPA State 8 and 9-ball Championships. Its quite an impressive operation to move in probably over 100 pool tables into both sides of the River Center, and then hang lights over each one. The schedule is as follows:
Wednesday, Singles 9-Ball
Thursday & Friday, 8-Ball Singles Event
Saturday & Sunday, All Team Events
I'm pretty sure its free to watch, and its a pretty cool event for downtown.

Bring on the conspiracy theories

Davenport may reorganize legal department -QCOnline

Davenport council to consider demoting attorney -QCTimes

Its got everything! It could tie in with the Malin pay scandal, the VanFossen everything scandals, the last time the council tried to take control of legal, potential nepotism, Alderman Meyer being left out, hundreds of thousands of dollars... I'm sure this will be a great topic for wild speculation and uninformed discussion. I always did find it funny that people took a break from hating on Mary Thee as soon as she went against Malin, since he's more hated by certain folks than she is. As I said on Cruiser's post about this, with some of the recent developments in the first ward, we're probably going to need more attorneys either way. Looking at the results over the last few years, new leadership in the legal department does seem like a decent idea though.

Let's see if some of you folks can work Lee Harvey Oswald into your theories.

Opening Day '07

Today was Opening Day for the Swing of the Quad Cities at John O'Donnell Stadium. One of the new owners was making the rounds, talking to people and meeting the fans. Obviously the weather wasn't good, but there were some school groups or something. The General Admission section had large blocks of kids, which probably helped push the attendance to 1500 for the day. Some of the new specials will be good for the team, such as the Tuesday $44 special. It consists of four box seat tickets, four slices of pizza, four sodas, and a Swing program. That seems like a reasonable price for a family of 4 to have a night out. If attendance starts coming up, the atmosphere will be more exciting and more people will be excited to go to games. The temperature ranged from 42 to 46 degrees, with occasional snow flurries. It was definitely the first time I'd seen those at John O'Donnell.
The hated-by-some sky blue uniforms are gone, replaced by darker blue and pinstripes. I don't foresee this increasing attendance, but I guess every little bit helps.


Here's a quick video of one of the Swing guys lining out. Next time I might try taking more videos and posting them online.

Easter Open Thread

Probably no new posts from me until Monday. Talk about whatever Easter or non-Easter topics your heart desires. This picture is from last year's Dwyer and Michaels Easter Egg hunt, because I forgot to make the trip to Iowa City for it yesterday.

Where in the QC is this? #14

Update at 11:50PM: We have a winner! hoganj300 successfully guessed the location of this image as a mural in Moline under the Arsenal bridge viaduct along the bike path. Here's the full mural, in all its wackiness.Update: Ok, here's another image to hopefully make things easier.
This one might be too easy, but we'll see. I'll post another image as a clue if no one gets it by the time I get up this afternoon.Where in the Quad Cities is this?

ebay, trailers, etc

• I know I'm late on the bandwagon, after the QCTimes and QCOnline articles about it, but here's the ebay auction for the Pierce School Mall. Eleven hours to go as of 7am, and no bids yet. Seems like just the existing tenants and investment potential would make it worth the third of a mil. Just don't try and open a Mexican dance club there.


• Keith Meyer presents another reason why I'll never be able to see eye-to-eye with my Alderman. In this QCTimes article about the council barely approving the contract to design the already-funded concession/restroom pavilion, it says that Alderman Meyer would like to have a concrete pad for a "concessions trailer." If there's one thing that says world-class riverfront to me, its definitely NOT "trailer." Maybe instead of spending $20 million on the new police station, we could have enlisted some of our homeless to help cobble it together out of pieces of plywood, twine, and corrugated metal. I think Davenport should behave like a city of 100,000, and some of the council thinks we should spend weeks arguing over a couple hundred thousand dollars for a logical project. I guess we'll just always have to agree to disagree.


• While going through my 4+ gigabytes of digital photos, I found a couple that I might be able to use for "Where in the QC is this?" threads, so I'd predict one of those in the next week or so. I was looking through the images looking for stuff to upload to my growing Flickr album.


• The Office finally makes it return tonight, if you're into that sort of thing.


• Speaking of making returns, the Swing of the Quad Cities will be playing their home opener next Monday, at noon. Its magnetic schedule day, so who can miss that? I urge many of you to turn out and show your support for the soon-to-be new owners. Hopefully they can make a night at the ballpark fun and affordable for families once again. I'm definitely planning on attending.


• No images for now; I'll give you dial-up folks a break.
  

Where'd the 150 people go?

Last night's LeClaire Park expansion meeting had maybe 20 citizens in attendance, which was a far cry from the 150 that went to the public kickoff meeting. It sounds like Saturday's meeting wasn't any better. From what I'm hearing, quite a few people are filling out the Online Survey located here, so at least the guys from the Design Center tasked with putting together a plan have something to work with. They have also been meeting with small focus groups, such as downtown businesses, the kids' session written about in the paper, etc.

None of the meetings I've been at have shown a clear public consensus. Some people want all grass, some people want a ferris wheel, others want to leave it as parking. Some people like the idea of a restaurant to replace The Dock, others don't want any permanent structures south of River Drive. One interesting thing is I've been able to look at some of the plans from the 80's and 90's, some of which are quite dramatic. Some of the plans from back then really had the casino dominating the riverfront, similar to Bettendorf's current strategy. Of course none of these saw that light of day back when they were being proposed. Go transparency.

Hopefully when a preliminary plan is presented, people will be able to pick things that they are ok with, and others that most people don't like. I find it worrisome that so few people are involving themselves in this, even if you count the hundreds of surveys that have been filled out. If even 300 people help design the expanded LeClaire Park, are 97,000 others going to complain about what's decided?

Lazy Tuesday

Yesterday the most recent addition to QCI's Museum of Crescent Cracker and Macaroni factory memorabilia arrived in the mail. Here's the link to my previous post about my collection of this junk, I mean... valuable history. This one's a postcard postmarked 1917, and shows what the back of the card calls the "most modern, sanitary, and sun-light Cracker and Macaroni Factory in the world."I hope to possibly have another post this afternoon, although I don't know what it would be at this point. Tonight is the 2nd of the 2 meetings for people to have input about the LeClaire Park Expansion. The meeting is from 6:30-8:00PM, in the 2nd floor of the RME, or Redstone Building. Everyone who wasn't at Saturday's meeting should show up tonight.

Back from the weekend Open Thread

I was visiting a friend in Bloomington, and to my surprise the house he purchased last month is in a New Urban/Neo-traditional neighborhood. Despite being an "older" New Urbanism development (2001) the neighborhood is still too new for the mature trees that will really make it seem like a traditional neighborhood. It does have alleys, rear-loaded garages, sidewalks, front porches, narrow streets (parking only on one side) and a central park square within walking distance. Similarly to the pending Prairie Heights development, the retail element isn't mixed into the residential like it would be in what I understand as true New Urbanism. Still, you can definitely see the difference between the image above and a typical new subdivision with wide streets, big yards, and houses dominated by 2 and 3 car, front-loaded garages.

What'd I miss out on around the QCA this weekend? I see both newspapers have printed articles basically saying no one knows what's happening with the Rhythm City casino move. Also, on the way back from Bloomington I swung through downtown Peoria, so expect some images of a few of their downtown developments in the next week. How did the LeClaire Park expansion meeting go Saturday? Anyone who missed it, don't forget the other meeting tomorrow night.