Historic Preservation

In 2006, Over-the-Rhine was placed on the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s list of the “11 Most Endangered Historic Places” in America. OTR made the list for two basic reasons: its significance and its threat of destruction.

OTR’s National Significance

The neighborhood’s roughly 350 acres is one of the largest, most intact, nineteenth century urban historic districts in the United States; and is believed to contain the nation’s largest contiguous collection of Nineteenth Century Italianate Architecture. OTR’s dense streetscapes are full of tenements, churches, theatres, storefronts, and social halls that are largely unchanged from a time when they were inhabited by working-class immigrants in the 1800s. Similar neighborhoods are extremely rare and can only be found in a very few other cities. Over-the-Rhine is home to the nation’s first large Music Hall, as well as the nation’s first “Turnhalle” (Turner’s Hall) and first German Methodist church. It was once home to Levi Coffin and his underground railroad operation, Harriet Beecher Stowe was an OTR resident before she wrote Uncle Tom’s Cabin, and it has been home to an impressive and eclectic array of authors, artists, and political figures from its birth through today.

Most American historic districts have been spared because of impressive collections of mansions or unique architecture. OTR is significant for essentially the opposite reason. It has a very authentic sense of place that still makes it feel like a working-class immigrant neighborhood. In the 1800s, wealthy beer barons lived across the street from their breweries and adjacent to their laborers. OTR’s building stock reflects this diversity of socioeconomic classes and mix of uses. Beer Baron Christian Moerlein’s OTR home still stands next to his office and across from part of the brewery’s massive complex; and the Kauffman apartment building where brewery workers lived is being saved and restored down the street from the remaining Kauffman Brewery buildings. In fact, we believe that OTR may contain more intact nineteenth century brewery buildings than any other city in America.

Over-the-Rhine was once one of America’s most densely populated neighborhoods (reportedly more densely populated than Manhattan during parts of the 1800s) and served as the first American home to tens of thousands of European immigrants. Although the neighborhood was extremely diverse, it was also home to a nationally unprecedented number of Germanic immigrants. Its magnificent public buildings such as Music Hall, Memorial Hall, Old St. Mary’s church and others, its collection of Italianate tenement stock, its rich brewing heritage, and its critical role in German-American history and nineteenth century immigration all make it a place of national significance. During a visit in 1995, Arthur Frommer of Frommer’s travel guides fame, remarked that “[i]n all of America, there is no more promising an urban area for revitalization than your own Over-the-Rhine….I see in my mind the possibility of a revived district that literally could rival similar prosperous and heavily visited areas.”

OTR’s Imminent Threat of Destruction

When the first commercial brewing operations were started in Over-the-Rhine in the 1820’s, Chicago was a harsh, remote outpost where a half-dozen families banded together at night for protection against the wolves that roamed the village’s few muddy streets. By American standards, Cincinnati is a very historic town. We have an extraordinary number of historic places on the National Register -- more than New Orleans – and OTR is larger than Charleston’s world-renowned historic district, but unlike these cities, we are failing to utilize our historic assets to our advantage. In fact, we have let many of these assets become an albatross: Historic buildings throughout Over-the-Rhine sit vacant and derelict, deteriorating over years of neglect and sporadically housing vagrants, prostitutes, addicts and drug dealers. Much of our approach to this dilemma has been standardized and reactionary. When the theatre where Buffalo Bill met his wife fell into disrepair, we turned it into a parking lot. When the ornate beer hall that served as the site of an historic confrontation over temperance laws between German immigrants and City Hall started looking shabby, we turned it into a parking lot. Over-the-Rhine is still one of America’s most historically significant neighborhoods, but it is at a tipping point. We have recently calculated that OTR is only four demolitions away from passing 50% destruction of its historic building stock! We either need to change policy and start taking historic preservation seriously or concede the loss of one of Cincinnati’s most valuable potential assets and one of America’s most significant historic neighborhoods.

As the maps below illustrate, the level of demolition of historic properties in OTR has been dramatic over the past several decades. Since 1930, approximately half of the building stock has been removed, most of it by City-sponsored demolition. While earlier decades saw widespread razing of blocks and streetscapes, recent years have brought a new, equally insidious phenomenon: demolition by neglect.

As poverty rates and disinvestment grew in Over-the-Rhine, buildings were increasingly abandoned and gradually deteriorated. Today, many buildings stand vacant and in dire need of repair, yet building owners remain unwilling to bring their properties up to code. Once buildings reach a critical stage of dilapidation, they are deemed a danger to the public and are slated for “emergency demolition” by the City. These emergency demolitions – the result of years of neglect -- are cutting wide, vacant swaths in the remaining fabric of OTR. Between 2001 and 2006, over 50 historic buildings were demolished in such a manner. In fact, just since the National Trust’s designation as one of America’s most endangered places, at least 10 historic properties have been demolished in Over-the-Rhine. Meanwhile, dozens and dozens more are condemned and in immediate risk of destruction. And even stable buildings are not safe. Solvent owners continue to seek demolitions as a preferred approach to neglected properties, and some purchase developable historic properties with the intent of razing them for mere convenience.

maps courtesy of Danny Klingler

Over-the-Rhine Foundation’s Action Steps

The Over-the-Rhine Foundation is working to preserve OTR’s history in a number of ways. We recently had the opportunity to do a series of presentations to City Council’s Vibrant Neighborhoods Committee, along with presentation co-authors, the Cincinnati Preservation Association and Centripetus. These presentations were made possible by committee chair Roxanne Qualls. The committee is composed of council members Chris Monzel, Cecil Thomas, and Laketa Cole. CPA and the OTRF will be conducting public meetings and forums to present versions of this presentation to the community throughout the remainder of 2009 and 2010. Please see announcements on the homepage to find dates and locations. The Power Point component of these presentations, along with a document detailing action steps can be downloaded here.

Part I (4mb pdf) explores why OTR is important to the City of Cincinnati, and some of the economic opportunity that the neighborhood represents.

Part II (16mb pdf) explains the land, lending, and legal policies that are contributing to the neighborhood’s deteriorating condition.

Part III (29mb pdf) proposes solutions. Some of these solutions require modest changes to Cincinnati’s Municipal Code. Specific, suggested changes to the code along with more detail of the recommendations can be Downloaded Here.

These presentations are an example of the work done by the Over-the-Rhine Foundation. Researching and compiling the information that has gone into these presentations – from numerous interviews of preservationists, developers, city employees, economic and legal research -- took over two years for the OTRF, CPA, and Danny Klingler’s Centripetus to complete. This work is not grant grant-funded or sponsored. It is only possible as a result of personal Donations from people like you.