Dayton Lane, historic home to Hamilton’s most prominent industrialists

Dayton-Lane is located just east of Downtown Hamilton between 5th St and Erie Blvd. The district includes an officially designated Historic District hosting mansions of some of Hamilton’s most prominent industrialists at the turn of the last century. Architectural styles include Queen Anne, Italianate, Second Empire, and Georgian Revival. The neighborhood also mixes in plenty of middle class homes and worker housing, a good example of how many turn of the century communities were built as truly mixed income districts out of the necessity of proximity before the creation of the automobile.

From an urban form perspective, Dayton Lane has decent density and convenient access to Downtown Hamilton. There is still a fair amount of blight here on the neighborhood edges and the district’s two commercial districts (i.e. Erie and High Street) are generally auto centric. Urbanizing these commercial districts with quality urban infill and permitting mixed-use development within the core of the neighborhood would go a long way towards improving Dayton Lane’s urbanity.

Click here to view the full Dayton Lane Album on my Flickr Page

URBAN STRENGTHS:

* Highly convenient to Dwtn, only a 5-15 minute walk.
Good generational and racial diversity.
* Some of the best architecture in Hamilton and certain the best representation of late 19th century mansions.
* Crazy diversity in housing prices ranking from 25K for an old worker house to 300K for a large Victorian mansion.
* The neighborhood hosts a cafe, drug store and lots of chain restaurants along Main Street. Most of the district is no more than a 15 minute walk to all the Downtown amenities.

URBAN WEAKNESSES:

* Bike infrastructure is non-existent.
* About 1/4 of the neighborhood is living in poverty. Interesting contrasts with wealthier households that own that large historic mansions.
* Neighborhood is a mix of well mentioned and gritty/blighted pockets. Because of this safety is still somewhat of a concern here.
* Rental product is a limited but very affordable.
* Only a couple pocket parks within Dayton Lane but the Smith Field sports complex and Greenwood Cemetery are walkable.
* The two commercial districts on the edges of Dayton Lane, High & Erie are pretty auto centric. High Street at least has usable sidewalks and some older buildings left. This does provide a fair amount of retail, albeit generally chains.
* A public elementary and middle school lie about 1/2-1 mile east of the neighborhood.

Highland Park and Prospect Hill, great neighborhoods on Hamilton’s westside

Some points of interest include a resurging main street with new businesses filling historic buildings along the southern edge of Prospect Hill and lovely 1920s & 1930s housing in Highland Park. Many pleasant streets throughout Prospect Hill in the early 20th century. Prospect Hill also has very convenient walkable access to Downtown.

The biggest areas I’d like to see in Prospect Hill/Highland Park improve include building new mixed-use buildings to fill in the missing teeth along Main Street along with revitalizing the blighted portion of the district along the Miami River.

Click here to see my full Highland Park Album on Flickr

URBAN STRENGTHS:

* Great generational and economic diversity.
* For-sale housing is a mix of affordable and middle of the market with prices ranging from 50K-200K. Prices are most expensive in Highland Park with very affordable pockets in Prospect Hill in the more blighted areas closer to the Great Miami River.
* Decent amount of parks including the nice plaza along Main Street, extensive natural trails along two mile run, sport parts surrounding the middle school, and several neighborhood pocket parks.
* Nice urban commercial street along Main with a nice mix of urban retail including a cafe, several bars & restaurants, several boutiques, banks, a drug store, and lots of other neighborhood serving retail.
* Limited cultural amenities within Prospect Hill/Highland Park but one simply needs to walk 5-20 minutes to Dwtn to find this.
* Good architecture spanning the first half of the 20th century. Some blight in Prospect Hill, but not too bad.
* A public elementary, middle school, and high school are all located in Highland Park are ranked pretty well. No schools however in Prospect Hill.

URBAN WEAKNESSES:

* Rental product is a bit limited but affordable. Concentrated in Prospect Hill. Highland Park is largely owner-occupied.
* Public transit access is limited.
* Limited amount of racial diversity.
* Generally a stable neighborhood but some blight along the River.
* Limited modern in-fill and what does exist is very auto centric. High Street becomes rather auto centric when passing through Highland Park.

Rossville another gem in Hamilton Ohio

The neighborhood is located on the west side of the Great Miami River across from downtown. The neighborhood takes its name from the old town of Rossville used prior to its merger with the City of Hamilton in 1854. There are still some gorgeous mid to late 19th century structures remaining today, which helps Rossville retain a solid urban fabric.

Some points of interest include a resurging main street with new businesses filling historic buildings and the large mansions lining South ‘D’ Street. Many pleasant streets throughout Rossville spanning many decades before WWII. Also very convenient walkable access to Downtown.

The biggest areas I’d like to see Rossville improve include building new mixed-use buildings to fill in the missing teeth along Main Street along with revitalizing the blighted portion of the district along the Miami River.

Click here to view the entire Rossville album on my Flickr page

URBAN STRENGTHS:

* Very diverse for-sale housing stock ranging in price from 50K-300K for large historic mansions.
* Great generational and economic diversity.
* Decent amount of parks including a riverfront park, a nice plaza along Main Street, and several larger parks that are mostly fields.
* Nice urban commercial street along Main with a nice mix of urban retail including a cafe, several bars & restaurants, several boutiques, banks, a drug store, and lots of other neighborhood serving retail.
* Limited cultural amenities within Rossville but one simply needs to walk 5-10 minutes to Dwtn to find this.
* Quality historic architecture from many different eras.

URBAN WEAKNESSES:

* Rentals are very affordable here but not a lot of product.
* Limited amount of racial diversity.
* Generally a stable neighborhood but some blight along the River.
* Not great walkable access to schools here.
* Limited modern in-fill and what does exist is very auto centric.

Downtown Hamilton- The City of Sculpture

I included the district between the Miami River and MLK Boulevard and all of German village and dwtn south to Sycamore Street.

Hamilton started as Fort Hamilton in. 1791. It was the first of several built north from Fort Washington into Indian territory. A settlement grew up around the fort and was platted. It was officially incorporated in 1810. By the mid-19th century, Hamilton had developed as a significant manufacturing city and by 1950 it had around 57,000 residents. This has resulted in a fairly large urban neighborhood surrounding Dwtn and fortunately much of it is still in-tact especially on the West Side.

Dwtn Hamilton held onto much of its fabric of low to medium rise buildings helping fuel its recent renovation the past 10 years. Along with new shops, restaurants, and small businesses, Hamilton created a new multi-faceted downtown park surrounded by new apartment buildings. North of Dwtn, German Village connects pretty seamlessly with gorgeous mid-late 19th Italianate architecture and a nice mix-used district along 3rd Street. Hopefully Dwtn Hamilton continues to fill in all the underutilized lots especially south of High Street. Great progress has been made, but certainly room to improve.

Click here to view the full Downtown Hamilton Album.

URBAN STRENGTHS:

*Highly walkable district in small 0.25 square mile.
* Great historic architecture both in along High Street, Hamilton’s main dwtn corridor, and German Village.
* The Dwtn/German Village population has historically been very low, but this is changing with increased dwtn population and historic renovations in Germantown.
* Nice set of parks including the riverfront park along the Great Miami, Symmes Park Playground, and the downtown jewel Marcum Park, complete with a fountain, significant programming, an outdoor stage, etc.
* Nice array of cultural amenities including several local museums & theaters, Artspace lofts, many restaurants & bars, and some live music venues.
* There has been a wonderful resurgence of locally owned shops, boutiques, cafes Dwtn and across the river in nearby Rossville. The main post office and library are also located here. No large retail stores or grocery stores however.
* High level of ADA infrastructure. Very comfortable to walk here.

URBAN WEAKNESSES

* Not great public transit. Some shuttles run by Butler County but the system is not really tied into the Cincinnati public system.
* Generally very affordable for-sale and rental product. Nice homes in German Village selling btwn 75K-100K. Larger mansions in the 200Ks. Not a ton of rental product listed dwtn, but higher end product slowly coming starting with the Marcum apts.
* Limited ethnic and household diversity dwtn.
* There is a public elementary school and Catholic grade school located just south of Dwtn.
* Very low density. This partially is to be expected as this is a mid-sized dwtn.