BY PAUL DAUGHERTY
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Time for one last debate.
Baseball on Main, i.e The Wedge, "fulfills the wishes of the people who voted for two stadiums on the river" two years ago, said Hamilton County commissioner Bob Bedinghaus.
Time for a final word. The last word, we hope.
Broadway Commons "opens the riverfront for more meaningful development," Jim Tarbell said.
And so on. We could go on (and on) about this issue, but frankly we already have. If only we debated education as much, or jobs. We are ready for the stadium to rise and the rhetoric to drop dead.
Two days before the vote, this is the sum total of our knowledge: They're both good sites. Either will work.
People should have say
I once thought Broadway was clearly superior. I don't any more. But it's as good as the alternative. And the passion behind it is infinitely better.
I liked the Broadway campaign. I liked its grass-roots nature and its populist appeal. I appreciated Broadway's message: People who pay for the stadium ought to have a say in its location.
I liked its modest start. Broadway sprung from the head of one man, Jim Tarbell. It grew from a romantic vision -- a green hillside beyond center field! -- into a viable economic endeavor. Would it be that all citizens were as concerned for their towns as Jim Tarbell is for his.
Meanwhile, I don't like the exclusionary way Wedge backers prefer to do business. I don't like the rich arm-twisters getting their way without being accountable to voters. Who elected DCI? Anyone cast a vote for the CBC?
I don't like the condescending, we-know-what's-good-for-you attitude that comes with it.
Michael Schuster, a local architect and staunch Wedge supporter, calls Tarbell "a helluva promoter" and suggests Broadway would make a fine location for "a Single A (minor league) team."
Wedge business as usual
Other Wedge supporters are equally dismissive of Broadway. And of Tarbell, whom they view as the gadfly on the wall, the dandruff on their Brooks Brothers suitcoats.
I've spent two years talking to these Wedge folks, and the impression they leave is strictly this: "You don't like our site because you don't know the facts."
That's crap, of course. We've had facts out the ears. We've been beaned with facts.
Here's a fact: The Wedge is business as usual. A stadium on the river. What a concept.
I don't like business as usual. I don't see where business as usual is all that effective. Lately, it has produced a downtown Lazarus we didn't need and a riverfront giveaway to the Bengals that rivals Manhattan-for-beads.
Business as usual lacks vision. It's getting its butt kicked by Cleveland and Indianapolis. The Reds say they want a stadium on the river because that's where it's always been. There's vision for you.
I don't like the Reds' arrogance. They spit in the eye of a $260 million gift while dying with a $21 million payroll. The Reds aren't architects, unless you count the monument to mediocrity they're building.
I like John Allen, the Reds acting CEO. I don't like him treating a free stadium at Broadway like something the cat dragged in.
I like Broadway because it represents a change in the way we think. We need that change, because what we've got isn't working. Been downtown lately?
Cincinnati needs a good, swift kick in its aspirations. It needs people who are willing to admit that downtown is broken and can't be fixed with old, tired ideas. The Wedge is workable. It's also been done before. The popular name for it now is Cinergy Field. What a fabulous place that is. What a revitalizing force. A real tourist magnet.
I hope that regardless of the outcome, the losing side gives up the fight and works to help the winner. We've wasted so much time already.
I hope it's Broadway. If it's not, we'll be getting more of the same. We know how that has turned out.
Enquirer columnist Paul Daugherty welcomes your comments at 768-8454.
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