Indiana Jones would love Over-the-Rhine. It's like one of those lost cities he finds in the movies, hidden under tangled, overgrown vines of an urban rain forest.

It's a time capsule. Everything is in place - churches, stores, houses, schools, fire stations. Just add people.

"It's just a shadow of what it was. Back in its prime, people were living on top of each other almost," said Margo Warminski, consultant and architectural historian for the Cincinnati Preservation Association.

"It was enormous. But the neighborhood has really emptied out."

The Bicentennial Guide to Greater Cincinnati says Over-the-Rhine had 30,000 residents in the 1940s, dipped to 20,000 in the 1950s, then climbed back to 30,000 again in the 1960s. By 1980, it shrank to 12,000. Today, the population is about 6,000, according to Bob Schneider, chairman of the Over-the-Rhine Chamber of Commerce.

To become a healthy, 24-7 neighborhood again, it needs 20,000, he said. "As we've preached for years, as OTR goes, so goes downtown," he told 260 people at the group's annual meeting Wednesday.

Most of Cincinnati only knows the neighborhood as a dateline in crime headlines. "Shootings leave one injured, one dead," said the latest example Thursday.

But some people see an exotic lost city under the vines of neglect.

"We like Over-the-Rhine because preservationists say it has the best collection of Italianate architecture anywhere in the nation," said Trudy Backus. She's a volunteer guide for walking tours called Architreks, on the second and last Saturdays of each month. (Just show up at the Coffee Emporium at 110 E. Central Parkway at 10 a.m.; adults, $8, kids $4).

Backus said that in the past year she's seen lots of new housing blending in with the tall and skinny old relics from the 1860s. "We've seen a lot of condo developments. It's very, very encouraging. A lot of good things are happening here."

Warminski says her favorite street is Main just south of Liberty, "a wonderfully intact commercial street from the second half of the 19th century."

If more people could visit and tour the neighborhood, they might decide "to live in what was designed as a walking neighborhood, where you can reach your business on foot if you work downtown, or Findlay Market, entertainment and coffee shops."

But she also sees that "some parts are really hurting. The omnipresent problem is crime."

More of those old Italianate houses would be sold as fixer-uppers if not for the 2001 riots and the crime wave that followed. But instead of focusing first on public safety, the city has tried to put new clothes on frayed and tattered Vine Street. It hasn't worked.

The good news is that Cincinnati Police District One Commander Capt. James Whalen is making a big difference, said Tom Besanceney of the Over-the-Rhine Chamber. This year, Whalen was given the group's President's Award for going beyond the call of duty to make "a massive change" in public safety.

City Manager Valerie Lemmie was there to applaud Whalen and announce that his district will soon get 17 more officers.

Cincinnati has a lost city with hidden treasures. Everything is there - waiting for someone to turn on the lights.

Just add people. Starting with cops.

E-mail pbronson@enquirer.com or call 768-8301.