Cleveland Urban Land Institute Publishes Report of Recommendations for Bulkhead Management for Cuyahoga River

The deteriorating condition of many of the bulkheads along the Cuyahoga River has been an impediment to development in the Cuyahoga Valley for the City of Cleveland, Port of Cleveland, Flats Forward, the Cleveland Metroparks, and private landowners.

In an effort to better understand and overcome barriers to developing and utilizing the riverfront and Cuyahoga Valley, the Vision for the Valley partnership engaged the Cleveland District Council of the Urban Land Institute to convene a ten-member multidisciplinary Technical Assistance Panel (TAP) to recommend best practices for financing, rebuilding and maintaining bulkhead infrastructure along one of Cleveland’s two major waterfront, the Cuyahoga River.

ULI Cleveland is a non-profit organization of practicing cross-disciplinary real estate and land use professionals and community leaders, that facilitates an open exchange of ideas, information, and experience among industry leaders and policy makers dedicated to creating better places in the entire region of Northeast Ohio. The TAP program of ULI Cleveland is powerful tool that can bring ULI’s resources to bear on a real estate development challenge. A TAP provides the market-based expertise of ULI members from across the country to cities and other organizations that need objective analysis and advice on how to solve difficult real estate development problems. A TAP is a multidisciplinary panel of experts that interview stakeholders, analyze the problem, and propose recommendations that are presented in a final report. The theme of this two-day TAP convened in November 2021 focused on bulkhead management practices that can be adopted to remove barriers to private development, encourage beneficial enhancements to privately-owned riverfront properties, and enhance public access and utilization of the riverfront for recreation, while continuing to effectively service the industry in the Valley.