Walking Cincinnati. Danny Korman
target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="#fb3_img_img_269586d7-d4d5-598e-bc8a-5c22caeaa1eb.jpg" alt="images"/> Covenant First Presbyterian Church, which nicely terminates this end of Piatt Park with its elegant Gothic-style 1875 facade. Cross Eighth Street and turn left at Waldo apartments, 801 Elm St. Built in 1891, it’s one of four surviving late 19th-century apartment houses that brothers Thomas J. and John J. Emery built downtown.
Turn right on Goshen Alley and then left on Weaver Alley. An overlooked part of Cincinnati’s downtown, alleys serve as a safe space for bicyclists and pedestrians to navigate clear of motorized vehicles. Cross through the parking lot on the left and return to Eighth Street and walk west to Plum Street, another one of downtown’s great corners where politics and religion are represented. On the southeast corner is the
Walk north on Plum Street and turn right into the Ninth Street Historic District, three blocks of more than 40 buildings from the mid-19th century to the early 20th century. Walk to Elm Street and go to the northeast corner. Crosley Square (140 W. Ninth St.), was designed by Harry Hake and built in 1922. Originally home to the WLW radio station, this impressive Classical Revival–style building currently houses the Cincinnati Hills Christian Academy.
Continue walking east toward Race Street. While there’s an empty lot on the northeast corner, the other three compensate for the void with solid historic buildings listed individually on the National Register of Historic Places. On the southeast corner is The Phoenix, built in 1893 to accommodate Cincinnati’s first professional Jewish men’s club. On the southwest and northwest corners, respectively, are Saxony and Brittany apartment buildings, designed by Samuel Hannaford & Sons.
Turn left on Race Street and walk to Court Street. On the left is
Cross Vine Street and stay on the south side of Court Street. This block retains its 19th-century scale and is almost completely intact, with just one missing building. According to Ann Senefeld of Digging Cincinnati History, all of Court Street, from Central Avenue to Main Street, was once lined with market booths, while the market building stood between Vine and Walnut Streets. By 1912 the city declared the market building a health hazard, and it was torn down in 1915. Perhaps as a partial nod to Court Street’s market past, Kroger built a 45,000-square-foot supermarket below a parking garage and 139 apartments that opened in summer 2019 at the northeast corner of Court and Walnut Streets. Ahead is the
Turn right on Walnut Street and look to the left at Homecoming (Blue Birds) ArtWorks mural on the side of Courtland Flats, at 119 E. Court St. It is based on a painting in Charlie Harper’s geometric style and depicts two bluebirds returning home. The
Proceed to Main Street. In the ground along Main Street is track for the reborn Cincinnati Streetcar, which opened in September 2016. Across Main Street (on the left behind the fabric awning with a large “A”) is
Turn right on Sixth Street and enter Cincinnati’s reemerging restaurant row. Most notable are Sotto, Boca, and Nada—all three the product of the Boca Restaurant Group. At Sixth and Walnut Streets is the Zaha Hadid–designed
Turn left on Walnut Street and left again on Fifth Street. Walk through Government Square, Metro’s downtown transit hub. Dominating the left side of the square is Potter Stewart U.S. Courthouse (100 E. Fifth St.), built in 1939. The next three blocks east of Main Street are where corporate Cincinnati functions. It’s a quiet place after office hours, with the exception of the