Nosey Online

This one in the PD has got me grimacing.

If Dorothy and Toto fly here anytime soon, city officials want them to know they're not in Kansas anymore, or Oz. Or even Brook Park.

Mayor Jane Campbell, business leaders and airport managers had a news conference at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport Wednesday for that very purpose.

John Mok, director of the Cleveland Airport System, said the airport didn't have any brand identity, and people told him "when you're in Hopkins, you don't know you're in Cleveland."

So the public-private partnership used the airport's 80th anniversary to kick off a dual marketing initiative.

The mayor said more than 30,000 passengers come through the airport every day, making it an under-used marketing tool for the city. The city, at the same time, can help promote the airport to passengers and airlines, she said.

To that end, the campaign includes what Mok called "the Clevelandization of the airport."

Campbell and Mok unveiled a new logo. The same graphic device will be used for Hopkins, the city airport system, and Burke Lakefront Airport -- to be known as Cleveland Burke Lakefront Airport.

The news conference was in Concourse A. Pillars already were adorned with Cleveland-themed posters celebrating, among other things, the Cleveland Clinic and the orchestra that carries the city's name around the world.

Because the Clinic and the orchestra haven't been used enough. If the Rock Hallis thrown in, you have the only real marketing tools for Cleveland. Take a look at downtown Cleveland after 6PM during the week and during the afternoon on the weekends. With the exception of the bar district at night (sometimes) and the Rock Hall and Science Center during the day, the city center resembles a ghosttown. I was down around the Public Square area last Saturday afternoon, and boy, it wasn't exactly a picture for a marketing flyer.

Cleveland is in desperate need of an image makeover. Constantly trying to sell outsiders on the Clinic, the orchestra, the Rock Hall and Science Center just ain't going to cut it. Because if you do manage to snare a new family of tourists, they can't walk anywhere outside of the Voinovich Park area without being either disgusted or bored (unless they are a family of boozebags, then the Flats Shooters or West Sixth would suffice, but only at night).

Plastering a new logo around Hopkins won't amount to much. Cleveland's image has absolutely no cohesive quality whatsoever. It is the sum of a few bright shiny lights and a lot of dim bulbs.