A Walking Tour of the Mall
Another Walk to Help You Soak Up More Cleveland History

Summer’s waning and we all know how short Cleveland’s summer is. People are cramming the outdoors: backyard parties, patio dining, beach picnics, weekend cycling, festivals, amphitheater concerts, and perfect sunsets. It’s also time to get away from the office and walk—we won’t want to do it in January.

It’s easy to walk The Mall. Not the downtown indoor malls—the Galleria, Halle Building, or Tower City--we can save those for January, but The Mall, our greatest downtown green space. The 1-mile Mall Route is on Card 5 of 8 of the Clevelanders in Motion Complimentary Walking Maps, a healthy lifestyle initiative of ParkWorks and the City’s Department of Public Health.

The Mall stretches north to south from the scenic overlook north of Lakeside to Rockwell. Conceived by architect and urban planner Daniel Burnham, the Burnham Plan of 1903 called for a 500-foot wide mall surrounded by civic buildings of uniform style and height.

Burnham, who was a city planner for the City of Chicago, believed every citizen in the City of Cleveland should be within walking district of a park. The Mall is one of the most complete examples of the City Beautiful design in the United States and was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1975.

Mall A is bordered by Rockwell and St. Clair, Mall B is bordered by St. Clair and Lakeside, and Mall C is bordered by Lakeside and a walled Lake overlook. Mostly civic buildings, with the exception of the Key Tower complex, flank the east and west sides of The Mall. If you stand in the middle of Mall A with its fountain of a man reaching skyward and look southward, The Mall feels off kilter because it’s just a short ways to the east and south of Public Square. It seems like the Terminal Tower should oversee the The Mall. Apparently that was part of the plan until Union Terminal was moved southwest to Public Square, and so The Burnham Plan of 1903 was never really fully carried out.

The Clevelanders in Motion tour starts at the entrance to Mall C on Lakeside. Standing at the entrance to Mall C, a Beaux-arts style building can be seen on either side. The Cuyahoga County Courthouse, built in 1911, and Cleveland City Hall, built in 1916, represent the Burnham Plan well because their height and style are uniform. Walking north along the east side of Mall C, we feel the open expanse of Lake and sky before us because they are unobstructed. The scenic overlook looks past the railroad tracks and the Shoreway, beyond Browns Stadium, the Port Authority, the Science Center, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum, to Lake Erie. Even though there’s no direct access from here to the Lake, the view reminds us of that Cleveland’s vibrant—we have commerce and entertainment taking place on our shores.

Turning west, we walk past the Courthouse and cross Lakeside at the crosswalk to enter Mall B. At one time a long pool with fountains was enclosed by the gardens and patios of Mall B. Hanna Plaza Gardens was redesigned in 1996 by Behnke Associates and the pool has been replaced by grass. Along the east expanse of Mall B is the Public Auditorium, which was the largest convention center in the country when it was built in 1922, and along the west side are county buildings. Trees and gardens with benches for sitting and enjoying the sun surround the green space in the middle, which is sometimes used for Frisbee or football, still a public space to be used by the people, in harmony with the Burnham Plan. The walk takes one along the western perimeter of Mall B to cross St. Clair to Mall A.

The Marriott Hotel and the Key Tower office building, on the western end of Mall A, are not in keeping with the Burnham Plan because they aren’t civic buildings. But Mall A’s proximity to the complex allows it to be used by visitors staying in the hotel and office workers working in the office building. The walk continues along Rockwell and the back of the 1910 Federal Courthouse, past E. 3rd Street and the corner of the Cleveland Public Library, built in 1925 by the noted Cleveland firm of Walker & Weeks. At the eastern end of Mall A is the Board of Education building built in 1930. The War Memorial Fountain was completed until 1964, and originally contained the names of the county’s war dead who served in World War II and the Korean War. In 2004, other names were added, and it now lists 5,506 county service members who have been killed in action since 1899. The official name of Mall A is Veterans’ Memorial Plaza and the fountain in the center is called the Fountain of Eternal Life, but is also known as the War Memorial Fountain.

The walk continues by crossing St. Clair to walk past the Convention Center/Public Auditorium and ends at Lakeside and the entrance to Mall C. Mall C was re-designed and dedicated as the Herbert Strawbridge Plaza within the last few years. The Cleveland Convention Center resides underneath Malls B and C and some plans have called for it to be extended north for a Mall D above the Amtrak station abutting the Shoreway.

The Malls are being used as parks for events like the Tri C Music Festival, which was a well-planned event with great music over a weekend. People of all ages brought set their lawn chairs out on Malls C and B and enjoyed music under sunny skies and starry nights. A stage was set up at the north end of Mall C and vendors sold food and drinks while the crowd jazzed to the sounds of David Sanborn and many other jazz musicians. Other events on the Malls this summer were the Puerto Rican Festival, Movies on the Mall, WDOK Soft Rock Café Caravan, and various other concerts. We should keep up our use of The Mall.

A couple of loops around The Mall at lunchtime is a good way to get exercise, learn some Cleveland history, and appreciate our municipal green space. Summer is waning . . .

From Cool Cleveland contributor Claudia J. Taller ctallerwritesATwowway.com
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