The Cleveland Convention Center was located in downtown Cleveland, Ohio, United States. Built by the city of Cleveland beneath the Cleveland Mall adjacent to Public Auditorium, it was completed in 1964. Plans for the convention center were first made in 1956, but voters twice rejected initiatives to fund construction before approving a bond levy in November 1963. A local private foundation donated several million dollars to beautify the mall atop the convention center with a reflecting pool and fountains.
Construction was plagued by issues with ground water, protests, strikes, and cost overruns. A major dispute broke out between civil rights activists and labor unions in the summer of 1963. Nevertheless, the convention center informally opened on May 11, 1964, almost three months ahead of schedule. A formal dedication on August 28, 1964, was followed an 11-day festival.
The Cleveland Convention Center underwent a major $28 million renovation from 1983 to 1987. Substantially reconfigured, although not larger, it reopened on October 5, 1987. The convention center was demolished in 2011, and the larger Huntington Convention Center of Cleveland built in the same underground location. It opened on June 7, 2013.
1957 push for a convention center
The "international center" Some time in 1954, Cleveland Mayor Anthony J. Celebrezze asked local architect R. Franklin Outcalt of the Cleveland architectural firm of Outcalt Guenther & Associates to work with him on a place for revitalizing the Cleveland Mall and lakefront near it. Outcalt agreed to donate his services for free. On May 29, 1956, Celebrezze and Outcalt unveiled their preliminary plan before a local committee supporting the International Geophysical Year. The plan proposed an "international center" which would lead from Public Auditorium's exhibition space under Mall C (the northernmost part of the Cleveland Mall) over the Cleveland Memorial Shoreway and New York Central Railroad tracks and toward Cleveland Stadium. The center would be primarily exhibition space, although an underground parking garage would be included. The plan also called for an 18-story hotel on land east of E. 9th Street, a 30-story office building with space set aside for companies engaged in international trade and representatives of foreign governments, an above-ground hall with permanent exhibits about international trade, an outdoor amphitheater, a swimming pool with a restaurant overlooking it, a plaza surrounded by stores selling foreign goods, and a reflecting pool. The plan also called for moving sidewalks on E. 9th Street between Lakeside Avenue and Euclid Avenue, and another running down W. Mall Drive from Lakeside Avenue to Rockwell Avenue and Public Square. Celebrezze said he would ask the Cleveland City Council for funds to conduct a preliminary study of the plan. But no such request was made.
In January 1956, New York City real estate developer William Zeckendorf ran into Celebrezze at the meeting of the American Municipal Association. Celebrezze invited Zeckendorf to his hotel room, where Celebrezze showed him plans for the "international center", hotel, and office building. Zeckendorf agreed to back the project financially and become its lead real estate developer if Celebrezze could win approval for the deal.
At a meeting on March 9, 1956, the board Cleveland Convention and Visitors Bureau (CCVB) approved a resolution asking the city to fund the construction of a new convention center to replace or augment Public Auditorium. Mayor Celebrezze responded by challenging the CCVB to come up with a plan. Dan B. Wiles, CCVB president, appointed Lee C. Howley, Vice President and General Counsel of the Cleveland Electric Illuminating Company (a local electricity provider), to appoint and lead a committee to develop this plan.
On April 28, 1956, the New York Coliseum opened in New York City. Prompted by the opening of the convention center, and by comments from leaders of the Cleveland Convention and Visitors Bureau (who indicated the city was losing convention business due to the small size of Public Auditorium), Cleveland City Council member Joseph Horwitz introduced a resolution in May to require the city to study the construction of a new convention center. In June, Mayor Celebrezze proposed that the "international center" be built as the new convention center. Celebrezze's proposal enlarged the scheme by having the building extend toward the Lake Erie shore, and extending an ell eastward over the space then occupied by stadium parking lots. This structure would be three stories tall, and have parking for 4,000 vehicles. Celebrezze used mayoral funds to hire Outcalt to conduct a feasibility study of the project.
Competing plans On April 19, 1957, Council President Jack P. Russell and Council member Wilson M. Latkovic introduced legislation to establish a 20-person committee to study a new site, bounded by E. 6th and 9th Streets, St. Clair Avenue, and Lakeside Avenue. Spurred by Russell, the city council also began considering Horwitz's bill in late April 1957. Two months later, The Plain Dealer estimated that the cost of purchasing land and demolishing the existing buildings to implement the Russell plan would cost close to $2.5 million ($ in dollars), which the newspaper characterized as exorbitant. Undeterred, Russell introduced legislation to authorize construction of a $16 million ($ in dollars) convention center designed by local architect Robert A. Little. Little's proposed exhibition hall was two stories high, had rooftop parking for 500 cars, and contained of space (which would have made it the largest convention center in the world.) Russell's bill proposed a $5 million ($ in dollars) bond issue, to go before voters in November 1957, to begin construction on the hall.
Russell's study commission bill passed the council, and on May 14 Mayor Celebrezze established the Heart of Cleveland Development Committee to study these and other proposals for improving the downtown area.
On July 2, 1957, local civic promoter William Ganson Rose promoted his own convention center concept, a $15 million ($ in dollars), structure on the Cleveland Mall with three below-ground floors. But his proposal was seen as a non-starter, as the Russell bill had already been adopted by the city council.
On July 16, the city council voted 25-to-4 (with another four council members not present) to put a $15 million ($ in dollars) convention center bond issue on the November 1957 ballot. The vote was preceded by testimony from Outcalt, who presented the new convention center as part of his 1956 proposal for lakefront revitalization. The plan still included a new hotel, a now-34-story office building, and a now-3,800-space parking garage. The new , single-level main exhibition hall would be built beneath Mall C. Outcalt also proposed a expansion of the exhibition space under Mall B and beneath Public Auditorium. The exhibit hall beneath Malls B and C would have moveable walls, to enable two large conventions to occur simultaneously, and meeting rooms capable of seating 8,000 people. Scaling back the 1956 plan, Outcalt proposed that only a small portion of the convention center bridge the railroad tracks, to permit convention exhibitors to ship their exhibits by rail to the site. Following Outcalt, William Zeckendorf told the council of his plans to finance the project and build much of it.
Outcalt's proposal was criticized by architect Little, who argued it was cut off from the rest of downtown, mixed parking and exhibit space in the same building, used open space rather than demolishing old and decrepit buildings, was too hemmed in by its proposed hotel and office towers, did not provide for the expansion of City Hall or the Cuyahoga County Courthouse, failed to give the city a visual symbol of its progress (by being buried beneath the mall), and was both too big to be built swiftly and too little to provide the economic stimulus the city wanted. Despite his criticisms, a week later the Cleveland investment banking firm of Ball, Burge & Kraus said it would issue bonds or stock or a combination in order to finance construction of the hotel and office building. Both Outcalt and Little called for additional studies, and the Cleveland City Planning Commission hired consultants John T. Howard and Walter H. Blucher to provide a joint assessment of both plans.
Disagreement over Zeckendorf's involvement
By August 1957, little public movement had occurred on the Celebrezze proposal. Zeckendorf sought a conference with the city council to get the project moving, and an advance team visited the city in mid-August to assess the real estate market, economic conditions, and other variables. The city council was concerned that Zeckendorf commit to specifics, and feared that the developer would agree to build but then scale back his plans in ways that would fail to achieve the hoped-for redevelopment goals. Zeckendorf's mounting interest brought an agreement on these issues on August 15. He signed a contract with Mayor Celebrezze in which he agreed to build a 1,000-to-1,500 room hotel, a office building, and a "trade mart" at a total cost of $45 million ($ in dollars)—but only if voters approved the bond issue financing construction. In addition, Zeckendorf agreed to construct a 16-to-25 story apartment building with between 1,500 and 3,000 units east of the convention center once the other buildings were completed.
Political complications began to interfere with the project. Celebrezze had not involved in the council in the negotiations, and the city council now threatened to balk at the approving the project. Celebrezze wanted to establish a group of businessmen and civic leaders to promote the bond issue to voters (who had a habit of defeating such referendums), but had to hold off until the council acted. This placed passage of the bond issue in jeopardy. Moreover, the two consultants hired earlier that summer had yet to issue their report. The city council appeared supportive of the project, but this soon changed. Councilman Russell withdrew his competing proposal for a convention center, after being convinced by other council members that competing plans would hurt the bond issue vote. But the council declined to support the group promoting the bond issue. This angered John A. Green, chairman of Ohio Bell, whom Celebrezze had asked to lead the promotional group. Green announced he would not do so unless disputes over the convention center were resolved.
Other approvals for the convention center proceeded. On August 23, City Planning Director Eric Grubb approved of the convention center plan and recommended its adoption by the City Planning Commission. Grubb warned the city that further studies of studies of traffic congestion and revenue projections from the parking garages were needed, and that mass transit's role in the project had not been spelled out. He also felt that the non-convention center structures (collectively known as the "Seaway Center") might make for too much density, and warned the city against concluding that additional parking alone would solve downtown's ills. The same day that Grubb issued his approval, consultants John T. Howard and Walter H. Blucher issued their reports, which called for an exhibition hall design beneath Mall B which would provide for southward expansion at a later date. Outcalt also went public with a criticism, calling for a hotel 50 to 75 percent larger than Zeckendorf had agreed to.