Port-O-Lets for Christmas: Genius of Water

I'm going to borrow a line from Channel 9's John Matarese -- "Doesn't that stink." My "Doesn't that stink" award this year goes to Fountain Square organizers for failing to remove a half dozen port-o-lets for the holiday season. (Surely they didn't leave them there on purpose??)

We all know the square's completion is behind schedule. But I wondered as I wandered between the port-o-lets, a creche, the Chabad House menorah, the ice rink and the Christmas tree -- what is the true meaning of "Downtown Dazzle"? (That, you recall, is the campaign, complete with rapelling Santas, to bring folks downtown for the season.)

I was there on Friday with some Chinese visitors, and we were hard-pressed to find a good photo op. Those darn port-o-lets kept getting in the way. I looked up and caught the new video screen atop Macy's. It showed a TV music channel screen, and out of the speakers below blared a funk-rock Christmas song.

This is holiday programming? Why not combine with WGUC and broadcast some of the great holiday concerts that fill up the entire month of December? Borrow the Cincinnati Pops' holiday video with Mel Torme. Go shoot a "Messiah" concert live.

It only proved to me again that the city powers have no idea how to tap into all of the arts that make Cincinnati a wonderful place to live.

I looked at the ice rink, closed Friday due to rain. Nevertheless, downtown was TEEMING with families and hoards of small children, making the holiday rounds, from the trains to Santa in Carew Tower. Still, things have changed. There were no window displays, no little Christmas villages in department stores or banks and no school choirs singing carols in hotel lobbies.

And no one was using the port-o-lets.

Enquiring minds want to know: Where would you put those port-o-lets?