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| - I have been visiting the Terminal Tower my whole life since about age 7, which was well before they put in the current "Tower City Center" mall, so you can imagine. I am not a fan of the mall or the casino additions, but I enjoy the parts of the old building that have been preserved and cleaned up/ fixed up, such as the ceilings and the gilded elevator doors.
This review is primarily for the Observation Deck, where you buy a ticket and go up to see the view. I had been up there 2 or 3 times when I was much younger. Over the years it has been closed and reopened and renovated at various times so I thought it would be fun to check out the latest incarnation. I bought a ticket online, which entitles you to a half-hour visit at a specified time. The day I picked was pretty uncrowded from the look of the advance ticket sales and also from the lack of people when I arrived. I noticed there were other days when the online tickets were completely sold out for a lot of the times and I would suggest avoiding that scenario, simply because there is not that much room on the observation deck and the windows are not that big.
Anyway, once I arrived, and got parked, and walked a very long way from the rear parking lot to the front of the building where you take the elevators up to the deck (note, this is not at all well marked and I had to ask about three people to find where to go...how hard would it be to put up some signs pointing the way to the "observation deck tour"?) I rode the elevators all the way up and stepped out into a tiny area with some folding chairs that I assumed was a lobby leading to the actual deck. Surprise, that WAS the actual deck, which seems to have been remodeled so it looks like it did in the 1930s.
Now, I love the 1930s, and old timey architecture, and they did a nice job, and it was clean and pretty and all that, but it was also boring as heck. What you basically have are walls with a large wooden sashed window every few feet. This is not enough windows (or enough space in general - what is with the several dozen folding chairs taking up the whole floor?) on a crowded day, and even on an un-crowded day, the sashes of the windows impede your view. Plus, the windows were very dirty on their outsides. Maybe I happened to stop by on a day before the annual power wash was scheduled, but if I were a photographer, I would not want to be taking any pictures out of a window as dirty and smudged as these were.
I seemed to recall there used to be a little souvenir stand up there so you could buy a memento of your visit. In fact there is a historical photo showing such a stand. Nothing like that exists now. You can't even get a postcard of the place up there. They don't even have a box or platform or little viewing telescope that costs a quarter to amuse kids who visit. There are very few exhibits on the walls (again they probably don't have the space).
I would also note that as of 2015, Public Square is being ripped up and remodeled down below so your main view straight down is going to be of a big patch of construction pit. Another side of the tower has an old photo of the view that points out buildings and stuff that, if you look at the actual view, do not exist any more. Cool from a history standpoint, but underwhelming from a viewing standpoint.
Overall it seems like the redesign was more for holding small receptions or events up there than entertaining a lot of tourists up there. It's still OK if you want to see the deck looking like it did in the 30s, or just enjoy a nice view of Cleveland and the lake (best on a sunny day). But kind of underwhelming, especially when I got told my 6 dollar ticket didn't qualify me for a parking validation so I got stuck with a bill for 9 dollars for parking outside with no valet. I would have had to spend 30 dollars in the mall (which has pitifully little of interest to buy) to get free parking. Really, Tower City? Not encouraging...
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