Gavin Hall.org http://www.gavinhall.org Gavin Hall.org http://www.gavinhall.org/media/feedlogo.gif Gavin Hall.org http://www.gavinhall.org en-us Copyright 2010 Weblogs, Inc. The contents of this feed are available for non-commercial use only. Blogsmith http://www.blogsmith.com/<![CDATA[If I was Mayor of Orlando]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2009/06/10/if-i-was-mayor-of-orlando/http://www.gavinhall.org/2009/06/10/if-i-was-mayor-of-orlando/http://www.gavinhall.org/2009/06/10/if-i-was-mayor-of-orlando/#commentsWhen traveling around I always see these great ideas that other cities and states implement that I wish Orlando would do. If only there was a "be Mayor for a day" program where I could create 3 laws in one day. If so here is what they would be (dealing with the food industry)

1) Food Ratings on Restaurants -- Stolen from LA -- Every restaurant has to have a letter grade displayed in their front window (A to F). It's great to know that the place you are eating at has passed health inspection and that the food you are eating is good to go.

2) Nutrition Info on Menus -- Stolen from NYC -- Every item on a menu has to tell you how many calories and grams of fat is in it. It's shocking on how bad some of the chain restaurants are for you. By doing this you are not only informing people so they can make better and healthier choices but you would also help the economy as it would lower rates of obesity in the state (currently Florida is 5th highest) thus lowering health care costs.

3) Local restaurants -- Stolen from Austin -- Austin has a cool "keep Austin weird" theme downtown. It gives tax breaks for owners of stores who live within the city limits. This encourages private companies to open up little places downtown and gives the city a great vibe. It could be taken a step further and allow alcohol sales to go an hour later for locally owned restaurants/bars downtown. Study show places with later alcohol sales have a lower rate of drunk driving accidents.

Seems easy enough. Of course I would demand a top hat during my be Mayor for a day. Demand!
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillalawsmayororlandovoteforgavin2009-06-10T00:49:00+00:00<![CDATA[Internet Famous ]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2009/05/18/internet-famous/http://www.gavinhall.org/2009/05/18/internet-famous/http://www.gavinhall.org/2009/05/18/internet-famous/#commentsAlex and I made it in the local paper today for one of our silly joke sites. Right before the picture was taken the phrase "do you want our shirts on or off" was said followed by an awkward laugh from the photographer.
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillaalexrudloffinternet famousInternetFamousorlandosentineltwitter2009-05-18T09:01:00+00:00<![CDATA[Brinks Truck!]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/12/14/brinks-truck/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/12/14/brinks-truck/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/12/14/brinks-truck/#comments

I have a dream.

A dream that one day I would own an Armored Truck.

It mixes my love of transportation with my love of being bullet proof.

After sharing my dream with my friends they encouraged me to look online and I found this beauty.

A 1991 former Brinks Truck.

I called right away and sure the call was a tad awkward. The guy said "What will you be using this armored truck for?" I said "Mostly personal transport". To which he responded "You are just going to drive it around!?".

That's exactly what I am going to do. Drive it around while being awesome.

I know what you are saying. Why even post this? Why am I not the proud owner of this fine armored-mobile yet?

Because it gets better.

It just so happens this armored truck was in the last Batman movie. It says Gotham Police Department on it and it has 6 gun ports.

Yes, SIX gun ports!

Attached are the pictures of my future armored truck/tail gating awesomeness. There are a few hurdles I need to work out before I can call this mine.

Such as:
1) Where can I park this at?
2) How do you insure an armored truck
3) What do you do when you want to sell it? I don't think there is a huge market for used armored trucks with six gun ports.

All small details in the scheme of things. It is going to be harder to not be awesome while knocking over hummers/banks.

Now I just need a few backers and I can bring this puppy home....Who's in?!

Gallery: Brinks Truck

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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillaarmored truckArmoredTruckdream2008-12-14T00:26:00+00:00<![CDATA[My Next iPhone]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/12/13/my-next-iphone/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/12/13/my-next-iphone/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/12/13/my-next-iphone/#commentsMy iPhone has a huge crack in it from when i dropped it. That's ok, I still enjoy it and it adds some character to it. I was thinking what would it take to upgrade me to a new iPhone and I can only think of one thing.

A second camera.

Why? Mix the 3G, the second camera, the headphones with a mic and years of experience with iChat.

You get the first perfect video conferencing device.

Imagine being able to take a call and if the phone is away from your ear (and you are talking to someone else who has an iPhone away from their ear) it syncs up and you can start looking at the other person.

The bandwidth is there. The headphones will give you a good experience of being able to hear and talk to the person with the phone away from your face. Apple has perfected video conferencing on iChat. And it is just creepy enough to make me want to dial random numbers to see what people are up to.

I'd upgrade the very first day and to be honest I think everyone else I know would too.

Hopefully the iPhone has the power to encode and decode video, AT&T has the bandwidth to support it and that the phones become very popular with slutty sorority girls.

Hey oh!
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillaiphone2008-12-13T00:03:00+00:00<![CDATA[My Olympic Dream]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/08/18/my-olympic-dream/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/08/18/my-olympic-dream/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/08/18/my-olympic-dream/#comments

I don't know what it is about the Olympics this year but I am into them like a fat kid into a box of ho-hos. My guess is that it's the eye candy of HD.

I'll tell you what its not though...NBC and their group of commentators. Don't get me wrong Bob Costas, I love you for your role in BaseketBall but during the opening ceremonies you said the stupidest things I have ever heard on national TV and I've seen a lot of President Bush speeches.

Hey Oh!

But I wanted to tell you about my Olympic dream. Something on the level of Mike Phelps' eight gold medals...

You see I used to own www.olympics.com.

Hand to god.

Back when I was 15 there was all this talk about the Olympics coming the following year to Atlanta. I went to olympics.com to see if they had a site but it didn't resolve. I did a whois and sure enough no one registered it...so I did.

It was a great moment until a month or two later I got a letter from Internic (now called Network Solutions) saying that my domain and dream were taken and given to the IOC.

How freaking lame.

So instead of being able to trade it for something reasonable like to be the life time mascot of the Olympic games...it was just taken from me.

And with that my Olympic dreams were over and I was crushed.

It didn't need to end like that. At very least they could have let me be King of one of those smaller countries no one has ever heard of.

Pretty sure they have the authority to do that.
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillabaseketballdomainolympics2008-08-18T12:52:00+00:00<![CDATA[A new type of power company]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/07/22/a-new-type-of-power-company/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/07/22/a-new-type-of-power-company/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/07/22/a-new-type-of-power-company/#comments
Everyone agrees using less foreign oil is for the best. Not only is it good for the environment and the US economy but shipping hundreds of billions of dollars to the middle east each year...some of it ends up in the wrong hands.

But 51% of the fuel is used for power of houses or businesses. In this space there has been a lot of advancements with solar panels and wind turbines but no game changer like the Tesla. T. Boone Pickens, besides having the best Texan name ever, thinks he might have a plan which you can read about online.

So today I started to look to see how I could do my part. I already walk to work (ahem) so I was interested in lowering my power usage. Orlando is blessed with a ton of sunlight so it seems to be wasted for it to not be making me money.

However solar cells are crazy expensive. Like 40k expensive. There are government grants and tax subsidies that bring it down some but still for that price I might as well just drill my own oil.

Don't think I haven't thought of that.

But I am more interested in a game changer. So until people start making drive ways out of solar panels...here is what I am thinking:

A company looks for people in high sunshine areas with high power bills (Cali, Florida, etc). They will come and install solar panels on your roof for free and then sell you back the energy at half the price you are currently paying from the power company.

They would be able to buy in bulk to bring down the costs and encourage growth in the market. Plus after they recoup the costs (in about 10 years) they then will be making profit for the next 15 years (typical solar panels are rated for 25 years of use).

For a home owner you are able to start using green energy with no upfront costs and able to slash your power bills in half. In Florida the power company has to buy back any unused power so I might be able to lower costs even more.

Maybe there is a company out there that does this or one about to start. If that is the case then sign me up!
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillapowersolar2008-07-22T22:29:00+00:00<![CDATA[Salmonella Outbreak]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/07/16/salmonella-outbreak/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/07/16/salmonella-outbreak/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/07/16/salmonella-outbreak/#comments

Jeez even salmonella won't visit Montana.
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillaSalmonella2008-07-16T23:44:00+00:00<![CDATA[A new type of scam?]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/07/14/a-new-type-of-scam/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/07/14/a-new-type-of-scam/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/07/14/a-new-type-of-scam/#comments
I think this is a scam.

I have a landline for just the gate at my complex. I think maybe three people know the number and none of them would be in Duval.

My hunch is this. They pick an area code (407) and then find a county in the area code (Duval). Perhaps they do a little research to find out what county in that area code has the highest crime rates. They then auto-dial all the phone numbers in the area asking for credit card information to accept this call. If you had a normal land line then it might really be your friend so whats a few dollars to find out. The scammers at that point have your credit card info and your phone number which they can reverse lookup to get your name and address. At that point they have everything they need.

Could it have just been someone dialed the wrong number? Perhaps...but my gut feeling is this is a scam.

Anyone else ever get called like this?
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillacollect callCollectCallduvalscan2008-07-14T21:33:00+00:00<![CDATA[Damn You Dairy!]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/07/14/damn-you-dairy/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/07/14/damn-you-dairy/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/07/14/damn-you-dairy/#comments


Yes, it's a real board game. I took this picture at a store in Winter Park.
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorilladairylactosemilk and cheeeseMilkAndCheeese2008-07-14T17:05:00+00:00<![CDATA[Pump Up The Price]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/06/20/pump-up-the-price/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/06/20/pump-up-the-price/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/06/20/pump-up-the-price/#comments
Instead I was filling up and as I was almost done the machine started going crazy and I started crying.



Man I hope it doesn't bill my credit card for twenty thee grand...
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillafuelgasgas pricesGasPrices2008-06-20T01:02:00+00:00<![CDATA[The Real Estate Con]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/06/04/the-real-estate-con/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/06/04/the-real-estate-con/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/06/04/the-real-estate-con/#comments
In the current system the real estate broker gets typically 3% of the sale price. But if you are looking to buy a house you can afford and want to get the best price possible...why would they help you do that? The more they make you pay for the house the more they will actually make. Sure, they can only push it so far until you don't buy the house at all and they make no money...but still.

I think they should change it so real estate agents get 3% of the LIST price not the SALE price. That way you and their goals are aligned.

Of course if I was selling a house I would base it on the sale price...

Don't get me wrong...not hating on the agents..some of my closest friends are agents.

Crooks apparently but close friends nonetheless. ;)
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillabrokersreal estateRealEstate2008-06-04T19:40:00+00:00<![CDATA[A + K + G]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/04/03/a-k-g/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/04/03/a-k-g/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/04/03/a-k-g/#comments

Over this last weekend Alex got married to Kat over in Melbourne. The wedding was fantastic and I even gave a speech. I got a few people asking for me to put it online since they couldn't hear all of it so I included it below. The theme of the wedding was "a+k".

And the picture above? Well the rehearsal dinner was "island casual". I saw one of these Spring Break 2008 shirts and just thought they were the best/worst things ever. I wore one to the party and it just seemed natural to buy a bunch to pass around. So I bought 8 of these ridiculous shirts for $5 dollars a pop and it is by far the best money I have ever spent in my life.


Good Afternoon my fellow citizens.

My name is Gavin Hall and I am the non-family obligated best man.

As someone who not married yet, ladies....I am sadly unable to share the wisdom that will guide our happy couple to wedding bliss. Instead my speech is directed to you, the family and guests, on how this perfect relationship came to be. A story that truly warms the cockles of my heart.

If Disney movies can be trusted at all...then when you find the person you are supposed to be with things change forever.

For Alex, this happened during freshmen orientation at UCF...when he met me.

You see Alex and I are from very different backgrounds. I grew up in Central South Florida, Alex grew up in South Central Florida. I went to an Private Episcopalian school named St. Marks, Alex to a Private Episcopalian school named Holy Trinity. Alex started with computers at 9, I was 8 and a half. Yet, besides our wildly different past we embraced and accepted each others differences.

It was a different era then that of today. Back then we wanted to unwind, we had to play the Playstation 2...not the Playstation 3. If you wanted to ask a girl out you had to MySpace her...not Facebook her. And our only option for raisins were raisins... the kids of today's have craisins. Things have defiantly changed but it was during that time when our friendship bloomed.

As we celebrated our first new year of being friends together there was a certain calm that came over us. Everyone knew we would all soon explode from Y2K, so I asked Alex what he loved more then anything.

"Taco Bell", he said

I feel with that response you can really get an insight on the true Alex. Born to a white women in Kansas and a Black man from Kenya, there was a youthful innocence to him that drew people in...and hunger for texmex that would silently but defiantly push people away.

We both continued on our paths during college and I was metaphorically there when he joined a fraternity, fought and won a tragic battle with hypoglycemia and brutally killed his first manatee.

As Alex and I took classes together our bond continued to grow. Soon we would move from Friends to Best Friends. And then Best Friends to BFF. Best Friends Forever.

When Alex moved to DC after graduation him and I stayed in close contact. He would tell me about his job and city life. About Museums, Metros and cab fare. Oh yes, and about girl.

I would hear stories of this incredibly intelligent, witty and beautiful girl he met who was from Ohio and neutral on horses. How she would tap dance in metro stations when she got bored and how she had never used a cursed word in her life.

Soon after Kat emailed me and it simply stated, "My name is Kathrin Stayzack (sp for google sake). I'm 100% polish and my dad is in a Polka Band".

Although Kathryn's father has since swore to me that it wasn't a Polka band..I think it is THAT statement that shows the true Kathryn. Someone who is always able to see the best in any situation.

As they progressed through their courting and the blossoming of their relationship, I was literally and awkwardly there.

I would see Kathryn talk passionately about her woobie, pirogi and politics...and as I drifted off, I would understand what people had to deal with when Alex and I talk about computers.

But from the start, it was that same passion when talked about each other...that made me know where this was headed.

When Alex told me he was going to propose to Kat, I think the same question went through everyone's mind.

How is this going to effect me?

Alex let me know that I wasn't losing my BFF but instead gaining a second BFF in Kathryn. Someone who soon would be contractually obligated to be nice to him...and ergo nice to me.

A + K + G

Please help me in toasting my very good friends Alex and Kathryn.

May today be the day that you are the least in love
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillaalexrudloffbrianrudloffmikepropstspeechspringbreakwedding2008-04-03T11:54:00+00:00<![CDATA[Amber Alerts]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/03/06/amber-alerts/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/03/06/amber-alerts/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/03/06/amber-alerts/#commentsAMBER 32828" (replacing 32828 with your zip code) to 26237. Any amber alerts that are sent out in your area will be sent to you so you can keep an eye out.

Go ahead and do it now...i'll wait.
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillaamber alertAmberAlertsms2008-03-06T18:54:00+00:00<![CDATA[SxSW 08]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/03/06/sxsw-08/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/03/06/sxsw-08/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/03/06/sxsw-08/#commentsFollow me on Twitter or drop me a line if you want to meet up.
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillasxsw2008-03-06T08:21:00+00:00<![CDATA[Expectations]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/03/01/expectations/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/03/01/expectations/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/03/01/expectations/#comments
-Unknown, but frequently quoted by Barack Obama
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillaquote2008-03-01T14:38:00+00:00<![CDATA[Efficiency]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/02/15/efficiency/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/02/15/efficiency/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/02/15/efficiency/#comments
Last week Mike and I traveled to DC to give a presentation on some kick ass new things we are working on. Typically I fly a few times each month (I love transportation!) but loading and unloading of a plane is just painful for me to watch as a programmer.

The goal of course for airlines is to have all their planes in the air all the time. If they are on the ground then they are not making any money. Because of this they try to optimize how their time is spent on the ground. However the actual loading of passengers into a plane takes longer then fueling or loading the luggage onto the plane.

This is the same in our industry. It's hard to get stoked about knocking off 1ms on a query because non iframed ads take 18 seconds to load into the page or because the page has 5megs of images. I'm sure this happens in the airline industry as well. Why bother improving the efficiency of loading fuel or bags or food into a plane when you know you are going to wait for the people to load.

Most airlines, like the RIAA, seem to stay in business despite themselves but that is an entirely different post. However they all seem to take some steps in order to optimize load times of passengers. Southwest doesn't do assigned seating. When flying out of LA on JetBlue they loaded from the back and front doors of the plane at the same time which seemed to really decrease load time but that setup is not available in many airports. United and pretty much everyone else gives you a "Zone Number" and you board when your zone is called.

It's that last one that really is bothersome. From my personal experience it looks like they load everyone with a window seat first then middle then aisle row last. This seems to make common sense...you don't want to sit everyone in the aisle first so that people with window seats have to jump over them to get in. However anyone who has been on a plane knows that the 2 seconds to squeeze by someone is nothing compared to the 30 seconds it takes to store your luggage in the overhead compartments.

That seems to be the bottleneck that no one is addressing. If you seat someone in the first row in a window seat but they have to spend 30 seconds putting their bag above them no one else can load in at the same time. So everyone waits in line.

The ideal solution (from an efficiency standpoint) would be to remove over head carry ons. This would mean less time getting through security and less time loading because unless it fits under the seat in front of you it is going to be checked.

Sure that puts more load on the baggage workers but that system can be optimized because you have trained people using it (not depending on your customers to find an efficient route).

I doubt many airlines would be bold enough to actually do that but don't we want to see what we can get the baggage and fuel loaders times down to?
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillaairlines2008-02-15T13:14:00+00:00<![CDATA[Don't send flowers with FTD]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/02/15/dont-send-flowers-with-ftd/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/02/15/dont-send-flowers-with-ftd/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/02/15/dont-send-flowers-with-ftd/#commentsAlex's playbook I am going to post my disgust with FTD. Mostly because it's my blog and I can do whatever I want.

I placed an order on Jan 23rd with FTD to have 12 Red Roses delivered on Valentine's Day. Needless to say the flowers never showed up.

When you call their 800-SEND-FTD phone number and press 3 for "problems with orders" it goes straight to a busy signal (been this way for over 24 hours now).

Also all email sent to them bounce back.

Fantastic!

So not only do I look like an ass for not having flowers sent but I can't even get in touch with anyone at FTD to figure out what went wrong.

From now on I am going to only use local flower shops. In Orlando I use the Downtown Florist and they always do great work.
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillacustomer serviceCustomerServiceflowersFTDsuck2008-02-15T10:55:00+00:00<![CDATA[The Manning Genes]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/02/03/the-manning-genes/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/02/03/the-manning-genes/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/02/03/the-manning-genes/#comments
Then I actually checked Wikipedia and there is a third manning. A Cooper Manning who did go into the business world after health issues. Not to mention that Archie Manning (Payton's and Eli's Dad) was a star QB for the Colts back in the day.

Perhaps this was all common knowledge, but craziness.
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillafootballsuper bowlSuperBowl2008-02-03T22:16:00+00:00<![CDATA[1 + 1 + 1 = yay]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/01/12/1-1-1-yay/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/01/12/1-1-1-yay/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/01/12/1-1-1-yay/#comments
First is that NanoSolar has produce solar panels that will drop the costs under $1 dollar a watt. Typically solar cells cost about $4 dollars a watt so there are a lot of cases where installing solar panels doesn't make economic sense. However at under a dollar you recoup your money very quickly which would lead to mainstream adoption of solar panels.

Second is Nano Wire batteries. This allows Li-Ion batteries to be able to hold ten times their current charge. So if your laptop gets 2 hours on a single charge it is now getting 20 hours.

Third is the Tesla Roadster. Around 250 miles on a single charge but able to prove that just because you are thinking radically with your technology doesn't mean it has to look like something that people in the 50's assumed they would see in the year 2000. Just a sexy, fast car that runs on dreams electricity.

All three by themselves are exciting but bring them together and now you are looking at being able to drive from Miami to NY and back on a single charge. Add to that the ability to do the charge 100% on your own from solar panels on your house and it seems like a perfect solution. That doesn't even factor that green house gases would go down and the USA wouldn't be 100% dependent on the middle east and all the benefits that come from that.

I don't want to sound like a smelly hippie here...but damn...this is a step in the right direction.
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorillananosolarsolar panelSolarPaneltesla2008-01-12T13:52:00+00:00<![CDATA[Anchors Downtown Orlando]]>http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/01/11/anchors-downtown-orlando/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/01/11/anchors-downtown-orlando/http://www.gavinhall.org/2008/01/11/anchors-downtown-orlando/#commentsI live in East Orlando which is typically called "The University" to people who live further then 10 minutes away (In Florida distance is by time not miles). Makes sense being University of Central Florida pretty much is what East Orlando is all about. To people that live on this side of town I live in Waterford which is an area with a huge outdoor center that includes a Target, Gap, 22 Screen Movie Theater, LA Fitness, Best Buy some 30 restaurants and lord knows how many shops.

The major stores that draw people are called anchors. An anchors job is to basically take people out of their car. This allows smaller shops that are based on foot traffic (like a smoothie shop) to be able to flourish. Someone will drive to Target but while there they will walk around to some of the other shops.

Downtown Orlando is setup to be based on foot traffic. It has been that way ever since I moved here. I always found it strange because before about five years ago you really couldn't live in the heart of downtown (now there are about 20 buildings you can live in) so there was no foot traffic. The only sudo anchors at that point were clubs. Bars don't count because you don't get all dolled up and pay for parking to go sit in a bar.

It amazes me that every other developer in Central and South Florida knows the concept of Anchors and how to get people out of their cars (which is required with people not using public transportation) yet no one in Downtown ever did it.

Hopefully this will change soon. Publix and an AMC movie theater should be opening up late this year but I don't think this will be enough. Downtown needs shops and restaurants that not only are big enough to draw people to them but also unique in Orlando. I hope that as more of these new skyscrapers finish they will start to flush out shops that draw people in. Small mom and pop shops are what give culture to a downtown and that is something Orlando could use a boost of.
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]]>alexrudloffpostgorilladontownorlandoucf2008-01-11T13:38:00+00:00