From Wikitravel

Northeast Ohio ("NEO") [1], USA, is usually defined as the 13-county region, with a population of 4.5 million (according to 2000 US Census Bureau), surrounding the Greater Cleveland Area and including the mid-sized cities of Akron, Canton and Youngstown. The Combined Statistical Area of Cleveland-Akron-Elyria, with a population of 3 million, is the 14th largest Combined Metropolitan Area in the United States. The metropolitan hub of the region, Greater Cleveland, is the five-county Cleveland-Elyria-Mentor MSA accounting for nearly 50% of the NEO population.

Contents 1 Counties 2 Regions 3 Cities 3.1 Other destinations 4 Understand 5 Get in 5.1 By plane 5.2 By car 5.3 By train 5.4 By boat 6 Get around 7 See 7.1 Itineraries 8 Do 8.1 Sports 8.2 Outdoors 9 Learn 10 Work 11 Eat 11.1 Hungarian Cuisine 12 Drink 12.1 Wineries 13 Stay safe 14 Get out

Counties

Northeast Ohio is defined within the region as including 13 counties as follows:

• Ashtabula County
• Columbiana County
• Cuyahoga County
• Geauga County
• Lake County
• Lorain County
• Mahoning County
• Medina County
• Portage County
• Stark County
• Summit County
• Trumbull County
• Wayne County

Regions

• Greater Cleveland

Cities

• Akron, the County Seat of Summit County, was formerly known as the Rubber Capital, and has successfully made the transition from the world's tire manufacturing hub to its high-tech Polymers Research Center, now referred to as the is the Polymer Capital. It is also the home of the All-American Soap Box Derby.
• Canton, the County Seat of Stark County, is the "Birthplace of Professional American Football".
• Cleveland, the County Seat of Cuyahoga County, is the "Rock and Roll Capital of the World" and home to one of the five richest collections of arts and culture institutions in the US.
• Youngstown, an old steel town, is the County Seat of Mahoning County.

Other destinations

• Aurora has a historic town center that is somehow protected from the excitement of Geauga Lake and Wildwater Kingdom Amusement Park and the Aurora Farms Outlet Center.
• Austintown is a suburb of Youngstown with a population of 32,000. It is a mixture of diverse races and industries. It is highlighted to be the next Boardman within 5-10 years.
• Beachwood is the cosmopolitan mecca of Cleveland's East Side, including the core of both its "Fashion District" and its "Restaurant Row"".
• Berea is a small town on the Rocky River and home to Baldwin-Wallace College as well as the NFL Cleveland Browns Training Center.
• Boardman is a suburb of Youngstown with a population of 38,000. It is home to most shopping in the Mahoning Valley.
• Burton is the center of Ohio's Maple Country.
• Cleveland Heights, first named "Turkey Ridge", is an inner ring suburb that sits atop Cedar Hill (the last of the Allegheny foothills), overlooking University Circle and some breathtaking views of the Cleveland skyline.
• Chagrin Falls, named after a French fur trader Sequin, is a charming town in suburban Cleveland, sitting atop the waterfalls of the Chagrin River.
• Chardon, the County Seat of Geauga County, displays New England Charm in the center of Ohio's "Snow Belt".
• Cuyahoga Falls just north of Akron sits atop the waterfalls of the Cuyahoga River.
• Fairlawn is the commercial mecca on the northwest side of Akron and was home of many of the pioneers of the rubber industry, such as the Goodyear, Seiberling and Firestone families.
• Fairport Harbor is a small town on Lake Erie at the mouth of the Grand River and has a beautiful kid-friendly beach just below its Lighthouse.
• Elyria is the County Seat of Lorain County, set in a traditional "Connecticut Western Reserve" town plan. It is home to the highly regarded and very progressive Lorain County Community College.
• Hudson is a picturesque Western Reserve town, located between Cleveland and Akron.
• Independence is the commercial mecca south of Cleveland, providing businesses accessibility to the East and West Sides of town as well as both Cleveland and Akron. It will soon be home to the NBA Cleveland Cavaliers training center.
• Kent, home of Kent State University, is a quaint town with a very diverse community (particularly on the liberal to conservative scale) and is home to the annual Folk Music Festival. It is the home of the Liquid Crystal Institute where liquid crystal technology was invented.
• Lakewood, originally named "Rockport', is the inner ring suburban home of the Gold Coast, high-rise residences lined up along Lake Erie, just west of Cleveland's Edgewater Park. It is also the most densely populated city between New York and Chicago.
• Lorain is an old steel town on Lake Erie at the mouth of the Black River.
• Medina, the County Seat of Medina County, is another quaint Western Reserve town with antique stores, craft shops and cafes surrounding its Public Square.
• Mentor, in Lake County, is home to Mentor Headlands Beach State Park.
• Middlefield is one of the hubs of Ohio's Amish Community.
• Oberlin, in Lorain County, is a small town that is home to the very liberal arts college of Oberlin College. Throughout history, the United States has experienced many changes for the better in sleepy Oberlin, Ohio.
• Painesville, the County Seat of Lake County, is home to Lake Erie College and also has a historical Public Square as its town center.
• Peninsula is a historic town tucked away in the Cuyahoga Valley National Park and is one of the stops of the Cuyahoga Valley Rail.
• Ravenna is the County Seat of Portage County, just east of Kent.
• Shaker Heights is one of America's first planned suburban communities and has served as the home of many of NEO's corporate, legal and health care leaders. It previously served as an enclave for the North Union Shaker Community.
• Solon is a suburb to Cleveland's southeast, home of many of Northeast Ohio's Real Estate Industry elite, and noted in the original theme song from The Drew Carey Show, "let's go bowlin' in Solon".
• Vermillion is a lakefront town in Lorain County with many marinas.
• Warren is the County Seat of Trumbull County.
• Wooster is the County Seat of Wayne County and is home of the College of Wooster.

Understand

When visiting or even thinking of Cleveland, the integration of the economies, communities, media coverage, culture and arts is extraordinarily interwoven with all of NEO (as can be proven by analyzing commute patterns among the counties). Unlike the vast majority of large US cities that have grown through annexation of outlying areas in their central counties and beyond (e.g., Chicago or Columbus), the City of Cleveland proper only encompasses 1/3 of Cuyahoga County, which has nearly 60 municipalities. It would be a mistake, frequently made, to consider the City of Cleveland as a point of direct comparison with other major US Cities. NEO simply isn't structured like most US metropolitan regions, in part, because of its rich history of individual centers of industry in the 1800s merging together into one super-metropolis throughout the 1900s.

Accordingly, residents throughout Cuyahoga County and surrounding counties most often proudly consider themselves to be "Clevelanders" and "Northeastern Ohioans" (even though they may also be "Akronites" or "Cantonians"). The result is an incredibly rich mosaic of ethnic urban neighborhoods and diverse suburban environments that offers the flavor (and food) of America and the world. Thus, many of the visitor attractions that one would associate with Cleveland and/or its surrounding environs (i.e., NEO), would normally be referred to as "Cleveland".

Get in

By plane

• Cleveland Hopkins International Airport, CLE. A hub for Continental Airlines.
• Akron-Canton Regional Airport, CAK.
• Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport, YNG.

By car

Northeast Ohio is served by the following interstate highways:

• I-71 connects Cleveland to Medina and then runs southwest toward Columbus.
• I-76 serving Akron and Youngstown and connecting to beyond Pennsylvania to the east.
• I-77 starts in Cleveland and runs south through Akron, Canton, New Philadelphia and beyond.
• I-80 is the Ohio Turnpike (a toll road) that runs across the northern part of the state, serving Cleveland, Akron and Youngstown (where I-80 and I-76 criss cross).
• I-90 also serves the far northern part of the state, including Cleveland, Lorain, Elyria, Mentor, Painesville and Ashtabula.

By train

Cleveland and Elyria are served by Amtrak.

By boat

The American Canadian Caribbean Line and the Great Lakes Cruising Company provide cruises that include Cleveland on the itineria.

Get around

Most points within NEO are easily accessible by auto with longer distances less than 1.5 hours in driving time. Most of NEO's counties are served by public transit systems that have cooperative linkage points among them (in order from largest system to smallest):

• Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority - [2]

• Metro Regional Transit Authority (METRO RTA) - [3]

• Stark Area Regional Transit Authority (SARTA) - [4]

• LAKETRAN - [5]

• Western Reserve Transit Authority - [6]

• Lorain County Transit - [7]

• Medina County Transit - [8]

• Ashtabula County Transportation Systems (ACTS) - [9]

• Geauga County Transit - [10]

• Portage Area Regional Transit Authority - [11]

• Community Action Rural Transit System (CARTS) (Columbiana County) - [12]

See

Itineraries

• Amish Country travel through rural land and small towns taking great care for the horses and buggies along the way. Find food and crafts for which the Amish community is famous, primarily centered in Geauga County (east of Cleveland) and Holmes County (southwest of Canton).
• Hall of Fame Cycle. Tourists can plan visits to:
  • the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum, Cleveland
  • Inventure Place (the National Inventors Hall of Fame), Akron
  • the Pro Football Hall of Fame, Canton
• Ohio & Erie Canal Byway.
• U.S. Presidential Libraries and Monuments, Northeast Ohio includes the homes, museums and monuments for the following U.S. Presidents:
  • James Garfield Cabin Moreland Hills (formerly part of Orange Township). Garfield Home Mentor. Garfield Memorial in Lakeview Cemetery, Cleveland.
  • William McKinley, Presidential Library and Memorial, [13], 800 McKinley Monument Drive NW, telephone +1 330 455-7043, fax +1 330 455-1137.
  • Behind every great man is a great woman. So, pay homage to the Presidents' wives at the First Ladies National Historic Site, 205 & 331 Market Ave. S, telephone +1 330 452-0876, victorian family home of US Presidential First Lady Ida Saxton McKinley now serves as an educational center on the subject of contributions by the wives of US Presidents and other women with significant roles in historical US politics.

Do

Sports

• Baseball.
  • MLB: Cleveland Indians.
  • AA: Akron Aeros.
  • A:
    • Lake County Captains.
    • Mahoning Valley Scrappers.
• Basketball. NBA: Cleveland Cavaliers.
• Football. NFL: Cleveland Browns.
• Hockey. AHL: Cleveland Barons.
• Hockey. CHL: Youngstown Steelhounds.

Outdoors

• Cuyahoga Valley National Park. Ohio's only National Park stretches across (north-south) the middle of Northeast Ohio.
• North Coast Beaches. Along the southern shore of Lake Erie are a large number of public beaches.
• Metropark Systems:
  • Cleveland Metroparks
  • Lake County Metroparks
  • Lorain County Metroparks
  • Mill Creek MetroParks - Youngstown - Mahoning County
  • Summit County MetroParks

Learn

Northeast Ohio's network of 55 colleges and universities comprises the second largest concentration of educational institutions in the nation (after New York City). Outstanding university and vocational training programs, coupled with exceptional liberal arts colleges, provide abundant educational opportunities.

Northeast Ohio offers a variety of educational institutions. Among the area's colleges and universities are:

Cuyahoga County

• Baldwin-Wallace College, Berea
• Capital University, Cleveland Center
• Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland
• Cleveland College of Jewish Studies, Beachwood
• Cleveland Institute of Art
• Cleveland State University
• Cuyahoga Community College
• David N. Myers College, Cleveland
• John Carroll University, University Heights
• Notre Dame College of Ohio, South Euclid
• Ohio College of Podiatric Medicine, Cleveland
• Ursuline College, Pepper Pike

Summit County

• University of Akron
• University of Akron Community Technical College

Portage County

• Kent State University, Kent
• Hiram College, Hiram
• Northeastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine, Rootstown

Lake County

• Lake Erie College, Painesville
• Lakeland Community College, Willoughby

Lorain County

• Oberlin College, Oberlin
• Lorain County Community College, Elyria

Stark County

• Malone College, Canton
• Mount Union College, Alliance
• Kent State University Stark Campus
• Stark State College of Technology, Canton
• Walsh University, North Canton

Mahoning County

• Youngstown State University
• YSU College of Health Human Services

Columbiana County

• Allegheny Wesleyan College, Salem
• Kent State University East Liverpool Campus
• Kent State University Salem Campus

Trumbull County

• Kent State University Trumbull Campus, Warren

Wayne County

• The College of Wooster

Work

Enjoy your visit, but you'll probably want to stay. Northeast Ohio is a global corporate center where national and international corporations grow and develop from the area’s strong, diversified economy. Poised as the leading center of commerce between New York City and Chicago, NEO has been ranked by Fortune magazine as the sixth best location in North America to conduct business. Five major industries have evolved to become the economic strength of the region: Health & Medicine, Science & Engineering, Biotechnology & Biomedical, Manufacturing and Education.

Twenty-five companies headquartered in Northeast Ohio are on the 2006 list of Fortune 1000 U.S. corporations. More than 37% of the Fortune 500 companies are present in Northeast Ohio through corporate headquarters, major divisions, subsidiaries and sales offices. In addition, more than 150 international companies have a presence there.

Northeast Ohio has a diverse mix of business activity, including the following Fortune 1000 Company Headquarters (according to the 2006 list):

• 112 Goodyear Tire and Rubber, Akron - Rubber
• 153 Progressive Corporation, Mayfield Heights - Insurance
• 184 First Energy, Akron - Utilities
• 210 Eaton Corporation, Cleveland - Motor Vehicle/Parts
• 213 National City Corporation, Cleveland - Banking
• 279 Parker-Hannifin Corporation, Cleveland - Aerospace
• 311 Sherwin Williams Company, Cleveland - Paint and Coatings
• 325 Key Corp, Cleveland - Banking
• 417 Timken Company, Canton - Bearings and Specialty Steel
• 486 Lubrizol Corporation, Wickliffe - Lubricants and Chemicals
• 589 Nacco Industries, Cleveland - Industrial Equipment
• 671 Diebold, Canton - Electronics
• 674 PolyOne, Avon Lake - Chemicals
• 678 RPM International, Medina - Chemicals
• 704 Aleris International, Beachwood - Metals
• 765 JM Smucker, Orrville - Food Consumer Products
• 825 American Greetings, Cleveland - Greeting Cards
• 839 Jo Ann Stores, Hudson - Specialty Retailer
• 846 Medical Mutual of Ohio, Cleveland - Health Insurance
• 878 Cleveland-Cliffs, Cleveland - Mining & Crude Oil
• 888 Applied Industrial Technologies, Cleveland - Bearings
• 922 Agilysis, Mayfield Heights - Electronics
• 928 Lincoln Electric, Cleveland - Arc Welding Equipment
• 955 Invacare, Elyria - Medical Products and Equipment
• 995 A. Shulman, Akron - Chemicals

Eat

Not only are there great places to dine and things to eat in Northeast Ohio, but these cuisines, several of which define American Food, were born here:

• Ballpark/Stadium Mustard the popular brown mustard comes from Cleveland.
• Hamburgers invented by the Menches brothers of Akron.
• Hot Dogs, while obviously descending from the global sausage family and much debate exists about naming the American treat, the first frankfurter wrapped in a bun (a "Hot Dog") was invented by Harry M. Stevens of Niles in 1904.
• Ice Cream Cones the cornucopia ice cream cone was also invented by the Menches.
• Lifesavers Candies invented in 1912 by Clarence Crane of Cleveland (also the father of famous American poet Hart Crane).
• Maple Syrup go to Geauga County in Northeast Ohio, the Village of Burton is the heart of maple country.
• Roasted Buckeyes where else would you go for this delicious snack but the Buckeye State?
• Salisbury Steak created by and named for Clevelander Dr. James H. Salisbury who desired to perfect the meat curing process (you can pay homage to him at Lakeview Cemetery near University Circle.) Just ask the Menches brothers who must claim, "It's just a fancy hamburger covered in gravy."

Hungarian Cuisine

• Greater Cleveland has the largest Hungarian population outside of Budapest.
  • Balaton, 13133 Shaker Sq., Cleveland, +1 216 921-9691.
  • Budapest Hungarian Restaurant, 13968 Cedar Rd, University Heights, +1 216 371-2280.

Drink

• The House of Blues, downtown Cleveland near Public Square.
• Great Lakes Brewing, [14] in the Ohio City District of Cleveland.
• The Powerhouse on the west bank of the Flats of Cleveland.

Wineries

• Dankorona Winery, 155 Treat Road, Aurora, +1 330 562-9245, just west of Geauga Lake.
• Ferrante Winery & Ristorante, 5585 State Route 307, Geneva, +1 440 466-VINO.
• Jilbert Winery, Valley City, [15].
• Maize Valley Farm Market and Winery, just east of Hartville, [16].
• Markko Vineyards, Conneaut, [17].
• Quarry Ridge Winery, 58 Front Street, Berea, +1 440 986-2255.
• Viking Vineyards & Winery, 268 Old Forge Road, Kent, phone +1 330 678-2080, fax +1 330

678-6364.

• Virant Family Winery, Geneva, [18], 541 Atkins Road, Geneva, +1 440 466-1314.

Stay safe

Get out

• Lake Erie Islands. Located west of Cleveland, a group of picturesque and festive islands in Lake Erie are accessible via ferry. In addition to several Ohio State Parks located on the islands, there is plenty to do including wineries, restaurants, bars, marinas and beaches.
• Lake Erie Tour Route and Lighthouses. Go back to the mainland and see the shoreline. The drive (or boat ride) around Lake Erie takes you through the Working Waterfronts around Buffalo NY, Cleveland OH, Detroit MI, Erie PA, Toledo, OH, and southern Ontario and is intermingled with beautiful preservations of flora and fauna as well as the history of North America's first westward expansion, the Old Northwest Territory.
• Niagara Falls
• Wayne National Forest
• Nearby cities (less than 3 hour drive) include: Detroit, Toledo, Columbus, Pittsburgh, Buffalo.

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