Downtown Cleveland is once again a bustling place, and its recent redevelopment has seen the emergence of several distinct subsections. In its traditional heart, among the banks and corporate headquarters, stand glamorous shopping malls. One, the Avenue at Tower City in the Terminal Tower, has an observation deck on the 42nd floor (summer Sat & Sun 11am-4.30pm; rest of year Sat & Sun 11am-3.30pm; $2, tickets from the visitor center in the lobby). Another, the Arcade , is a skylit hall built in 1890. The Playhouse Square Center (tel 216/241-6000, ), twelve blocks away at 1501 Euclid Ave, is an impressive complex of four renovated old theaters. Take a look at the gorgeous lobby of the small Ohio Theatre, with its starlit-sky ceiling.

Just to the southwest, in what were once mostly vacant lots, is the Gateway District . New restaurants and bars surround Jacobs Field stadium (tel 216/420-4200, ) - home of the Indians baseball team - and the equally modern multipurpose Gund Arena (tel 216/420-2000, ), which hosts the Cavaliers basketball team and major sporting and entertainment events.

West of the Gund is the riverfront , where one of the nation's busiest waterways shares space with excellent bars, clubs and restaurants strung out along a boardwalk. On both banks of the Cuyahoga River, the Flats , long known for its nightlife, relishes its industrial setting. Magnificent grimy old buildings, warehouses and slag heaps, set in among fourteen bridges , appear powerful and romantic rather than depressing, a proud testimony to Cleveland's manufacturing history.

A short but steep walk uphill leads to the Warehouse District , a nicely developing stretch of nineteenth-century commercial buildings between West Third and West Tenth streets, given over to shops, galleries, cafés and trendy new restaurants. North, on the other side of the busy Cleveland Memorial Shoreway (Hwy-2), the waters of Lake Erie lap gently into North Coast Harbor , the new showpiece of Midwest regeneration. To see the city from the water, try a two-hour cruise on the Goodtime III ($12.50; tel 216/861-5110) from the dock at East Ninth Street Pier, just beyond the I.M. Pei-designed Rock and Roll Hall of Fame . Next door to the Rock Hall - as Clevelanders refer to it - is the giant Great Lakes Science Center (daily 9.30am-5.30pm; OMNIMAX open until 9pm with shows on the hour; $7.75 for museum, $7.75 OMNIMAX theater, $10.95 combo ticket; tel 216/694-2000, ). Its white paneling and glass frontage perfectly complement its neighbor. There are no standout displays, though the cumulative effect of the 350 interactive exhibits (many on meteorological and aquatic themes) makes this a very enjoyable place to spend a few hours. Across the road, the futuristic, 72,000-seat Cleveland Stadium is the new home of the reincarnated Browns pro football team (tel 440/891-5000, ). After living in NFL limbo for three years, Cleveland football fans joyously welcomed a new franchise for the 1999 season.

To the west of the river, Ohio City is one of Cleveland's hipper neighborhoods, with junk stores, Victorian clapboard houses and the busy West Side Market at Lorain Avenue and West 25th Street, selling all manner of ethnic foods (Mon & Wed 7am-4pm, Fri & Sat 7am-6pm). It's easily spotted by its redbrick Victorian clock tower.

Downtown

• Downtown

Ohio cities


All U.S. city guides