Right Now Downtown

ALL ABOUT YOU

You may recall receiving an email survey through Right Now Downtown a few months ago.  While numerical scores are interesting, many of you took the time to write in your own comments and ideas about downtown.

Want to know what you think?  We can tell you now…

1.  Not one single comment was abusive or ugly.  That’s an anomaly on anonymous surveys.  It says something about you as a group.  We’re very proud to live and work among such unusually constructive souls.

2.  You want more places to have lunch.

3.  You want more places like McDonald’s and Wendy’s.

4.  You want more retail stores downtown.

5.  You want to know about marches and rallies happening downtown.

6.  You want City Center open again as a mall.

7.  You want City Center to remain standing and used for something else.

8.  You want the magic of your childhood.

We’ve been brainstorming on how to best follow up on these ideas.  While we finalize, we’re sending the intern out to chain himself to the wrecking ball at City Center.

Meanwhile, perhaps you have some follow-up solutions of your own?  Stay tuned for next week…

APPETITE FOR DESTRUCTION

Do an Internet search on “Columbus Zoo and Aquarium”: 40,300 results.

Search on “Columbus Topiary Park”: 1,210 results.

Now try these words, “City Center Demolition”…

61,100 results.

Yep, we like to watch demolition.  Who knew that the dismantling of City Center would become a major tourist attraction for downtown Columbus?  People flock into the core of the city just to gawk at the giant hole; the big rumbling construction equipment brings out the destructive kid in all of us.

They’ve got the view from the outside, but we’ve got an all-access-pass: a video view of the demolition from the inside and out (and an aerial perspective too).  It’s all courtesy of Amy Taylor, she’s Chief Officer of Operations for the Columbus Downtown Development Corporation/Capitol South – and she’s got all the details on the destruction…

Inside 43215: Behind the scenes at the demolition of City Center from Downtown Columbus on Vimeo.

CITY CENTER TRILOGY, PART THREE: PERFECT PEOPLE POWER

The park and the people rule.  That’s the very point of the Columbus Commons - it’s a place for common people to share common grounds.  The landscape provides a much-needed reality break found only in the great outdoors.

Sure, office life is productive, and virtual reality is fun.  But it’s our interactions with the natural world that feed the human soul.

That which will surround the park has a built-in, market-driven flexibility.  Plans for the perimeter include 400,000 square feet for offices, 70,000 square feet for retail, and 400 new residential spots.  Ultimately, those decisions will be shaped by human use patterns: the park and the people rule.

Some things are certain.  The Columbus Association for the Performing Arts (better known as CAPA) will be scheduling dynamic outdoor events for the Columbus Commons’ amphitheater.  Both concerts and events are in the works for spring 2011.

We know what we’ll bring to the park.  What will you bring?

http://www.downtowncolumbus.com/progress/columbus-commons

CITY CENTER TRILOGY, PART TWO: FUTURE COMMONS GROUNDS

The “Phoenix from the Ashes” story is a little too familiar, but it’s eminently appropriate for Columbus Commons… from out of the rubble of a faded local hotspot arises a new star with the same spirit of a community gathering place.

The plans have been drawn, circulated and discussed.  It’s a six-acre park in the very heart of our city.  While it’s not unusual for a thriving city to host a park at its core, it is unusual to have a park sitting on top of a place-to-park.

Yes, the underground 950-space parking garage will remain in full operation during and after construction beneath the greenery.  Retaining convenient downtown parking is a priority – and it’s actually simplified the rest of the Columbus Commons design process.

What goes with a park that sits on underground parking?  The turf can’t support multi-level high-rise structure.  So, the grand lawn must then be designed for people and human activities.  An amphitheater is in the works and an event staging area too.

Welcoming walkways, trees, benches, chairs and tables will greet guests and the Commons grounds will eventually be lined with retail, office space and housing that supports those activities to create a true downtown neighborhood.

And in the spring of 2011, there’s the Phoenix from the ashes again.  Out of the wreckage of a deserted mall, a gathering place at the city’s center.

http://www.downtowncolumbus.com/progress/columbus-commons 

vendor of the week: Sweet Thing Gourmet

Sweet Thing Gourmet is one of those indie businesses that make you smile and feel all excited again about working for yourself.

Owner Kyla Touris talks to us this week with her inspiring tale of moving to Columbus and starting a new life.

Here is what she had to say:
Okay, so I’m a jammer.  I learned from my mother the basics, and I dabbled in it a bit after college, mainly making presents for friends and such.  I was living in Montana at the time, and I would drag my husband with me to pick wild huckleberries.  It took hours to pick enough for one batch of jam, but it was amazing!  We made some as gifts and were told we should go into business.

When we moved to ohio with our infant son, we both planned to work and put out child in daycare.  I had mixed emotions about it.  Then we found our we were pregnant with twins, so that plan was derailed!  We scrimped for a few years on one salary and meanwhile, my mother-in-law had given me a subscription to Victoria Magazine, where I pored over stories about female entrepreneurs.  I was inspired by some of the stories and thought “Hmmm… there could be somthing there.”

I started researching outlets in our area and found the Worthington Farmers Market.  I wrote a business plan, shelled out money for some fancy jars and designed a logo and label with my husband.  We launched out product that year with four flavors of jams and some biscotti.  At first it was very seasonal, but gradually we began picking up holiday shows, home parties and gift boxes.  By 2005, we were going strong and our list of flavors grew quickly.  Now we are up to about 35.

The good and the bad of being your own cottage industry:
I’m my own boss, and I get to make all the decisions.  I keep the hours I want, which at times are very long.  Around the holidays, the business becomes my life, and it can be hard to shut it off.  While I started this to be home with my kids, it can be difficult to keep a balance between the two.  The creative part is fun, but the business part is a lot harder.  So much I am learning!  As the business grows, new expenses crop up and there is the challenge of maintaining the quality.  And still do it all out of our home.  My husband works with me now, and there are challenges there.  But then we turn on the music and get into the Zen of creating, and start to work through it all.

What do I love about Columbus?
I’m still learning about it.  We’ve been here almost 10 years, but so much of that has been devoted to our kids.  I love the downtown area a lot, though, with the urban feel to it.  I’m excited about the plans for the City Center site!  That’s what I love about the Pearl Market, too – it combines my country side with my urban edge.  And not to brown-nose or anything, but I love the people who run the Market.  Adam, Kacey, Tiffany and the rest of the crew are incredibly helpful and positive.  Really, it feels like a party!  Oh, and another thing about Columbus is CD101 and WCBE.  They keep me going much of the day!

Top five blogs/shops on the web?
I feel so unhip, there seems to be so little time to spend on the computer.  I did just discover Daily Candy, and I love columbusfoodie.com.  Oh, I’m so uncool!  I’ll work on it!

Who would I love to meet at the Market?
Eric Clapton!  Maybe he could come “jam” with me!

Thanks so much Kyla!  Make sure you go visit her fabulous stand at the Market and go check out her Web site too!  Tell her the Market Maven sent you!

Hurray for Capitol South for demolishing City Center and creating a site for future, long-term development.  Finding an adaptive reuse for City Center is next to impossible.  The building is about as versatile as a vacant big box store.

Small-scale, incremental development on a traditional street grid is what makes a downtown work.  The best downtowns evolve over many years.

BIG IDEAS often get cities in trouble.  In the 1950s, the BIG IDEA was building highway canyons into downtown areas and ripping down tens of thousands of houses.  The 1960s brought us urban renewal, which cleared hundreds of acres of “slums,” further destabilizing urban neighborhoods and fueling flight from the center city.

The BIG IDEA in the 1970s was skywalks, built as part of a plan to make downtown one big bunker.  The bunker plan got refined in the 1980s, when downtown malls were built to make downtown feel just like the suburbs.  Neat!

Now is the time to get out of the way and let entrepreneurs rebuild downtown one building and one storefront at a time.  A little patience will get us the best result.

Press coverage about Columbus Commons from February 4, 2009.

Mayor Coleman during a press announcement on February 4, 2009 at The OSU Urban Arts Space.

Guy Worley during a press announcement on February 4, 2009 at The OSU Urban Arts Space.

Hugh Dorrian and Michael Mentel during a press announcement on February 4, 2009 at The OSU Urban Arts Space.