jonoh81

People are acting like this will create a walkable neighborhood or something when it's just creating more car-dependency and use when there are literally plenty of similar nearby options that someone would have to drive to anyway. How is this any different than say, people in German Village demanding abundant parking in front of their homes? It's all about arguments for car convenience, not neighborhood quality. Not getting the reasoning on this at all, and seems a bit hypocritical given all the mocking of the NIMBYs in GV and Clintonville for basically the same thing.

If that weird, post-industrial wasteland that is South High, railroad tracks and 104 can see new development, there really isn't any excuse anywhere.

Meh, I will continue to always want to see the best use of land regardless, and I don't think a car wash is going to magically change the trajectory of the area. It's the kind of thing you see built when an area has no real momentum to begin with, just like self-storage units. I feel the same way about people being all excited about a Sheetz gas station. It's... a gas station. Not sure why anyone should be satisfied with car-centric, car-dependent, low-density development anywhere within Columbus' borders at this point.

This is getting thumbs up?

5 stories is not bad for the location, but I have to chuckle at the suggestion that "max density" is coincidently the maximum height before steel.

I'm usually the one who is harsh on development, but this looks okay to me. Garage instead of surface parking, mix of uses, a not too bad density. The only thing I don't really like is not directly related- the proposed extension of John Shields Parkway to this site. Bridge Street is hardly a long haul, and it would be a waste to build another river crossing just to service this site and connect to Dublin Road.

True, though it kind of bothers me that people who would work at Easton can't afford or don't have access to reliable transportation. Something seems wrong with that.

But who is calling for all sorts of density without also building the proper infrastructure? This seems like a straw man to me. This is exactly why a regional plan is so necessary. Put it all on paper and make sure things don't spiral out of control. You are going to need roads, sewer and power infrastructure, police, fire, etc. regardless if you get sprawl or density. Sprawl just has many inherent disadvantages to it that will end up costing residents more financially in the long run. 10 miles of roadway being paid for by 100 people is a lot more expensive than 10 miles of roadway being paid for by 1000. You kind of hint at some of the problems with sprawl by talking about the Northridge busing situation. Kids wouldn't need to be on a bus for an hour or more if everything wasn't spread so far apart to begin with. How much is that setup costing the district on fuel and driver hours alone? Density is FAR superior on budgets, as well. I just gave an example via roadways, but it applies to everything. The more people within a given area, the more local budgets receive in taxes for schools, services and infrastructure. There are endless studies on how much more draining low-density sprawl is to local budgets than more urban-style development. There's a reason why urban areas have to subsidize rural infrastruture. What do you mean capable of supporting it? As in there wouldn't be any demand? Isn't the Columbus area supposed to get like a million more people over the next few decades? We're already in a housing shortage that requires at least 2x the construction rate annually, so this seems suspect. I'm of the Field of Dreams thinking here- if you build it, they will come.

The Easton area doesn't seem all that exclusive, though. Outside of the immediate complex, the area is pretty middle class with some of the most diverse neighborhoods in the city. It's not like it's Bexley. Affordable housing is always welcome, just a weird headline to me.

Maybe they'll rip out what they've started and go with something much bigger. The area can certainly support it, and that's what the zoning change was for.

Issues of quality aside, why would 5-over-1 type density be bad for the community vs. low-density sprawl that factually would cause far more community problems in the long run?

Yeah, but we have people who live in urban neighborhoods who should have no expectation of low-density development and they still act like that. Sure, some people in Licking County are worried about changing the kind of lifestyle they have now, but change is going to happen whether they like it or not at this point. So they either roll with it and get the best outcome possible, or they fight it and ensure only the worst- and arguably most damaging- forms of sprawl get built. Or they can move. There is no longer any reality in which the status quo can be maintained.

Easton needs to get going on those 40-story towers.

Huh? The apartments that would be built are almost certainly not going to be Section 8, but having mixed-income neighborhoods has been shown to be economically beneficial to all. The problem with low-income housing 50 years ago was that racist governments wanted it all to go into the same place, concentrated away from everyone else. And concentrated poverty is horrific for improving the lives of those residents. But having a percentage of units be low-income in otherwise market-rate buildings doesn't produce those negative outcomes. Also, Section 8 housing recipients have no worse crime rates than the rest of the population. Studies often show that most Section 8 housing typically goes into neighborhoods that already have elevated levels of crime- which is then unfairly associated with the low-income housing by the public- but that Section 8 itself plays no statistical role in increasing it. In fact, there is even evidence that Section 8 may actually have a mitigating factor on neighborhood crime rates. It's similar to the belief that people on welfare have greater rates of drug use, something studies also haven't found. Basically, everyone wants to crap on poor people because certain things about them sound reasonable, but then the evidence just isn't there.

Maybe they're just preparing for Ohio's new climate in 20 years.

lol, you've never lived in a small town. It's a good-old-boys network top to bottom. Cities are far more accountable and it's not even close.

The crappy 5 story would almost certainly be praised by said commission. They're completely out of touch with where they live. I've said it before, but I don't know why developers just don't go to the City. Half of these neighborhood commissions just function as power trips for some people and are not seriously working in good faith to get the best possible project. The one version that was tall, dense and didn't demolish all the historic building was perfect. The neighborhood gatekeepers are making housing more unaffordable than it should be.

This is basically how I think the area should develop, via a map. Lots of mixed-density residential on a street grid, a mixed-use corridor along 62, streets upgraded to bike/transit boulevards, etc. https://www.allcolumbusdata.com/how-we-should-develop-around-intel/

Are any of the buildings fronted along the streets or are they set back with parking? It's kind of hard to tell from that. If it's the latter, yeah, that's not great.

So many bash cities for their supposed local government corruption and disfunction, but small towns are next level. Remember New Rome?

Same issue here. Why are they only utilizing like 1/4th of the site for housing? Just don't get the thinking.

Absolute waste. It calls into question an organization's purpose for providing housing if they're not going to bother maximizing the housing on their sites. They could've fit 10x more here with little issue. The fact that they took down a perfectly resuable old building in the process makes it even worse.

Just saying, any single project is not going to be "transformative". The way it's being described, it sounds like a huge complex of buildings, but that doesn't seem realistic given the space available, and I am not keen on the idea of mass demolition.

I can't wait for all those ghosthunting shows to book rooms at the hotel.

Same people argue against bike lanes and rail, ensuring traffic remains as big an issue as possible. All they really care about is personal convenience. A good commission would laugh them out of the room.