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A view of the unrenovated warehouse located at 435 West State Street in East Franklinton.
Development plans in East Franklinton continue to chug right along at a steady clip. Just three months ago, the information gathering process kickstarted with a public input meeting and a series of interviews with neighborhood stakeholders.
“Many of those stakeholders came from within East Franklinton, like major property owners and area commissioners,” says Brian Davis, Planning Assistant with ACP Visioning+Planning, Ltd, one of the firms working on the plan. “But we also contacted people outside the neighborhood including the local arts community, urban designers and members of the city-wide creative class.”
Davis says that several themes emerged during this process, which he distills down into five main areas:
- Affordability – The requirement for affordable living opportunities was expressed by both existing residents in East Franklinton as well as potential new young artists who are willing to move into the neighborhood.
- Diversity – The requirement of diversity has remained the most often repeated topic during the public input process thus far. The definition of diversity varied in use, but includes an emphasis on the resident mix.
- Identity – East Franklinton should not strive to be the next Short North. It was made clear that the efforts in this area should not seek to replicate other successful neighborhoods in Columbus. The need for a unique identity is essential.
- Branding – “Creative Community” is not an adequate descriptor. This title does not accurately describe the comprehensive types of people that would be attracted to a revitalized East Franklinton neighborhood. Innovation District was proposed as an alternative, but was not supported by the entire community.
- Optimism – Recent developments in East Franklinton provide a unique opportunity for continual momentum. Participants in the public input process showed a strong sense of optimism throughout.
Attendees of the September meeting were also asked for assistance in identifying pride points within the neighborhood, as well as sites with strong potential for future redevelopment. Those focus areas include 400 West Rich Street, Dodge Park, the former Riverside Bradley area, McDowell Avenue, and the blocks located between Town and Rich Streets.
“What could happen with those spaces still needs to be identified,” says Davis. “But those were consistently identified as areas of interest.”
A conceptual rendering of a renovated warehouse (left) next to new construction residential units (right) proposed for West State Street — Rendering by m+a architects
The planning efforts for East Franklinton continue next week with a two-day series of workshops and and a community open house event at the warehouse space at 435 West State Street. The first workshop takes place on the evening of Tuesday, December 13th and will bring attendees up to speed on the project thus far, provide examples of other similar district plans in other parts of the US, and will look for feedback on key themes.
“What we learn on the first night will drive what happens on the second night,” says Davis. “But we want to continue narrowing people’s interests and concerns from very broad to specific.”
The all-day open house event will kick off the second day where the urban design team will develop a refined set of project principles based on input from day one’s workshop.
“These design concepts will be graphically illustrated and mapped across the study area,” explains Steve Kearney, Senior Planner with Goody Clancy, the planning firm that is the contract holder for the project. “While this will be a working session, we welcome anyone who is interested in participating.”
The concepts developed throughout the day will then be presented to the public during the evening workshop on day two.
“Participants will have a second opportunity to further refine the planning effort,” says Kearney. “While workshop #1 will be about creating the project principles, workshop #2 will be about how these principles may physically emerge.”
Once again, input from both inside and outside the neighborhood is encouraged for this ongoing process.
“Any successful planning effort must build on the assets and authenticity of East Franklinton, and this cannot happen without residential input,” states Kearney. “Likewise, it will be essential to understand what the creative class is looking for in a neighborhood. This has to be a joint effort.”
Beyond next week, the planning efforts will continue with a market analysis, which will take a look at housing, commercial and retail needs within the planning area.
“The market analysis will significantly shape the outcome of the overall plan,” says Kearney. “The ultimate goal of the planning effort is to develop an achievable vision for East Franklinton that will result in implementation, and market realities must be taken into account in order for this to occur.”
The public presentation on the market findings will occur sometime in mid-January 2012.
For more details on the upcoming East Franklinton Plan Community Workshops, CLICK HERE for event info.
An interior view of the unrenovated warehouse 435 West State Street in East Franklinton.
I’m curious what identity they try to create here. I feel an artist community may make it too similar to the Short North. I think the Innovation District is an interesting idea but I’d like more details.
I don’t think the Short North has been an “artist community” for at least a decade. It does still have a high concentration of galleries, but I’m not sure if it’s as affordable for artists as it used to be, generally speaking (I’m sure you can still find a good deal here and there). In the Short North of today, an artist would be more likely to live in a regular apartment, rent a studio space outside of the neighborhood, and maybe on a rare occasion have a show at one of the galleries in the neighborhood. I also don’t think there has ever really been any serious form of artist live/work spaces housed under one roof, which is one of the concept proposed for warehouse spaces in Franklinton.
I think Franklinton has an opportunity to address some of these concerns, as well as open things up to other non-artist creatives who are interested in new spaces.
I don’t like the term “FTON”. I’m no prude, but I immediately think of “Fuck-ton” when I see FTON and don’t think something that conjures up imagery of swear words provides a positive mental image as far as neighborhood branding goes. Sorta like how in the early ’80s the Short North was called SoButt for “South of Buttles”. Perhaps I just need to get my mind out of the gutter.
+1
Fuck-ton isn’t gonna be good for anyone.
+2 on FTON
+3 on FTON. It sounds lazy.
Any thoughts on the neighborhood plan as a whole? Aside from the “branding”. ;)
Well, I’m a sort of creative-minded person (i.e. I don’t make things but I deeply appreciate art, music, high fashion, conservation, and old things), and after graduating I’ve thought that living in Franklinton would be awesome, with its proximity to downtown, low prices, and interesting residents. Plus, I have long had a major soft spot for Rich st., something about all that brick and old industrial buildings just makes me swoon, along with killer transit access.
The plans definitely increase my interest in the area, because I love community-building and it sounds like east Franklinton is becoming a better place to live every day. One thing it noticeably needs is a food coop, or a real grocery store of some sort.
To a large degree East Franklinton is a blank slate full of empty lots and warehouses with great proximity to downtown (location, location, location). I think the key will be taking it slow if it is to really become an arts community and not something NRI would cook up. Unfortunately converting these large spaces or building new will cost a lot of money and I think where it will come from is the big question. There is a lot of community goodwill here and I would hate to see that taken advantage of by outside investors who would control the purse strings. Part of the strategy will probably need to be how to keep long term prices affordable if it is to remain an arts community instead of an investment which gets flipped when the $$$ appear.
+4 on FTON
@LATFJoss
As far as the grocery store, I think the Aldi on Mound St. is actually pretty decent if you give it a try. I also appreciate their common sense approach to bags and carts. I think it fits in well with the quirky character of the area.
It will be interesting to see how this plays out. The Short North was built of many run down small scale commercial spaces that could be bought cheap and renovated by small to mid level investors. This really is not the case in Franklinton. There will have to be business partnerships created with larger (maybe outside) investors.with deeper pockets. In the current climate there will probably be some serious vetting and the higher mortgage payments that come with these projects. I hope it can keep some of the grassroots feel that it has at the present time.
All the branding they would need for me would be to have affordable, good housing- for people of all income levels, including students, recent grads, creative types, even young families (especially pre-school age until CCS get’s their shit together) and of course the families who already live there.
I think the warehouses and the general feel of Franklinton is best suited to housing and stupid/office space (especially for local businesses). It should be walkable and a good place to live of course with restaraunts and bars and basic things like that, but it doesn’t need to be the gallery district or the entertainment district or draw in visitors from the suburbs at all. It should draw in residents and businesses who need small offices. It could be a place where lots of people can move so that downtown can have a larger population close by, and it could support the more specialized neighborhoods already in place, such as the arena district and short north. Especially once we get some kind of trolley/street car that just goes around to the various neighborhoods. There are a LOT of people who would love to live closer to the action, but the prices are just to high. This area is the cheapest in the region, and it should be used to ensure as much affordable housing as the people would like.
Wasn’t “fuck city” a branding suggestion of Gob Bluth?
fton was a sticker meant to mimic the country code oval stickers you see on cars. im no advocate for rebranding the area as fton thats for sure. all great comments please come to the meetings and share these thoughts!
i dont think we will ever see a grocery store in east franklinton as the BD kroger is a 10-15 min walk across the river. something smaller though would be nice. greater franklinton west of 315 is greatly under served imo. aldi at central point just doesn’t cut it.
The streets need a major road diet….at least from what I see in the rendering.
Mike – Are you saying they need a diet to get to the state in the rendering, or that the rendering still needs a diet? I think it looks pretty accurate as to what is there now… a travel lane in each direction and on-street parking on both sides (one parallel, one diagonal – similar to part of Gay Street).
The neighborhood does need fewer one-ways IMHO. I’m not a big fan of one-way streets in residential neighborhoods.
Yea, the streets definately need a diet. I’ve seen people fly through there, especially on Rich. Make them two way.
I really hope developers try and utilize as many of the industrial buildings as possible. It’s one of the larger concentrations and Columbus as a whole does not offer too many options when it comes to loft living. (Our lack of Rust Belt status and industrial wastelands) I realize some of these buildings are probably too far gone or contaminated so some may be cost prohibitive. They should mix in 10-20% income based units whenever possible, which is what they should be doing everywhere.
The area as a whole is quite the hodge podge, which may actually work to its advantage. Because of that hodge podge, the neighborhood could naturally become quite quirky, for a lack of a better term.
A centrally located park/gathering space would be nice as well. Could also provide for a good outdoor gallery space.
I’m referring that the road needs a diet. The rendering just illustrates how wide it really is. Would be nice if they modified the setbacks in this area to allow the buildings to come closer to the street — that of course would require city involvement to modify curbs, lanes, etc which is unlikely to happen. Hopefully they can at least convert some of these streets to have landscaped medians and bike lanes and to change the diagonal parking to parallel and make wider sidewalks.
whoa those apartments are ugly
I think the area should be called the Pioneer District and cater not just to artist, but people cities have been ignoring like the elderly and minorities. This area could attract progressive people of all ages who lean toward creativity.
Because the area is a clean slate, there is room for experimental housing types that would appeal to people just starting out or re-tuning their situations.