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According to an article on 610 WTVN’s website, a new plan for renovations to the campus area around Lane Avenue do not include a future for the St. John Arena. According to OSU officials, The 54-year-old multi-purpose athletic building has outlived its usefulness and a renovation wouldn’t be worth the cost.
The full article on 610′s website can be read here: “As OSU campus evolves, can St. John Arena survive?“
@futureman – Don’t forget the new Ohio Union garage – both the old and new have over 1050 spaces.
I saw my first big time concert at St. John – Peter Frampton w/ Sweet opening in the late ’70′s. I was 14, had a great time and my first contact high to boot!
OSU has consulted with an outside firm to reevaluate the university buildings and one of the 25 year plans is to demolish the French Field House and St. John’s. In it’s place they would build new facilities for FAES on the east side of the river (the FAES buildings are among the oldest non architecturally valuable on campus and are slated for demolition in this time frame). They’ve also talked of expanding the Chadwick Arboretum at the site of the FAES buildings. This, and the removal of the low-head dam will create an expanded park along the river (since the dam removal would make the Olentangy 1/2 its current width).
These are just ideas at this point, but ones that OSU is seriously considering.
Maybe 1000 isn’t that huge. I like LO2W’s ideas for integrated retail/housing/transit though.
If only someone would invent a compact car or a two-wheeled vehicle that runs on a motor, then we could have many more parking spots while using less room. Maybe someday OSU can strive to be as green as Best Buy.
What a great place to see a basketball game. It will be sad to see it go.
It’s such a shame that when they built the ugly-ass Schott, they decided to charge 20k for seat licenses on the floor turning it into one of the sleepiest arenas in all of sports.
I love basketball and I can’t stand watching games there.
@Parker I’m in the FAES school and what you said has been swirling around there for several months. Unfortunately I’d like to see the school stay on the west side of the river but, it seems as though the powers that be have made up their minds to move.
Columbusite Says:
Maybe someday OSU can strive to be as green as Best Buy.
Well, for one thing, OSU has those spots. They’re now standard in new and revamped facilities. For another, just what can a university do to make its students/employees/visitors use bikes instead of cars? Have bike racks? They do. Bike-friendly routes? They do, to the extent they can. They can’t design the city surrounding it, and they can’t design public policy.
Columbus and Central Ohio need better mass transit, and gas taxes need to be higher to get people to walk/carpool/bike/take the bus. Otherwise, OSU will need parking…or to stop growing, but I don’t see that happening—and I’m not sure that would actually do anything, really. On net. Driving to OSU would most likely just be substituted by driving elsewhere.
But, of course, then we could blame someone else. Even if we didn’t solve the problem.
@ Kirk – I’ve been around OSU long enough to not hold my breath on these things. It may happen someday, but at this point it’s sort of like the sustainable ag curriculum they’ve been talking about for 10 years (although there is a course or two now so I shouldn’t complain).
@ Columbusite: OSU can participate/pressure for better planning and policy regarding bike-friendly neighborhoods. They can also encourage such transportation more… they sure as heck sell the football team to central Ohio, I’m sure they can spare a bit of change to market other ideas. Is OSU already doing any of this? I don’t know.
You are absolutely right about the ROI, even though most parking garages I have been involved with are more like $15K per space. $10, 12, 15K – it is still a cash cow. More money in parking = less money to operate the university.
Bristol Bar Says:
May 12th, 2010 at 8:31 am
Almost there; here’s the deal. Parking garages are very expensive to build (10K/parking space the last time I looked into it) mainly b/c of all the engineering and support it takes to hold all the weight. Your generally looking at a 10-12 year ROI. Once its paid for it is a HUGE cash cow. 2-5% operating cost, the rest drops right to the bottom line. Gee is smart and he realizes that building these will bring much needed cash to the university for a long time to come.
Actually, parking garages cost over 20K per space. From OSU’s transportation & parking:
http://www.tp.ohio-state.edu/planning/southcampparkplan/AppendixD.htm
I miss watching b-ball games in this joint too. The Schott is a mess. Steep and so far away from the action – that it is better to watch on tv. The latest news is that the tearing down won’t happen for many moons. http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2010/05/13/st-john-art-gsi8gsts-1.html?sid=101
I didn’t say a word about bikes. The solution was in my sarcastic comment about microcars and scooters. There should be a large percentage devoted to them in parking garages (like the entire first floor), rather than a couple of token spots here and there. They should also have a good deal of on-street parking designated for both also.
St. John deserves to be preserved
SUNDAY, MAY 16, 2010
BY BOB HUNTER
No matter who makes the decision on St. John and when, it’s important for campus planners to understand how many of us revere the building and how some would move the men’s and women’s basketball games back there from Value City Arena if we could. It’s a storehouse of beautiful memories, not only of Ohio State athletics but of high school state tournaments, concerts and graduations.
READ MORE
Columbusite Says:
I didn’t say a word about bikes. The solution was in my sarcastic comment about microcars and scooters. There should be a large percentage devoted to them in parking garages (like the entire first floor), rather than a couple of token spots here and there. They should also have a good deal of on-street parking designated for both also.
There are. Check out the entire first floor of the Lane Ave. parking garage that just opened over the winter.