jdneer wrote:

I take it none of you live in this area… my condo is right behind this proposed 12 stories… my northern view is officially gone when this built. Couldn’t have bought this at worse time.

It’s not like they’re building a billboard in front of your ocean view. I’ve got a friend with a north facing unit in City View and while beauty is in the eye of the beholder there isn’t much to see. The best view is probably on the rooftop looking south. For some the additional building is only going to add to the “city view”.

Regardless from an investment perspective the additional development is only a positive for you. You should be happy you bought before the development comes instead of having to pay the premium afterward.

I’m disappointed by the commission’s attitude toward enforcing the design standards. Just like with the new Hilton, our governance structure fails to enforce consistent sidewalks and no skywalks. Why do we even have these standards if developers get a variance? Why should a hotel get a curb cut? They can’t find a way to operate without one? There must be literally thousands of hotels around the globe that operate perfectly fine without cutting into a downtown sidewalk and creating a hazardous situation for pedestrians. Did they seriously threaten to pull the plug on the project without a curb cut??

Speaking of this, I want to know why Columbus is building a wall to hide the view of Nationwide from the 3rd street bridge? It’s a pretty stunning view of a vibrant city as you drive south into downtown. It doesn’t look like the wall is high enough to prevent rock tossing, so I have to wonder what the rational is.

Walker Evans wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Eugene_C wrote:</div>
Speaking of this, I want to know why Columbus is building a wall to hide the view of Nationwide from the 3rd street bridge? It’s a pretty stunning view of a vibrant city as you drive south into downtown. It doesn’t look like the wall is high enough to prevent rock tossing, so I have to wonder what the rational is.

I was wondering the same thing, but I assumed it was an ODOT project rather than a city project. Or maybe an ODOT requirement for the installation of the bike lanes?

Seems like its probably to prevent people from going over the side since actual people will be out there now with the bike lanes.

I totally agree

I have to agree –
City planners continue to have that “Cow-Town” attitude towards the vision of what we COULD be.
overall – disappointing.

CB_downtowner wrote:

I think our obsession with height is becoming a bit much. 12 stories is a nice win for this area.

+1

If a 40-story proposal falls out of the sky, hooray.

If not, I’m not going to complain too much about a constant stream of five to seventeen story buildings announced every month.

Almost every city with even a tiny bit of growth is seeing a lot of infill these days. We need to move away from this idea that what’s happening in Columbus is somehow unique, because it isn’t, and there is evidence that the city is actually doing poorly compared to many of its peers in terms of overall development. And even if one believes that it’s a lot, it can still do better, and the projects that do get proposed should still be pushed to be the best they can be. I think many can agree that the latter is definitely not happening, whether it comes to transit or individual projects. It says a lot that this forum, which focuses on development and has many posters who care about development, still aren’t all that demanding when it comes to standards. So if the people who are somewhat passionate about development aren’t demanding better, I’m not sure who else would be. That to me is and has always been Columbus’ biggest problem. I love the city, it’s my hometown, and overall it’s a great place, but this is an area where it consistently and frustratingly falls short.

Now to keep this somewhat on topic, the design for the hotel is super boring- and to top it off destroying a historic, award-winning building… which of course the city rolled over on as usual. The design for the Bridge Park hotel is about 10x better than this or any hotel project recently announced within Columbus, especially Downtown, and it’s a glaring example of how Columbus developers don’t seem to be even trying all that hard. But really, who is telling them to?