Dive Brief:
- A Columbus, OH, nonprofit developer and city officials have announced that a $500 million mixed-use project is in the works for the city's downtown, according to Columbus Business First.
- The Columbus Downtown Development Corp. has proposed a 3.1-million-square-foot development that would include two residential towers of up to 35 stories each with between 1,575 and 1,800 living units, up to 840,000 square feet of office space, 180,000 square feet of entertainment, retail and dining space, as well as a 240-room hotel.
- CDDC officials said this project would be the largest development in the history of Columbus and that the city has been considering developing the site for more than 100 years.
Dive Insight:
The CDDC, which is in charge of the project, issued a request for qualifications to 190 developers who might serve as a master planner. The developer that ends up winning the project would choose its own design and construction team. City incentives include 15-year tax abatements, which all new construction developments in the city's central business district receive.
Master-planned communities are still pervasive in suburbia but have also started to infiltrate downtown communities as a way of revitalizing once-vibrant neighborhoods. Millennials who want to live, work and play in an urban, walkable setting are the drivers of much of the activity, and many employers are scrambling to position themselves in these areas in order to attract younger workers.
Chicago, as well as other established cities, has seen this shift and has a smattering of mixed-use neighborhoods in the planning stages or underway. Related Cos.' Midwest division is planning what is likely the most ambitious of these developments. The company is turning what some have called the "last, large undeveloped swath of green space" in downtown Chicago into a massive, mixed-use complex that will add millions of square feet of office and retail space to the area, as well as thousands of new residential units. The 62-acre, Chicago River-front site is an abandoned rail yard that in recent years has been turned into a campsite for the area's homeless. The project is expected to cost billions of dollars and take approximately 15 years to complete.