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Tale of the Tape:
Columbus Pop. 2011: 797,434 (City); 1,858,464 (Metro-2011) - (incorporated in 1812)
Jacksonville Pop. 2011: 827,908 (City); 1,360,251 (Metro-2011) - (incorporated in 1832)
City population 1950: Jacksonville (204,517); Columbus (375,901)
Metropolitan Area Growth Rate (2010-2011)
Columbus: +1.19%
Jacksonville: +1.09%
Urban Area Population (2010 census)
Columbus: 1,368,035 (ranked 36 nationwide)
Jacksonville: 1,065,219 (ranked 40 nationwide)
Urban Area Population Density (2010 census)
Columbus: 2,680.0 people per square mile
Jacksonville: 2,008.5 people per square mile
City Population Growth from 2000 to 2011
Columbus: +85,964
Jacksonville: +92,405
Convention Center Exhibition Space:
Columbus: Greater Columbus Convention Center (1993) - 426,000 square feet
Jacksonville: Prime F. Osborn III Convention Center (1986) - 78,500 square feet
Attached to Convention Center:
Columbus: Hyatt Regency Commons (631 rooms), Drury Inn & Suites (180 rooms)
Jacksonville: N/A
Tallest Building:
Columbus: Rhodes State Office Tower - 629 feet
Jacksonville: Bank of America Tower - 617 feet
Fortune 500 companies:
Columbus: Nationwide (100), American Electric Power (176), Limited Brands (256), Momentive Specialty Chemicals (452), Big Lots (476)
Jacksonville: CSX (226), Winn-Dixie Stores (363), Fidelity National Information Services (425), Fidelity National Financial (472)
Urban infill obstacles:
Columbus: Downtown is walled off from adjacent neighborhoods by loop formed by three expressways.
Jacksonville: State & Union Streets cut off Downtown Jacksonville from Springfield.
Downtown Nightlife:
Columbus: Gay Street, Short North, Arena & Brewery Districts.
Jacksonville: East Bay Street
Common Downtown Albatross:
Surface parking lots.
Who's Downtown is more walkable?
Columbus: 86 out of 100, according to walkscore.com
Jacksonville: 78 out of 100, according to walkscore.com
About Downtown Columbus
Downtown Columbus centers around the intersection of Broad Street and High Street, with the northeast corners being known simple as Broad & High by the surrounding businesses and media. Downtown as a whole encompasses all the area inside the inner belt and is home to most of the largest buildings in Columbus. The State Capitol is located on the southeast corner of Broad & High, in Capitol Square. Downtown is also home to Columbus State Community College, Franklin University, Columbus College of Art and Design, Grant Medical Center, as well as the main branch of the Columbus Metropolitan Library, the Main Street Bridge and many parks. Downtown has many neighborhoods or "districts", but it can easily be separated into three main areas; The Discovery District, High Street Corridor, and the Riverfront. The Short North, Italian Village, and Victorian Village are directly north of Downtown. Olde Towne East, and the historic King-Lincoln District are directly east, while the Brewery District and German Village are directly south of Downtown. Franklinton is to the west of Downtown, with a portion of Franklinton in Downtown.In the northwest area is the Arena District, a mixed-use development centered around Nationwide Arena, the home of the Columbus Blue Jackets. The Arena District also includes the baseball stadium Huntington Park and the Lifestyle Communities Pavilion.
Downtown is currently home to approximately 11,000 residents.
The Brewery District dates back to 1836 when its first brewery was opened by German immigrant Louis Hoster. At the height of its success, there were five breweries located in the area. As the years passed, consolidation of the breweries took place. However, the market went south when in 1919 the 18th Amendment (Prohibition) was approved. The area declined, becoming home to some industry and warehouses. In recent years, redevelopment has taken place on a large scale, with numerous restaurants, bars, and even a grocery store coming to the area.
The Westin Columbus Hotel was originally known as the Great Southern Fireproof Hotel and Opera House when it opened in 1897.
The new $105 million, 325,000-square-foot Franklin County Courthouse opened in June 2011. Much of the design work on the courthouse focused on making the building environmentally friendly. That includes a sod-like green roof to reduce storm-water runoff into city sewers, a building layout designed to reduce heating and cooling loads, low-flow and dual-flush plumbing fixtures and exterior sun shades to cut glare and heat gain. There also is a rain garden and collection tank to catch and store water for irrigation of courthouse landscaping and a series of high windows help pull daylight to illuminated interior spaces.
Columbus Commons is a 9-acre park located on the site of the former Columbus City Center Mall. With the decline of Columbus City Center, plans were announced in February 2009 to replace the mall with a project that includes an urban park, homes, offices, restaurants and shops. In April 2009, Capitol South requested federal stimulus funds to help finance the demolition of the mall and construction of the park, but was rejected. Financing eventually came in the form of Columbus City Council allowing Capitol South to refinance existing City Center parking garage loans and use funds earmarked for downtown housing. CDDC, Capitol South, the Franklin County Commissioners and Columbus Metro Parks, funded the creation of Columbus Commons with a goal to redevelop this downtown property. The first phase of the project cost a total of $20 million. Demolition of City Center began in September 2009 and construction of the Columbus Commons began in mid 2010. The design team was made up of construction manager Corna-Kokosing, architects Moody Nolan and landscape architects EDGE Group. The park opened to the public on Memorial Day weekend 2011.
The Scioto River rises in west central Ohio and flows 231 miles south to where it meets the Ohio River at Portsmouth. During the antebellum years, the Scioto River provided a route to freedom for many enslaved people escaping from the South, as they continued north after crossing the Ohio River. Too small for modern commercial shipping, its primary economic importance is for recreation and drinking water.
The Scioto Mile is an urban oasis comprised of more than 145 acres of lush parkland. Stretching along the riverfront from the vibrant Arena District to the natural beauty of the Whittier Peninsula, the Scioto Mile reconnects downtown to the Scioto River through an integrated system of parks, boulevards, bikeways and pedestrian paths. The $40 million riverfront investment opened in July 2011 and was a part of a city's five-part revitalization plan created in 2002.
The Palace Theatre is a 2,827-seat restored movie palace that originally opened in 1926.
The intersection of Broad & High Streets is the epicenter of downtown Columbus.
Built between 1839 and 1861, the Ohio Statehouse anchors the southeast corner of Broad & High Streets.
Ohio Public Employees Retirement System (OPERS) is the largest state pension fund in Ohio. OPERS' 12-story office tower was completed in 2002 and is adjacent to the Grant Medical Center. Established in 1900, Grant Medical Center is one of the top hospitals in the U.S. and is nationally recognized by the American College of Surgeons for its Level I Trauma Center, robotic and minimally invasive surgery, heart and vascular care, neurosciences and orthopedics.
The main branch of the Columbus Metropolitan Library opened in 1907.
Formed in 1878, as the Columbus Gallery of Fine Arts, the Columbus Museum of Art was the first art museum to register its charter with the state of Ohio. The museum opened in the current building on January 22, 1931.
The first services at this chapel for the Broad Street United Methodist Church were held on Easter Sunday 1885.
The Columbus College of Art & Design (CCAD) is a private college founded in 1879 as the Columbus Art School. With an enrollment of 1,300 full-time students, CCAD offers a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in nine areas: Advertising and Graphic Design, Fashion Design, Fine Arts (including painting, drawing, ceramics, sculpture, printmaking, and glassblowing), Illustration, Industrial Design, Interior Design, Photography, Animation, and Media Studies including computer graphics, video and computer animation. In addition to major areas of concentration, CCAD also offers specialized courses of study in art therapy, fashion illustration, product design, package design.
Over the last decade, the Gay Street corridor has been a focal point of city leadership. To stimulate redevelopment, developers along the corridor have recieved low interest loans, a new parking garage and the conversion of the former one way street into a bi-direcational livable street.
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tufsu1
July 31, 2012, 08:48:19 AMgreat timing...I'm on my way to Cincy, Columbus, and Louisville this weekend
David
July 31, 2012, 09:20:38 AMColumbus totally surprised me. I was on a 2 week road trip that took me though Atlanta, Knoxville, Lexington & Cincy with a final destination of Pittsburgh and Columbus just happened to be on the way. I had never bothered to look up any stats on the city so when I saw its skyline pop over the horizon after I came around a curve on I-71 I was literally taken a back.
I had always assumed it was a small college town similar to Gainesville, not a city larger than Jax. I only had 24 hours to spend there but I spent most of my time in the short north and downtown driving around taking pictures of the architecture. I'd visit more often if it were closer, it appeared to have a lot going on.
thelakelander
July 31, 2012, 09:58:02 AMtufsu1
July 31, 2012, 10:23:38 AM^ yeah...and I heard from a certain someone that flying in and out of Dayton is the way to go
vicupstate
July 31, 2012, 11:57:53 AMThis is why you don't tear down a building just because it is distressed or vacant or in need of renovation. I would bet this same area was distressed also, not that long ago. You could not possible 'build new' to replicate the same environment either, even if it made economic sense to do so (which in most cases it would not).
copperfiend
July 31, 2012, 04:02:27 PMWould this type of signage even be allowed in our town?
Ocklawaha
July 31, 2012, 07:05:24 PMKarma?
stephendare
July 31, 2012, 07:36:05 PMsounds like Vin Zant got reincarnated by the name of Bill Brinton.
Fallen Buckeye
July 31, 2012, 09:34:50 PMGetting me homesick. My hometown is about an hour east, but I have spent a good deal of time in C-bus and have lots of friends and family there. I think Ohio State has a big influence on the community. It's actually in the city, and it brings a ton of business. There's also a steady stream of skilled workers to work for all these companies. Couple that with all the state government and you have a really stable base to build on.
Fallen Buckeye
July 31, 2012, 09:41:34 PMThere's one other thing Columbus does that I wish they would do here: railroad overpasses. Instead of blocking up these major streets in town with railroad crossings, a lot of the trains go over traffic on little bridges. Is there a reason they can't do this here besides cost?
Ocklawaha
July 31, 2012, 11:01:35 PMSo how did COLUMBUS become a metro larger and arguably more vibrant then Jacksonville? Here's an Ockphoto essay...
Columbus Interurban Terminal
Ohio and Indiana Interurban Electric Railways
Emblem of the high speed Cincinnati and Lake Erie Railway, who's lightweight cars often moved at speeds approaching 100 mph.
Columbus Interurban Terminal. Note the two C&LE RY lightweight cars on the left of the Columbus, Delaware and Marion heavyweight car.
Columbus Interurban Terminal, track plan
Columbus Interurban Terminal, Passenger Station
Columbus Interurban Freight Station
A well maintained Ohio and Southern Traction Company car, smallest of the local interurbans
Columbus, Buckeye Lake and Newkirk RY., at Canton
Rare color shots of Columbus, Delaware and Marion Railway
By: Walker
The Ohio Historical Society unveiled a new historical marker yesterday to honor the recently restored interurban depot in Canal Winchester. The Dispatch has a great article running today (“Depot’s day, 80 years later“) that features a bit of history about this electric fixed-rail system that served the region in a similar manner to a light-rail network. The interurban was a popular, inexpensive and highly utilized system that carried passengers at up to 60mph from Columbus to Chillicothe, Zanesville, Marion, Dayton and all points in between. Unfortunately, the automaker lobbyists killed the system in the 1930s and it only lives on through historical markers.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Depot's day, 80 years later
Siblings recall Canal Winchester rail stop as it gets historical marker
80 years ago, George and Dorothy Boving came home from school and were told by their father to go straight to the depot.
"We didn't hesitate to do what our dad told us to do," Mr. Boving said yesterday. "We really just sat there on the train, but I think our dad kind of realized it was historic."
What their father realized - and they didn't - was that it was the last ride on the Scioto Valley Traction Line for the interurban, an electric passenger railroad that was the light-rail system of its time.
The seats were comfortable and the carriage wasn't noisy, Mr. Boving said.
Waiting at the end of the line in Lancaster was their mother and baby brother, and several hundred people who then saw off the car as it headed back toward Columbus.
They stepped off the train and posed with other passengers for a photo.
Yesterday, an enlarged copy of that picture was on display at the dedication of a historic marker at the Canal Winchester Interurban Depot.
In it, Dorothy, 10, is looking off to the side, holding 8-year-old George's hand.
Mr. Boving, now 87, and his sister, Dorothy Boving Hockman, 89, attended the ceremony at the depot in Canal Winchester.
Mr. Boving even donned a white cap, shorts and high socks similar to those he's wearing in the photo as a child.
The station opened in 1904, but the rise of the automobile eventually drove the interurban into obsolescence, rail historian Alex Campbell said.
When the last car traveled in 1930, Columbus' population, now more than 1 million people in the metropolitan area, had grown to a whopping 290,564 people.
The interurban, with cars that could top 60 mph, brought Columbus closer to outlying farm towns, Campbell said.
The Scioto track started Downtown, wound through German Village and out to Obetz. There, it spilt into two lines, with one bound for Lancaster and the other for Chillicothe.
Hockman said she remembers riding it to a little red schoolhouse every day in the first grade.
One rainy morning, she showed up at the station and the tall girl who normally pulled the handle to signal the car to stop for them wasn't there. She couldn't reach high enough, and the interurban passed by. Just as she began to cry, the train stopped and backed up.
Another girl had told the conductor that he had to go back for Dorothy.
When the interurban stopped running, the old Canal Winchester depot, behind 20 S. High St., was transformed into offices for a power company.
But the village bought the building in 2002, deciding to restore the depot to its original gray brick with a red tile roof and bright-white trim. Canal Winchester has spent $123,000 on the project, although some of that has come from donations and grants, Mayor Michael Ebert said.
"It's our intention to bring back some of the feel of a day gone by," he said.
tufsu1
July 31, 2012, 11:03:53 PMtwo other reasons
1. state capitol
2. O-H-I-O (they do have 56,000 students)
stephendare
July 31, 2012, 11:38:28 PMwe have twice as many students here in jacksonville, tufsu.
JFman00
August 01, 2012, 12:06:59 AMThat's 56k at "the" OSU alone. If you're counting community colleges (which I think is safe to guess that you are, given the 80k enrollment of FSCJ), their number is around 100k.
peestandingup
August 01, 2012, 02:43:16 AMIts not about numbers. There's no real "campus life" here. FSCJ is a gussied up community college & UNF is in a suburban strip mall. Whereas Ohio State is a place where students live & breathe the actual college lifestyle, centered in the Columbus urban core. Plus, its a much older institution.
They're not even remotely the same things.
vicupstate
August 01, 2012, 06:40:42 AMJax should try to get an art school. The one is Savannah has done more for their urban core than just about anything, except the tourists.
fsquid
August 01, 2012, 08:22:10 AMI though Ohio State was north of the core
copperfiend
August 01, 2012, 08:24:41 AMWe have one. The Jax Art Institute and the Florida Coastal School of Law are both tucked away in the old AT&T/Citibank buildings off Baymeadows.
mbwright
August 01, 2012, 08:27:26 AMJacksonville--before needs lots of work
Coluubus--after shows the result of lots of work
I see that their courthouse was at least affordable.
thelakelander
August 01, 2012, 08:32:43 AMIt's a little over two miles north of downtown Columbus. However, there's a vibrant walkable neighborhood in between. It would sort of be like having Riverside where LaVilla once was and UNF's main campus where the farmer's market is located.
tufsu1
August 01, 2012, 08:56:28 AMexactly.
stephendare
August 01, 2012, 09:05:54 AMthen why did you bring them up, tufsu?
tufsu1
August 01, 2012, 09:08:47 AMumm..I was agreeing with psu who was noting that isn't just about the numbersd alone....so here are two reasons:
1. the presence of a major reserach university has a huge effect on the entire metro area...Columbus has that and we don't
2. the presence of that university (with its massive full-time enrollment) near the urban core is huge...sure we have FSCJ, but only one of their campuses is downtown....their FTE numbers are way lower than OSU...and its a commuter school
stephendare
August 01, 2012, 09:30:05 AMIt's not about the presence of students, it's about whether or not they are incorporated into the city daily life.
Your original post didn't seem to be implying that.
Fallen Buckeye
August 01, 2012, 11:27:40 AMMy little brother went to OSU, and I have a ton of friends who did (I'm actually a OU Bobcat alum). Those students spend a lot of time in Columbus's urban neighborhoods. High Street runs right up to OSU, and a lot of those vibrant neighborhoods like the Short North and Arena District sit right between downtown and the campus. Also, don't forget that OSU sports draw huge crowds, and those bars and restaurants along High Street are packed for every game. The Horseshoe by itself holds 100,000. And besides OSU, you've got Franklin University and Columbus State that have 40,000 by themselves. Then there's a good number of schools in the suburbs like Capital and Otterbein, and a lot of those kids are spending time downtown. Many students are actually living off campus in some of these urban neighbors actually. It really isn't very comparable to Jax. OSU is much more akin to UF than UNF.
stephendare
August 01, 2012, 11:35:51 AMmeanwhile the downtown campus of fscj might as well be the syrian embassy for all of the love or interaction it gets from either downtown or springfield.
and edward waters kids are usually frisked if they come downtown unsupervised.
the unf kids get parking tickets and stringent credit checks in the limited housing market.
Its the stupidest thing I've ever seen anywhere
fsquid
August 01, 2012, 11:40:23 AMcan't trust those meddling kids.
jaxjags
August 01, 2012, 11:55:29 AMHaving been born and raised in Columbus but now living in Jax, a few comments:
1. As many have commented OSU has a huge influence on downtown. It is relatively close, provides 2 additional arenas for entertainment and sports, medical school and hospital, research centers, etc. The influence is from downtown to Clintonville along North High Street. A large area, but it is a large school.
2. State Capitol - The capitol and State office tower are downtown. This draws state employees, visitors, tourists, lobbyists, etc. As my dad worked in Capitol, I can attest that this provides much foot traffic downtown.
3. Geography - Although the Short North and German Town are nice, beyond that and the OSU party district there is not much more. There are few if any Five Points,San Marco, Avondale, Riverside, Atlantic/Neptune Beach, Jax Beach entertainment areas.
Imagine what Jax would be if it were the Capitol, had UF and all entertainment we had were moved to one location.
Except for Charlotte(Bank of America) and San Diego ( weather/conventions) most of cities described before have state capitol or large university near downtown.
I do believe the city gov. here makes very poor decisions. Great example is to not sell small part of shipyards for brewery. That small move could be catalyst to have a "Brewery District" in Jax.
Fallen Buckeye
August 01, 2012, 12:32:12 PMThat's a really good characterization.
thelakelander
August 01, 2012, 01:18:27 PM^Tallahassee....
Ocklawaha
August 01, 2012, 10:08:59 PMDid someone mention OSU? ...Okay, I couldn't resist this.