Mixed-use Project in Columbus, Ohio, continues to add retail and other uses
In Columbus, Ohio, Nationwide Realty Investors’ latest mixed-use development, Grandview Yard, continues to welcome new tenants and celebrate significant construction and development milestones.
Upon completion, Nationwide Realty Investors’ ambitious $650 million project, which is located just two miles west of downtown Columbus in Grandview Heights, will include more than 1.2 million square feet of office, retail, restaurant and hospitality space and up to 1,300 residential units.
Recent highlights include the announcement of eight new office tenants, including Hilliard Lyons, Unum Life Insurance Company, and the United States Navy. These new tenants will join Ernst & Young, Northwestern Mutual, Ohio Health Urgent Care, Willis Insurance, and others in the more than 200,000 square feet of completed office space at Grandview Yard.
Nationwide Realty Investors president and COO Brian J. Ellis says, “The demand for space at Grandview Yard remains high. As the development continues to mature, we are able to provide an even more engaging mixed-use environment for our office tenants.”
Nationwide is also joining the office mix at Grandview Yard. In 2014, the company announced that it would open a 500,000-square-foot corporate campus. The three-building complex and adjacent parking facilities will be home to more than 3,000 Nationwide associates, who will move into the first 320,000-square-foot building in May. The second building, a 160,000-square-foot structure, will be completed in 2017, and the third building is slated to open in 2019.
Adjacent to the Nationwide campus will be a new five-story building on Yard Street, with approximately 14,000 square feet of first-floor retail below several floors of residential. The new retail/residential building is currently in pre-development with construction anticipated to begin mid 2016.
Grandview Yard will also open additional hospitality assets later this year, including a Courtyard by Marriott hotel and The Grand Event Center—a unique 13,000-square-foot conference and events space adjacent to the hotel. The Courtyard by Marriott, a four-story, 135-room facility, will open later this summer. The Grand Event Center will include a 4,000-square-foot ballroom that seats more than 300, a number of distinctive social areas and open spaces for smaller meetings, breakout sessions, brainstorming, or networking, an outdoor courtyard with fire pit, and a full-service kitchen complete with an executive chef. The Grand is booking events beginning in October.
The third phase of Apartments at the Yard is underway and scheduled to open later in 2016. The new 166-unit Brooks residential building, a four-story, 166-unit apartment building featuring one and two bedroom flats and a 128-space underground parking structure. The first two phases of Apartments at the Yard are open and fully leased including four buildings with 274 total residential units. Forty-five for-sale townhomes are also currently under construction in partnership with Waggenbrenner Development.
According to Ellis, Grandview Yard will be adding another high profile restaurant tenant this year as well.Eddie George’s Grille 27—a restaurant named for Heisman Trophy winner and OSU graduate Eddie George—will relocate from its current location on High Street to Grandview Yard this spring. The Grille offers classic American fare, a full service bar with 27 craft beers on tap and handcrafted cocktails. The new location will boast more than 70 HDTVs as well as an array of memorabilia in an upscale setting.
These new additions join a diverse range of existing tenants and facilities at Grandview Yard that includes a 92,000-square-foot Giant Eagle Market District, a 126-key Hyatt Place Columbus/OSU Hotel, a 42,000-square-foot LA Fitness, an 18,000-square-foot Hofbrauhaus restaurant and German bier hall, Ohio State University Medicine and Pediatrics, Panera Bread, and Wright Patterson Credit Union.
Nationwide Realty Investors has already committed more than $150 million toward infrastructure improvements and upgrades at Grandview Yard. As of today, more than four miles of streets and sidewalks have been added. A grant from the Ohio Public Works Commission (OPWC) to the City of Columbus for $5 million will provide necessary funding to widen the rail bridge on Third Avenue, creating more lanes for vehicles and facilitate convenient and safe pedestrian and bicycle access. The bridge project is slated to begin in July and will be completed in 2017.
Ellis noted that contributions from Grandview Heights, the City of Columbus and the State of Ohio have been important factors in Grandview Yard’s success. According to Ellis, these long-term commitments to infrastructure improvements allowed Nationwide Realty Investors to move forward quickly with Grandview Yard. “They embraced our vision for this vibrant, mixed-use urban development,” said Ellis.
Nationwide Realty Investors, which has extensive experience planning and building large scale, mixed-use urban environments, is also the developer of the $1 billion Arena District in downtown Columbus, and is currently under construction with the $750 million, 3.5 million-square-foot mixed-use Rivulon development in Gilbert, AZ.
