[colug-432] Looking for info on Columbus

[Stephen Potter]

On 3/1/2011 6:39 PM, Richard Hornsby wrote:
> Dublin (Northwest) :
> Upper Arlington (Northwest/Central):
> Bexley (East/Central):
> New Albany (East/North):

There used to be a saying around town that UA was old money, Dublin was 
new money, and Bexley was lots of money.  Nowadays, we kind of have to 
add New Albany to that mix as shit-loads of money.  About 20-30 years 
ago, New Albany was a little tiny farm town and very cheap.  Then, Les 
Wexner (founder of the Limited Brands companies) decided to move the 
Limited corporate offices near there, moved himself to New Albany (and 
built a huge mansion and estate), build Easton (aka Wexland Mall) and 
started convincing the executives at the Limited to move there as well.  
It has since grown to be the richest area in central Ohio and is 
sometimes derisively called Wexnerville (a play on Westerville which 
nearly borders it on the North and West).

> Westerville (Northeast): older homes, decent area, moderately priced IIRC.  Farther from campus/downtown than it looks, especially in traffic.

Westerville was one of the homes of the temperance movement in the 1800s 
and early 1900s.  It remained a completely dry town until about 15 years 
ago.  Even now, most of Westerville itself is still dry.  Westerville 
and Worthington both straddle I-270 and depending on which side of I-270 
you are on depends a lot on how the area is.  Westerville, north of 
I-270 has seen a lot of new growth in response to the build up of the 
Polaris area (even thought it is closer to Worthington).  Worthington, 
south of of I-270 is an older, more affluent area, while north if I-270 
is less affluent, even though it is sandwiched just south of Polaris.

> Whitehall/Reynoldsburg (East-Southeast): Never really explored those areas.  Have a friend who lives in Reynoldsburg and seems happy even though she works in Grandview.  Another friend teaches in Whitehall schools, they're not real great.

Whitehall and Reynoldsburg are two very distinct areas.  Not only are 
they separated by I-270, there's also several miles of mostly 
under-developed land between them.  Whitehall for the most part is a 
fairly economically depressed area, bordering on the near-east side 
"ghettos" of Columbus, and has a fairly high rate of crime.  Whitehall 
was mostly built to provide housing to support both Rickenbacker AFB and 
the Defense Construction and Supply Center (now Defense Supply Center, 
Columbus).

Reynoldsburg is less economically depressed, although we went through a 
major growth and contraction during the late 1990s and throughout much 
of the 2000s, so we're not much further along than we were 20 years 
ago.  Reynoldsburg ranks in the middle in the area for median income and 
housing costs.  We are bordered by Pickerington, Gahanna, and near New 
Albany , which are higher value areas, and I'm hoping some day it will 
rub off on us (rather than Brice, Whitehall, and Blacklick Estates, 
which are lower value areas) .  :-)  There's a lot of major industry 
close to us (several of the Limited companies have facilities in the 
area- Bath & Body Works HQ is here) , as well as the State Fire 
Academy/Fire Marshall, and a large Ohio Dept of Agri facility.  We are 
also right on I-70 and I-270, so we have easy access to anywhere.  We're 
also the birthplace of the tomato (and have the Tomato Festival every 
year, whoo hoo!).

> Obetz/Groveport (Southeast): Somewhat industrial area, if Columbus had one of those.  Generally considered blue collar, lower to middle income area.  Didn't get over that way very often. Not far from Rickenbacker which is both a major cargo hub and Air National Guard base.

I grew up around Groveport, in the Blacklick Estates "place" (really, 
that's what the Census calls it...). Groveport has long been associated 
with all sorts of transportation, having early been a stop on the 
Ohio/Erie canal, and later having Rickenbacker AFB (now International 
Airport and ANGB), and many transportation companies headquarters.  They 
also have many major cargo facilities for lots of companies.  The 
Village of Groveport is a very nice, old village with lots of older 
historic homes.  The school system has totally gone down the pot, being 
second only to Columbus City Schools at this point, which is a real 
shame from what we used to have.  Blacklick Estates is a residential 
area roughly bordered by SR-33, Hamilton Rd, I-270, I-70, the Village of 
Brice and Brice Rd.  It is lower-middle income.  Still not a bad area 
from what I see when I go over that way, and from friends that are still 
in the area.

Obetz really is nothing more than a residential area, with now some 
industrial areas being built around it.  I don't believe it even has a 
Village Hall or Offices any more.  They do still have the Zucchini 
festival every year though....

You can also go a little further out into areas that haven't been 
mentioned such as Marysville, Delaware, Powell, Johnston, if you don't 
mind a bit of a commute (being from DC, you probably don't.  :-)
> Again, not personal, but one area I would definitely avoid is the section bounded by I-71 on the west, I-670 on the south, and I-270 on the north and east. (general vicinity of Karl / Morse / Cleveland Rds) - highlighted in red.  Too much nonsense, too much crime, too much BS in the schools.

You want to stay out of the near-side side ghettos as well (that's the 
area bordered by I-70 and even south of I-70, I-71, I-670, and Bexley), 
so really your red square could just continue straight down until it 
reached 104.  There's a few nice areas to the east of Minerva Park and 
over toward Easton that would be ok and are on the edge of the red 
square.  I'd also stay away from Valley View, Hilltop, Franklinton area 
(that's west of downtown.

> All of this comes several years after the city council granted huge tax breaks to build malls around the outerbelt (Tuttle Crossing, Polaris, Easton) - basically sealing the fate of the City Center downtown mall, and taking with it much of what (little?) life downtown had.  For years, Coleman's big plan to save downtown from the damage the city had inflicted was some crazy "trolly" idea that no one wants.  Really the only significant things left downtown now outside of business hours is Short North (Gallery Hop?) and the arena district.  I moved out of the state this past November, but the last I knew the wheels were starting to wobble a little even on the arena district because the hockey team just isn't pulling in the revenue/ticket sales they need to be sustainable.

Just south of downtown, sandwiched between the two bad areas I mentioned 
(the east and west 'ghettos') is German Village.  It is still a very 
nice, trendy area with lots of great restaurants.  It is the equivalent 
of the Short North, just to the south.  :-)

Chris  asked about salaries and whether 80-95k was reasonable.  It 
depends a little on which companies you talk with.  Larger companies, 
like JP Morgan Chase, Nationwide, etc, will get you that without much of 
a problem.  If you work with local contracting firms, you'll probably 
get in that area without too much problem.  Smaller companies, 
university, and government that will put you on the high to very high 
ranges.  Chase and Nationwide usually have openings, I recently saw an  
opening at the Limited (actually, Victoria's Secret) in their web area, 
although they are currently on Solaris and moving to AIX or Linux.

Chris also asked about housing prices, and as someone mentioned it is 
going to depend on where you look and how big of a house you want.  You 
mentioned 4-bedrooms, but that can be anywhere from 1200sf to 3000sf (or 
more).  You can look at sites like mihomes.com (M/I Homes, a local 
builder) or dominionhomes.com (another local builder) to see what new 
build prices are.  You can find anywhere from low $200s to $400s or even 
higher.

As far as weather "problems", the further north you go, the more the 
weather seems to be an issue.  There's a line right about I-270 on the 
north side that delimits how much snow we get.  Also, the city itself 
sits in a bit of a depression, which tends to split storm fronts coming 
through around it, so the east side areas get less interesting weather 
than any.

-spp