Columbus 'Zones In' on More Housing Amid Population Boom

The effects of the nationwide housing supply crisis were pushing Columbus, Ohio, to the brink.

In the past 15 years, an influx of residents has brought the population to 913,000, but that is expected to more than double over the next 20 years. Meanwhile, the city is creating 18,000 new jobs yearly but needs about 200,000 new housing units over the next decade to sustain that growth.

"We are success-ing ourselves into failure, because we are attracting people into our amazing community but not building the housing that it needs to house them and keep up with this level of growth," says City Council President Shannon Hardin. With that rapid and projected growth, Hardin says residents were feeling the pressure in the form of displacement, crime, and food deserts.

Compounding these issues was a zoning code that hadn't been comprehensively updated in 70 years, acting as a barrier to constructing more housing, transit, and commercial development. Most projects required variances, adding costly delays and uncertainty to the process. "Because of the zoning code that we had, everything [submitted] was pretty much done as a one-off or very contractual," says Festus Manly-Spain, assistant director of building and zoning services in Columbus.

To address these growing issues, Columbus planners came up with the Zone In initiative to fix the outdated code.

A Growing Problem

With too much demand and not enough supply, the need to quickly add multifamily housing into historically single-family-zoned neighborhoods began to create friction between residents and the government. A code update was needed. Working in the staff's favor, though, was support from city leadership to do something.

In November 2021, planners worked with a consultant to assess Columbus' current state and make recommendations for action. That data showed a clear need to create capacity for new, denser housing along mixed-use corridors, staff pinpointed as the ideal places to "Zone In" on. "If we're going to add one million people, where should they go? You could sprawl out or focus on centers," says Mark Dravillas, AICP, planning administrator for Columbus. "Our determination really focused on corridors. It accommodated housing, transit, and neighborhood retail."

The first phase of the initiative eventually rezoned 140 miles and impacted parts of 29 neighborhoods.

Planners as Storytellers

By the winter of 2023, draft code elements were ready to be shared with the community for feedback.

At the city council level, Hardin says the elected officials "wanted to be radical listeners." This meant eliminating time restraints on speakers during discussions about the code changes. "One of our sessions was six hours long — but it was purposeful."

But public meetings only captured so many voices and perspectives. To get a fuller picture — and that broader buy-in — planners hosted workshops, went to churches and festivals, and put out digital and print materials. "In recent years, we really made an effort to establish long-term relationships with neighborhoods and [community] leaders, so that when the time came when we were working on something like Zone In, we could have actual communication with these folks," Dravillas says.

The team also came up with a more interactive idea — an open house-style gallery in downtown Columbus that would be fully staffed with planners and allow anyone who came to learn more about the proposed changes and ask questions.

Hardin refers to it as an Apple Store approach, and its roots were in storytelling. "How do we tell stories about what we gain if we do something, but also what we lose if we don't?" he says.

The galley was open the entire 60-day public comment period, including nights and weekends. Luis Teba, project manager for Zone In, describes it as having had an "MTV 1990s studio vibe," with televisions and couches set up to encourage conversation. "It was a gathering spot where people could come in and get the whole story," Teba says. "It laid the foundation of what the entire zoning process was and why we were doing it."

Approximately 1,500 Columbus residents visited the gallery that city planners staffed during the 60-day comment period for the Zone In initiative. Photo courtesy of the City of Columbus.

One of the goals of the gallery was to make the information digestible and easy to follow. "There wasn't too much planner jargon," says Manly-Spain. It also helped reduce the time it normally would take for the team to make changes based on the public's feedback.

"We worked the hell out of our planning staff for those 60 days," Dravillas says. "They spent hundreds of hours in that gallery."

About 1,500 people visited the gallery. "There was probably no other place in the city where you could have found a more eclectic or interesting mix of people than in the gallery those 60 days," says Manly-Spain.

Staff also received more than 1,900 comments about the proposed changes by April 2024.

Changes Lead to Success

In July 2024, the Columbus City Council approved the changes to its zoning code for the targeted Zone In areas, including providing height bonuses to developers who designate at least 20 percent of their housing units for households earning less than the area's median income. The changes also removed parking requirements in those areas, allowed apartments without ground-floor commercial, and set new design standards.

As a result, Columbus upzoned around 13,000 housing units almost immediately. Voters also approved a $8 billion plan for a rapid-transit system, including 150 miles of sidewalk, in November 2024.

In the months since the code update was passed, Manly-Spain says proposals for up to 1,000 housing units have been submitted. "It shows that people are hitting the ground running," he says. "We have seen a lot of smaller missing middle projects that Columbus has been without. That's a win."

And with no minimum parking requirements, Manly-Spain also has seen an increase in small businesses wanting to move into the corridors. "More of these mom-and-pop restaurants, barbershops, dentist offices — those types of businesses that would not have come to fruition because they would have had to go through a six-month variance process."

Hardin says the city's planners were crucial to getting community buy-in for the initiative. He says that because they were already actively working with community members, they had a level of respect and trust that the elected officials don't always have.

‘The Work Continues'

Now, Columbus planners are moving on to the next phase of Zone In. "To work on a generational project was a real honor, but the work continues," Dravillas says. "The political will is as strong as ever. We're sorting out how we're going to tackle the rest of the city, but the gauntlet has been laid."

For Hardin's piece of the puzzle, he knows that despite the gains that have been made in the community to buy into these changes, there will always NIMBYs who disagree. So, it's up to those entrusted to lead to make the hard choice.

"The decisions that we make right now about what investments we make, about what we build, and about who we are will determine what kind of community our city is when we are 2 million people strong," he says. "That's a huge responsibility for the planners, for the staff, for the elected officials, and community members. I think that it is on all of us to make sure that we meet the moment."

Top image: Kevin Wheeler (center), the former project manager of the Zone In initiative for Columbus, Ohio, provides information to residents about the code changes planners wanted to make to increase housing in the city. Photo courtesy of the City of Columbus.