City announces mixed-use groundbreaking

Columbus will hold an official groundbreaking for the multifamily and urban grocer development later this month.

The ceremony will be held at 3 p.m. on April 21 at the project site, which is the southeast corner of Second Street and Lafayette Avenue.

Contractors had already begun some work on the property as of late March. Deron Kintner, general counsel with the developer, said earlier this year that construction would likely take about 20 months or somewhere in the range of a year and a half to two years.

The development, to be named “The Taylor,” will include approximately 200 market rate apartments and an urban grocer facility. The estimated cost of the project is about $40 million, with developer Flaherty &Collins paying about 71% of the cost.

The city agreed to invest $11.8 million into the development under the project agreement, according to Bruce Donaldson with Barnes &Thornburg. City officials have said in the past that the development’s property tax dollars will reimburse the city for its contribution. The Columbus Redevelopment Commission also committed to selling property for the development at minimal cost to the developer.

The mixed use development started out as part of a larger joint project. Originally, when the city was considering developers for its hotel conference center project, companies were told that they could get “bonus points” if they brought a multifamily urban grocer partner to the city as well.

For the hotel conference center development, the city chose Sprague Hotel Developers, who partnered with Flaherty &Collins (with the latter company providing the multifamily urban grocer piece).

However, because of the pandemic, the multifamily urban grocer project and the city’s plans for a hotel conference center were later split off into two separate projects, rather than taking place simultaneously.