Hello Worthington! Crawford Hoying returned to the community on June 16 with a more detailed look at its plan to turn three 1970s-era office buildings on West Wilson Bridge Road into a walkable, mixed-use neighborhood. The session came shortly before the project's first appearance in front of the city's Municipal Planning Commission. The developer walked neighbors through new design work on an interior commercial street built for walking, building heights that step down toward the homes behind the site, and a hotel near the Olentangy Parklands, and it cautioned that construction is unlikely to begin before 2028.
A second look, ahead of the city's first
Two months after introducing the concept in April, the development team returned with a more refined program.
The 17-acre parcel is one of the largest contiguous redevelopment sites available in Worthington. The residential program grew from April's roughly 400 units to about 600 across three phases — a mix of apartments, condos, and likely some senior housing, though the team noted the count could come down if the balance shifts toward for-sale product. Office square footage moved up as well, from 150,000 square feet in April to about 200,000 in June.
What hasn't changed: the core structure of the plan. The three parcels — 400, 450, and 500 West Wilson Bridge Road — remain the redevelopment footprint. The developer still owns five buildings along the Wilson Bridge Road corridor and plans to renovate two to relocate existing tenants while the redevelopment proceeds. The two-hotel framework, the concept of an interior commercial street active on both sides, and the 2028 groundbreak target all carried over from April. The team was still framing everything as concept-stage work, still in motion.
The meeting came just before a milestone in the public process. The development team told residents the plan would go before the Municipal Planning Commission in the coming weeks — the first time city commissioners would see the concept — and encouraged supporters as well as critics to attend.
An interior street built for walking
April's concept introduced the idea of an interior commercial street lined with retail and restaurants on both sides — a direct lesson from Bridge Park, where one-sided streets proved less successful for restaurants and entertainment. By June, that street had a working name — the team is loosely calling it "Bend Road" — and specific dimensions to go with it.
The design intentionally slows cars. The street would run roughly 38 feet from curb to curb — one travel lane in each direction, each about 11 feet wide — with on-street parking on the south side only. Sidewalks would range from about 10 to 15 feet, widening to as much as 25 to 30 feet at corner "pockets" set aside for outdoor dining. The team described a mix of larger restaurant spaces alongside smaller commercial suites, with room for uses beyond food and drink, such as a dentist or doctor's office.
The team again contrasted Worthington's more flexible zoning code with Dublin's, which forces buildings tight to the property line and requires variances to create the kind of irregular, gathering-friendly streetscape they want here.
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Heights that step down to the neighborhood
April's concept called for multifamily buildings reaching four to five stories, with two- to three-story townhomes along West Wilson Bridge Road for visual variety at the street edge. The June presentation emphasized the step-down more explicitly: building heights would range from about three to five stories overall, with scale deliberately decreasing toward Wilson Bridge Road and toward the single-family neighborhood behind the site. Renderings shown to neighbors were described as early character images rather than final designs, meant to convey massing and movement along the street.
A riverside hotel, and possibly a second
April's plan included two hotels totaling roughly 300 rooms, with early conversations underway with Marriott, Hilton, and Hyatt. June got more specific about the first hotel's location and character.
One of the evening's more detailed exchanges concerned the hotel planned near the western, riverside end of the site, closest to the Olentangy Parklands. The team confirmed the hotel's footprint would expand beyond the building that stands there now, pushing west toward the river and tree line, though a large sanitary sewer line crossing the area limits how far it can go. The current concept will change after the Planning Commission meeting to reflect that expansion, they said.
Residents pressed on height and on the hotel's impact on the adjacent parkland, where people gather in the evenings. The team said it could not imagine the hotel exceeding five or six stories and described the massing as breaking down in scale as it approaches the park, with a lower one-story element in front of a taller piece behind. A hotel guest, one representative argued, would expect and even welcome nearby activity such as dining and recreation, while quiet hours would still be respected.
The plan also leaves room for a second hotel, coming later in the project's third phase. The team cited its Dublin experience, where it has built multiple hotels as demand grew. It pointed to a current Dublin project — an Autograph Collection hotel being developed with restaurateur Cameron Mitchell — as an opportunity it said it did not see coming when its first Dublin hotel opened.
The sledding hill and the tree canopy
Neighbors repeatedly raised the Olentangy Parklands sledding hill, a popular winter spot at the west end of the site. The team said the plan preserves it, and that the existing access road — which Hunter called dangerous to navigate at the April meeting — is being shifted north to give the sledding hill more room, not less.
Trees and habitat drew sustained attention. Residents urged the developer to plant mature, established trees in key gathering spaces rather than rely only on fast-growing varieties, and to support pollinators and native habitat such as fireflies, solitary bees, and butterflies, particularly where the site meets the Olentangy and ongoing efforts to remove invasive plants like Japanese honeysuckle. The team's landscape designers said they would balance making an immediate impact in marquee spaces against the reality that large transplanted trees have a low survival rate, and that most of the existing mature trees on the site would likely not survive redevelopment. They committed to keeping well-placed existing trees where feasible.
Several lighter ideas surfaced for activating the parkland and the site's public spaces: bike, kayak, and canoe businesses; a coffee shop; pickleball; and ways to involve schools, Scouts, and children, such as handprints in concrete or built-in habitat features, to build long-term community ownership. A dog park or dog-friendly area was floated but described as too early to commit to.
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Traffic, cut-through worries, and a possible bus change
Traffic remained a central concern, as it was in April — but the discussion shifted focus. Where April's conversation centered on the westbound backup at the Olentangy River Road intersection and Hunter's advocacy for a dedicated turn lane there, June's exchange was more about neighborhood cut-throughs.
Neighbors worried that drivers would continue to use residential streets — particularly Rieber Street — as shortcuts, even with calming measures, and pushed for Wilson Bridge Road itself to be treated as a "complete street," with trees and sidewalks on both sides rather than one. The team agreed a one-sided road is a real shortcoming and noted there is unused grass shoulder that could carry a continuous sidewalk, while cautioning that much of Wilson Bridge Road is the city's responsibility, not the developer's.
The April plan called for disconnecting the site's internal road from the Rieber Road intersection to discourage cut-throughs. By June, an early engineering idea for a roundabout near Rieber had been considered and ruled out — it didn't feel walkable and could push more traffic into the neighborhood. Asked how eminent domain would work on a project like this, the team said it would not apply here, because eminent domain is generally a tool the municipality uses for public roads, not a private redevelopment.
The city was already running its own traffic study of the corridor before Crawford Hoying filed any plans. One resident said they had heard COTA may reroute its Route 35 bus through the area — a possibility consistent with changes under COTA's Short-Range Plan. The team said it had heard the same but was not yet coordinating with the transit agency, and hoped to learn more as the plan advances.
The argument for the office tax base
The team made an economic case for keeping a substantial amount of office in the mix — a theme from April, but with a stronger commitment attached. Worthington, like Dublin and New Albany, relies on income-tax revenue, and office employment is the engine behind it. The West Wilson Bridge corridor alone generates roughly half of the city's income-tax revenue. The June program calls for about 200,000 square feet of office — up from April's 150,000 and roughly matching what stands there today — reflecting deliberate pressure from the team to hold the line on that tax base.
The existing buildings have gone years without meaningful investment, the team said, and even modest improvements have already produced results: one existing tenant in an adjacent building Crawford Hoying is retaining, OPOC.us, announced plans in late April to more than double its workforce at its headquarters along the corridor, which city officials cited as an early sign that employers are already betting on the corridor's future. The aim is to deliver office space competitive with what the firm has built in Dublin, which the team argued still draws employers even in a soft market for older, lower-grade space.
Construction, materials, and "21st-century Worthington"
The April presentation introduced the team's materials philosophy and its "21st-century Worthington" framing — authentic, durable materials with a contemporary feel, not a replica of historic Old Worthington. June's conversation went deeper on what construction itself would look like for neighbors.
Pressed on how construction would affect the neighborhood, the team said it was too early for a detailed staging plan but that a full construction-management plan would be required as the project advances. Work would generally happen during daytime hours, with one common exception: concrete pours, which often start early so the concrete can cure. The team said neighbors closest to the work typically get a direct line to the project superintendent to flag problems quickly.
On architecture, the team responded to a resident who said the renderings looked more modern than expected. Rather than try to replicate Old Worthington's historic look, which the team argued risks feeling like a fake movie set, it said it would lean on the same authentic, durable materials it described in April — given a contemporary treatment. The team pointed to cheap veneer brick that ages poorly as the kind of shortcut it wants to avoid.
Timeline and how to weigh in
The best-case schedule is largely unchanged from April: master planning, rezoning, and renovation of an existing building this year, running in parallel with a development agreement negotiated with the city; building design and tenant relocation in 2027; and a groundbreak no sooner than spring 2028, which the team itself called a little aggressive. The project would be built in phases from east to west, with the second hotel arriving in the third phase.
Two things are new to the timeline picture. The three Class B buildings slated for demolition currently house 31 tenants whose leases Crawford Hoying has committed to honoring — a constraint that shapes the 2027 relocation window. And there's now a specific date on the calendar for the first public milestone.
The next opportunity for residents to weigh in is the Municipal Planning Commission, where the developer's tentative plans are expected to be considered at the commission's Thursday, July 9, 2026, 7 p.m. meeting at the Worthington Municipal Building, 6550 N. High St. Residents can also share input with the city's Planning and Building division at planning@worthington.org or (614) 431-2424.