Dublin Corporate Area Plan (Final – February – 2022)
The City of Dublin’s office space has been considered some of the best in Central Ohio for the past 40 years. Like many suburbs, Dublin fostered a Class-A office model offering freeway visibility, easy automotive access, an abundance of free parking and idyllic office “parks” with manicured landscaping and large stormwater ponds. As they have aged, this development model is having an increasingly difficult time competing with office space in more vibrant, amenity-rich environments.
The Dublin Corporate Area Plan builds upon a study of Dublin’s legacy office parks – including Metro Center and the businesses along Frantz Road and Blazer Parkway – and presents a long range vision that seeks to determine ways to improve these areas for businesses, employees and residents, as well as encourage additional private investment that benefits the entire community.
Several major changes have occurred nationally in the past decade that present a challenge to the standard suburban office model in both the quantity and quality of the office experience. The first is a shift in the perceived and actual parking demand for certain users that now utilize a much higher employee per- square-foot ratio than when parking ratios were first developed. The second is the consistent increase in employee desires for nearby convenience and entertainment uses, as well as other amenities. National studies show that today’s employees expect to be able to walk to lunch, fitness centers and other services from their workplaces. At the same time, integrated housing within office parks has become a growing trend around the country with the goal of creating a true mixed use, walkable environment that sustains businesses. The challenge for older office parks is to find the space for all of these uses, as well as the facilities that support walking, biking and transit connectivity.
This 30 to 50 year vision seeks to provide successful revitalization for the Dublin Corporate Area, while pointing the way toward future opportunities and sustainable development.
PLANNING GOALS
The following goal statements serve as the policy foundation for the Dublin Corporate Area Plan.
- Reposition the “legacy” office sites for success by encouraging new investment, as well as reinvestment in existing buildings.
- Create a walkable, mixed use environment with the commensurate amenities, while recommending places for infill and new development.
- Use formal and informal open spaces as organizational and focal elements for new development and redevelopment.
- Apply place making principles to encourage vitality within the district.
- Identify under-served markets and the related opportunities for attracting new private investment.
- Establish a strategy to “refresh” the Frantz Road streetscape that better refl cts the gateway nature of this important corridor.
- Recommend mechanisms to ensure additional development along Frantz Road does not adversely impact neighborhoods to the east.
- Recommend zoning tools to ensure successful implementation of the vision and plan recommendations, while providing new zoning protections for adjacent neighborhoods.
- Introduce consistent and compatible architectural and site design guidelines for the entire district.
