The Neighborhood Commercial Revitalization Program (NCR), sponsored by the City of Columbus, historically consisted of matching grants for interior and exterior improvements to commercial properties in designated corridors. The program also historically consisted of competitive interest loan programs, technical assistance, capital improvements, and planning services.

Currently, the program is available to tenants and business owners within the following areas:

• Franklinton: West Broad Street
• Hilltop: West Broad Street
• East Main: East Main Street
• Parsons: Parsons Avenue
• King-Lincoln: East Long Street/Mt Vernon Avenue
• Linden: Cleveland Avenue

The condition of each corridor is assessed every two years to understand commercial conditions within the areas. These conditions were recorded by Neighborhood Design Center staff through field assessments in which visual inspections determined a property's building occupancy and the condition of the building's interior, exterior, and signage. Generally, residents within a 20 minute walk of an area are the most likely customer base for businesses along these corridors, and so additional demographic and economic trends were collected through Esri Business Analyst for the corridors' 20 minute walksheds.

These assessments serve as a planning resource to assist in strategically selecting sites and areas of targeted redevelopment to enhance the impact of coordinated and unified NCR development. This StoryMap illustrates many of the key findings of these assessments. Users can scroll through the entire site or choose to navigate to specific sections by clicking the tabs at the top of the page.

The Parsons NCR corridor is the only corridor located on Columbus' Southside. As the longest NCR corridor, it spans from E Livingston Ave to Hosack St. The 190 commercial properties along the corridor have 33,895 residents within a 20 minute walk to potentially serve.

The Parsons corridor serves several different communities within its 20 minute walkshed, including the Southside communities of Merion Village, Southern Orchards, and German Village. Other notable adjacent communities include downtown and Old Town East. These communities all have varying populations with different median incomes, family makeups, and housing types, meaning that the corridor has the potential to support a variety of business types. Other notable attractions to the area include Nationwide Children's Hospital, a major Columbus employer, and Schiller Park, which attracts a large number of visitors to the corridor and surrounding historic German Village.

The population of the corridor's walkshed increased slightly between 2020 to 2023, at 3%. The population is projected to maintain this growth rate into 2028, with around 35,000 residents potentially calling the area home.

The median home values for properties within the walkshed is expected to reach $333,000 by 2028, a 15% increase. This growth is slightly outpaced by the projected 17% increase in home values for Columbus. While overall Columbus home values are rising at a slightly faster rate, home values for the corridor's walkshed are currently around $56,000 higher. A portion of this walkshed does cover the Columbus downtown area, likely a major influence on the estimated housing values.

There are an estimated 18,940 housing units within the corridor's walkshed. This number is projected to increase by 4% to 19,694 by 2029, while the number of housing units for the city overall is projected to grow by 3%.

The number of vacant units within the walkshed are projected to fall to 12% by 2029. This loss will transfer to a gain in renter occupied units, rising to 55% of housing units. The number of vacant units in the walkshed varies greatly from the Columbus median of 8% in 2023. 41% of the city's housing units are owner occupied, compared to the walkshed's 33%.

Merchant retail sales along the corridor total $113.4 million. Retail sales for the entire walkshed total $337.1 million. Residents in the walkshed spent a total of $433.6 million in retail goods, meaning that $96.5 million in retail spending was spent outside of the walkshed. According to Esri's Spending Potential Index, the walkshed has an index of 84 for retail spending. 100 represents the national average spending for the index, where a number below 100 represents below average spending and a number above 100 represents above average spending.

Residents in the walkshed tend to be employed in white collar jobs, which make up more than half of all employment:

• White Collar: 67%
• Blue Collar: 15%
• Sector: 18%

The corridor and surrounding area are well served and connected to infrastructure that supports multiple modes of transportation.

COTA runs bus routes directly through the corridor, providing direct access for potential shoppers and workers with stops spread along the entire corridor. In addition to its current bus routes, COTA's  LinkUS initiative  plans to perform a study for streets surrounding the Parsons area to potentially construct a dedicated Bus Rapid Transit line.

The corridor benefits from direct access to the I-71 and I-70 interstates north of the corridor, which extends the distance that visitors may be willing to travel to reach the corridor. While the interstates increases access by car to the corridor, it also creates a physical barrier between the corridor and areas north, including downtown and Olde Town East. The highway may discourage residents in these areas from travelling by foot or bike to reach the corridor.

Another barrier for residents inside and outside of the walkshed is a lack of bike infrastructure around the corridor. It is difficult for most residents to travel through Columbus by bike, likely a major contributor to low bike ridereship for walkshed residents. While travelling by bike is currently not the most convenient choice for walkshed residents, they do have access to CoGo bikeshare stations, which provide rentable bikes throughout Columbus. There are currently 15 bikeshare stations within the walkshed, primarily located in the German Village neighborhood and downtown, with one directly on the corridor. Locating these bikeshare stations along the corridor provides direct access for visitors utilizing these bikeshare services.

The Neighborhood Design Center assessed the conditions and occupancy of all commercial properties for each NCR Corridor through an on the ground visual inspection.

As part of this assessment, staff determined which properties were vacant and occupied, and what type of businesses occupy the properties. This information allows for potential business owners and stakeholders to understand what type of businesses the corridor is lacking in and which ones are overrepresented. Levels of vacancy also indicate how successful these corridors are as commercial spaces, with less vacancy indicating a thriving market and more vacancy indicating a need for targeted investment.

The following maps are a block-by-block assessment of building frontage and building stock, and how they contribute to the look and feel of the corridor.

The corridor was separated into the following blocks:

 East Livingston Avenue to East Kossuth Street 

 East Kossuth Street to East Deshler Avenue 

 East Deshler Avenue to East Moler Street 

 East Moler Street to East Morrill Avenue 

 East Morrill Avenue to Hosack Street 

Scroll through the StoryMap to view each assessment or click the links above to jump to specific blocks.

Click the images below for an expanded view.

Street Elevation

Building Frontage

Building Stock

Click the images below for an expanded view.

Street Elevation

Building Frontage

Building Stock

Click the images below for an expanded view.

Street Elevation

Building Frontage

Building Stock

Click the images below for an expanded view.

Street Elevation

Building Frontage

Building Stock