Scioto Mile Fountain to be replaced with $15M upgrade
‘Aquatic experience’ will have interactive features
Columbus Mayor Andrew J. Ginther’s administration and a Downtown civic organization have entered into a $15 million public-private partnership to rip out and replace the Scioto Mile Fountain, the leaking riverfront splash pad that first opened in 2011.
“It’s not a repair that we’re looking at,” said city Recreation and Parks Director Bernita Reese.
Rather, the fountain will be replaced with what she called “an aquatic experience” that will include interactive fountain features that react to kids’ movements and more.
The proposal calls for keeping three of the current fountain’s five trademark “halos” and its large central “bloom,” metal sculptures that pour water onto visitors and shoot jets up to 75 feet. Two smaller halos will be removed to fix an unforeseen issue with the original fountain that created mud at the perimeters of the 200-foot-wide water park and fouled the operating system for the fountain, which has an underground hold of 110,000 gallons to operate.
“We looked at how do we provide an equitable, fun activity with water features to the Downtown area, and not just for youth, because as our Downtown grows we have a lot of young people and adults,” Reese said.
Besides replacing the existing fountain, the plans call for upgrades to the surrounding grounds that include new food options with food truck and picnic areas and computerized LED lighting that will make the area an attraction year-round by lighting the fountain waters at night and illuminating dozens of additional globe-like sculptures during the winter months.
City taxpayers will contribute $7.5 million to the project, an amount that the city will transfer to the Columbus Downtown Development Corporation, which will act under contract as project administrator. Construction is expected to begin this spring, closing the fountain area to the public for a year, with a planned reopening on Memorial Day 2024.
The new total budget for the fountain replacement project is more than 16 times what the city preliminarily determined in 2021 it could cost to repair the existing fountain, which is extensively leaking from its network of miles of individually controlled
underground pipes.
Even after adjusting for inflation, the repairs will cost taxpayers more than half the $10 million the city originally contributed to create the entire milelong riverfront park in 2010, a $44 million public-private project that involved removing low-head dams and reclaiming land from the river.
Amy Taylor, president of the CDDC, said Thursday the proposed repair plan became so intensive, requiring ripping up most of the 15,000-square-foot plaza, that it was scrapped in favor of installing a new, state-of-the-art fountain.
The original fountain — which cost around $10 million to $12 million to build — is at the end of its life cycle, Taylor said.
“It was always anticipated that the fountain had a life cycle of about a decade,” Taylor said. The new fountain should have a similar decade-long life before needing any major maintenance or replacement, she said.
Officials couldn’t immediately say what warranty, if any, would protect city taxpayers and the CDDC from future breakdowns with the high-tech equipment involved with the planned new fountain, but Taylor said it is her understanding the existing fountain originally carried a one-year warranty.
The Dispatch previously reported that the old warranty, covering pumps and other control equipment, essentially became void after the installation firm, Fantastic Fountains, went out of business shortly after the new park opened. The prime contractor for the new fountain will be WET, a premier creator of major water attractions around the globe, Taylor said.
An endowment that could be tapped for maintenance — but is also used for other expenses, like planting flowers along the riverfront in the spring — currently has a balance of between $10 million and $11 million, Taylor said.
It is unclear what details were presented to City Council when it signed off on the $7.5 million fountain expenditure in mid-october, voting unanimously and without debate to assign oversight to the CDDC. The deal with the CDDC
wasn’t competitively bid. The bid-waiver form said just that “it is in the city’s best interests” to award the contract to the nonprofit organization because is it “is intimately involved in other significant downtown projects and the Strategic Plan.”
A private entity whose board is appointed by the city, Taylor said the organization hasn’t yet signed a final contract with the city, and it is unclear what collaboration on decision-making or public reporting and auditing of construction costs that agreement may require. Former Mayor Michael Coleman stepped down as chairman of the CDCC board at the end of last year, and former Columbus Partnership head Alex Fischer has replaced him. CDDC executive director Greg Davies was a former city director under Coleman and a former chief of staff to Ginther.
When Ginther penned the deal with the Columbus Crew to build the new Lower.com Field soccer stadium and its surrounding improvements, costing city taxpayers more than $100 million, it did not provide for any public oversight or audit authority over the team. As a result, officials came away with no details about how the team actually spent that money.
Joe Motil, who filed last week to run for mayor against Ginther, said Taylor’s statement that officials knew all along the current fountain would last only a decade shows a lack of transparency with the public. He said the $15 million proposed for a new fountain could be better spent on other city needs and issues, such as affordable housing or homelessness, “as opposed to things that look nice in a promotional marketing campaign.”
“...There are so many other needs, especially within our city Recreation and Parks Department, rec centers and such that need funding, and they’re going to spend $7.5 million (in taxpayers’ share) on this? It’s just unimaginable.”
To put the $15 million expenditure on fountain improvements into perspective:
● The 21-story, 280-foot tall, 275,100square-foot Midland Building at 250 East Broad is currently valued by the Franklin County auditor at $13.75 million.
● The 27-story, 348-foot tall, 527,130square-foot Continental Center at 150 East Gay Street changed hands in 2021 for $11.97 million.
● The 21-story 313,240-square-foot high-rise Key Bank Building at 88 East
Broad Street, directly across from the state Capitol, sold for $12.03 million last year.
Reese and Taylor provided an extensive list of benefits from replacing the current fountain, noting the fountain is a popular, free recreational amenity for the public to use during the ever-warming summers; underground maintenance needed to even continue operating the current fountain should be maximized for longevity to avoid future shutdowns; the proposed lighting and globe sculpture upgrades will make the fountain plaza a destination even in the winter months, and only two city workers will be needed to operate the fountain works during the operational months as opposed to the current six, making it more efficient.
Most importantly, they said, the fountain has become an important signature landmark and centerpiece for the city of Columbus and will be more so as it is transformed from essentially a dark and largely overlooked space during the winter into a flurry of computerized colored lights and sculptures.
“We’re excited,” Reese said. “It’s going to be a joy.” wbush@gannett.com @Reporterbush