Earlier this month, Austin City Council pushed to February an action item on a Major League Soccer stadium and practice facility site on city-owned land.

The delay gives city staff more time to study each of its eight identified sites and to meet with stakeholders to determine which sites might be most realistic as the future home of Crew SC, should ownership decide to move the team after the 2018 season.

In Columbus, the path to a soccer stadium isn’t as clear.

On Nov. 29, Columbus Mayor Andrew Ginther and Columbus Partnership CEO Alex Fischer released a letter outlining stadium proposals they pitched to Crew investor-operator Anthony Precourt and MLS Commissioner Don Garber during a Nov. 15 meeting in New York. Among the options presented: Berliner Park, Dodge Recreation Center in Franklinton, a redevelopment of the state fairgrounds, where Mapfre Stadium currently sits, and unnamed “feasible” downtown stadium sites with the idea of creating a “stadium central” with Nationwide Arena and Huntington Park.

Since, there has not been public discussion regarding possible stadium sites in Columbus, as Ginther’s office and the Columbus Partnership have been firm in their stance they will not enter a “bidding war” with another city. Precourt Sports Ventures, the Crew’s ownership group, meanwhile, has held that it is “open to productive dialogue should the City of Columbus choose to re-engage with PSV.”

So while the identification and research process continues in Austin, many in Columbus have been left to speculate as to which site or sites in Columbus might be suitable for building a new soccer-specific stadium to keep Crew SC in Ohio.

One plot of land that has been a popular topic of conversation among Crew fans and interested observers is the Nationwide Realty Investors-owned site west of Huntington Park on the edge of the Arena District.

According to a Nationwide Realty Investors spokeswoman, however, Nationwide has not “been approached with any level of specificity” by the Crew/Precourt Sports Ventures or “anyone else” regarding the 25-acre site, which it purchased for $11 million in 2011.

NRI was made aware “earlier this year” by Crew officials that the team was studying the site, among others, the spokeswoman said, but “since that time, they have not made us aware of the results of their study.” Nationwide Realty Investors has not received further inquiries about the site, the spokeswoman said.

In announcing in November its decision that it would not go through with developing a 23-acre parcel adjacent to the Nationwide site, Schottenstein Real Estate Group revealed that earlier talks with the Crew regarding a possible stadium at the location had fallen through.

Schottenstein said at the time the site “was not pursued by the Crew due to the inability for a stadium to fit on the site and/or” development and access restrictions limiting the location.

The Crew countered with a text exchange between Schottenstein Real Estate Group President Brian Schottenstein and Crew President of Business Operations Andy Loughnane in which Schottenstein acknowledged to Loughnane, “Per your email it didn’t look like (a stadium overlay) could fit on the property.”

In a conference call with reporters on Oct. 17, the day the Crew’s potential move to Austin after the 2018 season was announced, Precourt said of Downtown Columbus stadium sites, “There are three sites that have been recommended to us and we will continue to look at them. That’s all I can comment on.” Precourt told The Dispatch in October that a stadium in Downtown Columbus, the Arena District or Franklinton would be a requirement to keep the Crew in Columbus.

Less than a week before the December Austin City Council work session in which the soccer stadium action item was pushed to February, PSV released a rendering and sketch of a stadium at Butler Shores Metropolitan Park, a park composed mostly of baseball and softball fields just across Lady Bird Lake from Downtown Austin.

It’s not immediately clear, based on analysis that still needs to take place at the Austin city level, which site PSV and the city will pick, but the search continues in earnest as PSV explores its options in Austin.

aerickson@dispatch.com

@AEricksonCD

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