Senior housing planned for West Fifth Avenue. Visuals provided by Wagenbrenner Development.

The 20-acre development planned for Battelle parking lots in Harrison West has a new name, a revised site plan, and a chance to break ground before the end of the year.

Now called Founders Park, the latest tweaks to the layout and programming of the development were presented to the Harrison West Society earlier this month. That group signed off on the necessary zoning variances, clearing the way for the project to go before City Council and for the development team to start pulling permits and planning for construction.

Joseph Reidy, General Counsel for Wagenbrenner Development, said that site grading could start before the end of the year, followed by infrastructure work and the first vertical construction as soon as next spring. He stressed that the exact timeline will depend on “additional approvals that we’re waiting on from the city.”

Wagenbrenner Development has been the lead developer on the project since it was first announced in early 2017. Other partners on the project include M/I Homes, Continental Real Estate, Daimler, and Fortress Real Estate Companies.

The final plan for the site calls for more residential units and more structured parking than the previous iteration, but the design of the 160-room hotel and 200-unit senior center haven’t changed. The development will hold a total of 342 apartments, 470 structured parking spaces, 38 single family homes, 50 for-sale townhomes and a six-acre park.

After plans for a grocery store fell through last summer, additional restaurant/retail space along West Fifth Avenue was added. A 7,000-square-foot gym will be available for residents but also open to the public.

Although no tenant announcement have been made yet, “our focus is local operators,” said Reidy. “Within the city of Columbus there are some really great restaurant operators, coffee purveyors, and we would like our site to be the next stop for one or more of them.”

As for the name, Reidy said it is an attempt to pay homage to Battelle without creating confusion by naming the development directly after the large non-profit research institute.

“We wanted to acknowledge and celebrate all of the innovations that Battelle has been responsible for,” he said. “They hold the original patent for photocopying…and have been the founders of so many innovations that are part of our every day life.”

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