Columbus Thread VII (Convo and Questions About Columbus for Visitors and Locals)

[koteka]

I couldn’t find the location on the website, it just mentions “northeast.” Where is the place?

I think they will announce it soon. I don’t know where it will be.

 

[koteka]

I couldn’t find the location on the website, it just mentions “northeast.” Where is the place?

Today she announced it will be in Newark. I think she was hoping for Reynoldsburg, but it sounds like she found an existing building in Newark that will work for what she wants to build

 

[ThirdPeriodTurtle]

Hey a couple of quick questions for locals, how's the Downtown/Arena District for walking? Like if I'm planning to stay somewhere within a 2-3 mile radius from Nationwide, is that going to be walkable throughout with little to no problems with sidewalks and such? Looking at Short North, River South, German Village, Olde Towne East etc nearby districts... Any areas to avoid (esp. after a game when it's dark)?

And what about travelling to/from Cleveland, is the Greyhound bus the best no-car option? $35-40 doesn't seem too steep at least (but if there's cheaper ways than the official site, I'd love to know).

 

[Nanabijou]

Today she announced it will be in Newark. I think she was hoping for Reynoldsburg, but it sounds like she found an existing building in Newark that will work for what she wants to build

So this is a studio rink? Kind of a Battery-like facility?

 

[squashmaple]

Hey a couple of quick questions for locals, how's the Downtown/Arena District for walking? Like if I'm planning to stay somewhere within a 2-3 mile radius from Nationwide, is that going to be walkable throughout with little to no problems with sidewalks and such? Looking at Short North, River South, German Village, Olde Towne East etc nearby districts... Any areas to avoid (esp. after a game when it's dark)?

And what about travelling to/from Cleveland, is the Greyhound bus the best no-car option? $35-40 doesn't seem too steep at least (but if there's cheaper ways than the official site, I'd love to know).

Depends which directon you're walking to/from. The Arena district, downtown, and Short North (the neighborhood directly to the north of the Arena district) are all quite safe and walkable with good sidewalks. Would not recommend OTE at night or River South, and avoid anything that says Discovery District or Southern Orchards. Anything along North High St should be safe--I live a few miles straight up High myself. Happy to give advice if you've got specifics, too! I am actually a trained tourism ambassador for the city with the CVB, though my actual license for it has expired so I can't put the letters after my name anymore, lol. The Jackets actually paid for it for me back when I worked there.

I have personally taken the Greyhound between Columbus and Cleveland, as I do not drive. They recently moved the Greyhound station from downtown to a new, horrible location in a rough neighborhood (sorry to any Westside/Hilltop locals, maybe my Clintonville snobbery is showing, but I would not call that a great area to a tourist). You're going to want to uber/taxi/lyft from there to your ultimate destination, or arrange a ride maybe with someone here (I would if I could!). Definitely do not walk from there.

As a nondriver, I mostly take our local bus service around, called COTA (Here is a link to COTA's trip planner, which is super helpful). It has a very good app called Transit and is $2/ride with a max of $6/day (so any more rides beyond three are automatically free including transfers), with real time bus tracking. It's not the best public transit, especially compared to Europe, but the buses are clean and safe especially if you stay on lines that run along High St and closer to city center (I would avoid heading out east and south as a tourist). You're Finnish, right? Will you have an american SIM card while you're here? If not, there are still tons of wifi hotspots around including the arena itself, most restaurants, and the buses themselves also have free wifi.

 

[Doggy]

Hey a couple of quick questions for locals, how's the Downtown/Arena District for walking? Like if I'm planning to stay somewhere within a 2-3 mile radius from Nationwide, is that going to be walkable throughout with little to no problems with sidewalks and such? Looking at Short North, River South, German Village, Olde Towne East etc nearby districts... Any areas to avoid (esp. after a game when it's dark)?

And what about travelling to/from Cleveland, is the Greyhound bus the best no-car option? $35-40 doesn't seem too steep at least (but if there's cheaper ways than the official site, I'd love to know).

Also, when are you hoping to come?

 

[koteka]

So this is a studio rink? Kind of a Battery-like facility?

Yes.

• 54'x93' Ice Surface
• 12'x20' Synthetic Practice and Shooting Lane

 

[Jackets Woodchuck]

Does anybody know where Megabus and Barons Bus (scheduled service, not charters) stop in Columbus?

 

[koteka]

Does anybody know where Megabus and Barons Bus (scheduled service, not charters) stop in Columbus?

Looks like OSU is an option.

 

[ThirdPeriodTurtle]

^^ Thanks for the above, sounds like I could use that too instead of the Greyhound downtown..

Depends which directon you're walking to/from. The Arena district, downtown, and Short North (the neighborhood directly to the north of the Arena district) are all quite safe and walkable with good sidewalks. Would not recommend OTE at night or River South, and avoid anything that says Discovery District or Southern Orchards. Anything along North High St should be safe--I live a few miles straight up High myself. Happy to give advice if you've got specifics, too! I am actually a trained tourism ambassador for the city with the CVB, though my actual license for it has expired so I can't put the letters after my name anymore, lol. The Jackets actually paid for it for me back when I worked there.

I have personally taken the Greyhound between Columbus and Cleveland, as I do not drive. They recently moved the Greyhound station from downtown to a new, horrible location in a rough neighborhood (sorry to any Westside/Hilltop locals, maybe my Clintonville snobbery is showing, but I would not call that a great area to a tourist). You're going to want to uber/taxi/lyft from there to your ultimate destination, or arrange a ride maybe with someone here (I would if I could!). Definitely do not walk from there.

As a nondriver, I mostly take our local bus service around, called COTA (Here is a link to COTA's trip planner, which is super helpful). It has a very good app called Transit and is $2/ride with a max of $6/day (so any more rides beyond three are automatically free including transfers), with real time bus tracking. It's not the best public transit, especially compared to Europe, but the buses are clean and safe especially if you stay on lines that run along High St and closer to city center (I would avoid heading out east and south as a tourist). You're Finnish, right? Will you have an american SIM card while you're here? If not, there are still tons of wifi hotspots around including the arena itself, most restaurants, and the buses themselves also have free wifi.

Thanks so much for this! Very helpful. I'll have to digest a bit. And yeah Finland, in recent years I think the roaming fees are fine so I don't need to get an American SIM (been there done that and it's always a bit of an annoyance).

Also, when are you hoping to come?

I have two options: Either in January (Jan 13-15 for SEA & VAN games) or late March (work trip that I would extend, sadly this coincides with the longest CBJ road trip of the season and screws up real bad with my plans, would kinda leave the PIT & COL games as the only viable options).

A follow-up: How hard do you all think it's going to be to get tickets for the PIT (Mar 30) and COL (Apr 1) games? Right now games don't seem to be soldout, but I'd imagine at least the Pittsburgh game is guaranteed to be soldout no matter how the team is doing? I wonder if people make a lot of game-time decisions on their tickets so if I'm a couple of weeks early maybe I could snatch some good ones still...

I would love to be eco friendly and all that and mix business with pleasure, but these schedules are so difficult that maybe I should just do a separate trip on my own. It also never ceases to amaze me how vast the North American continent is, it's not just a quick hop from the east coast to the west coast...

 

[Monk]

And yeah Finland, in recent years I think the roaming fees are fine so I don't need to get an American SIM (been there done that and it's always a bit of an annoyance).

I highly recommend going the eSim route for international travel. Cheap & easy. I've used Holafly numerous times.

eSIM USA from $6 with Unlimited Data - Holafly

Shop at Holafly for the best prepaid eSIM cards for travel to USA, Unlimited Data is included so you can use your cellphone worry-free.

esim.holafly.com

 

[ThirdPeriodTurtle]

F* Ticketmaster for not letting me buy official CBJ tickets from abroad. Somebody should do the world a favor and run them out of business, absolute worst ticket company everywhere in the world...

Anyhow, I noticed there's a "STANDING ROOM ONLY" for CBJ tickets. What are these, exactly? It was listing sections 107, 108, 109, 110, 111, 112 but surely those cannot be actual standing "seats"?

In Europe it's customary in some countries to have like a full standing seat section where everybody is standing and there are zero seats on that section, usually behind the goals of each side. These are for the fan clubs and so on. But I've never heard of this in the NHL, so the standing room must mean something else?

 

[squashmaple]

F* Ticketmaster for not letting me buy official CBJ tickets from abroad. Somebody should do the world a favor and run them out of business, absolute worst ticket company everywhere in the world...

Anyhow, I noticed there's a "STANDING ROOM ONLY" for CBJ tickets. What are these, exactly? It was listing sections 107, 108, 109, 110, 111, 112 but surely those cannot be actual standing "seats"?

In Europe it's customary in some countries to have like a full standing seat section where everybody is standing and there are zero seats on that section, usually behind the goals of each side. These are for the fan clubs and so on. But I've never heard of this in the NHL, so the standing room must mean something else?

They are slots along the back wall behind each of those sections. You have an assigned spot to stand, essentially. It’s not worth it.

 

[ThirdPeriodTurtle]

They are slots along the back wall behind each of those sections. You have an assigned spot to stand, essentially. It’s not worth it.

Thanks - but an assigned spot to stand? How does that work... Edit: Unless you just meant like a general location for multiple people to stand, yeah that makes sense now that I have my brain on, lol.

But shouldn't the views be quite alright? I've been looking around and people generally praise the Arizona SRO and Chicago SRO sections, and I thought they were basically unreserved general admission types. The ticketing floor plan is of no use if you ask me, it still displays actual seats in those sections and no mention of the SRO... ARI and CHI had nice circular ribbons going around in the floor plan.

If I'm not able to score proper medium-priced tickets to the CBJ home games on Stubhub (PHI @ CBJ Apr 6 is the one I'm most worried), I may have to try to get one of the standing spots...

For what it's worth, my Ticketmaster hate earlier was a bit misplaced this time - it's the CBJ version of the Ticketmaster purchase process that is preventing me from buying tickets without a U.S. credit card. Most other teams seem to use the regular Ticketmaster system and I've just bought a ticket to CBJ @ ARI on March 26 next year. No purchase problems but of course Ticketmaster wouldn't be Ticketmaster if their Mobile App wasn't only available for U.S. and Canada folks, so it's a bit of a hassle anyway. (I have to login to the website on a mobile browser to see the tickets - they've prevented desktop browsers from viewing them. Annoying but it'll do...)

 

[Columbus Hockey Dad]

How is Nationwide for kids? I’m a Westerville transplant from Philadelphia. I’m not going to badmouth my hometown, BUT, it wasn’t always so kid friendly taking in Flyers games. I took advantage of some great Black Friday sales for CBJ tickets in the lower bowl and will be taking my 11 year-old to some games. Looking at parking at McConnell garage, and the tickets come with a meal plan.

 

[koteka]

How is Nationwide for kids? I’m a Westerville transplant from Philadelphia. I’m not going to badmouth my hometown, BUT, it wasn’t always so kid friendly taking in Flyers games. I took advantage of some great Black Friday sales for CBJ tickets in the lower bowl and will be taking my 11 year-old to some games. Looking at parking at McConnell garage, and the tickets come with a meal plan.

You should be fine as long as you didn’t buy something like a Friday night game against Pittsburgh.

 

[Columbus Hockey Dad]

You should be fine as long as you didn’t buy something like a Friday night game against Pittsburgh.

Nope, that was not an option! But a number of Friday games (Sens, Blues, Devils, Toronto…).

 

[koteka]

Nope, that was not an option! But a number of Friday games (Sens, Blues, Devils, Toronto…).

Toronto fans will show up, be so amazed at how cheap beers are at NWA compared to Leafs games, and get really drunk but in a goofy way. They will happily tell you you that it was cheaper to come to Columbus, get a hotel, go to a few restaurants, and buy a bunch of beer than just buy tickets to a Leafs game. They will tell you how awesome Columbus is. I have sold 50/50 raffle tickets for youth hockey at Toronto games. The Leafs fans would drop a bunch of money on the 50/50 raffle.

 

[Doggy]

Honestly one of my biggest complaints with NWA is how freaking loud they play the music and other crap over the sound system. It's like they feel the crowd isn't loud enough so they are gonna just blast everyone's eardrums. I have been at games where I see kids covering their ears....and I get it. My SIL actually avoids going to games because of it and I have considered earplugs myself.

I have been to a dozen different NHL arenas and none of those arenas pumped in more fake loudness that NWA. It's the worst part of my hockey experience at NWA...that and the losses.

 

[Columbus Hockey Dad]

So my son and I had an awesome time at last night’s game! The people there were very friendly and even the drunks were happy drunks. Yes, the music was a little loud but not a big deal. Though the Greatful Dead cover band made it hard to hear those working at the concessions stands.

Speaking of which, does anyone know where you're supposed to use your "family value meal deal" vouchers for those who purchased them with the tickets? We used it at the Bratwurst concession stand and the guy there said he had never seen one before. i dunno???

Anyway, everyone there was great. And holy hell the cannon! By the end we figured out the timing, but first time is heart attack time! Parking was very easy in, and very easy out. They know they are doing down there! Looking forward to our game next week against the Blues!

 

[spintheblackcircle]

mall-at-tuttle-crossing-under-new-ownership-as-stores-close

Tuttle getting more and more empty

 

[Double-Shift Lasse]

mall-at-tuttle-crossing-under-new-ownership-as-stores-close

Tuttle getting more and more empty

Just more proof you can’t win a mall.

 

[Doggy]

Just more proof you can’t win a mall.

 

[Doggy]

mall-at-tuttle-crossing-under-new-ownership-as-stores-close

Tuttle getting more and more empty

There is always a need for more indoor pickleball courts.

Pickleball: reinvigorating old unused tennis courts and empty spaces at dying malls.

 

[Bobcat205]

Just more proof you can’t win a mall.