In the end, it was a promise that was too good to last.
Downtown Columbus, long derided for decrepit buildings and a plethora of parking lots, would be revived by a skating rink. But not just any skating rink. This would be our city’s own Rockefeller Plaza, with a sunken, nine-thousand-square-foot rink for both ice- and roller-skating, intriguing architecture, pedestrian walkways, a restaurant and a huge, cascading fountain.
The venture was the brainchild of the Capitol South Community Urban Redevelopment Corporation, a non-profit organization tasked with constructing office buildings, restaurants, residential buildings, a performing arts center and even a huge shopping mall in the three blocks immediately south of the Statehouse. A multi-million-dollar federal grant paved the way for what would be called the Centrum…