It’s all happening so fast. It seems like every week another local business gets forced out of the area by a national chain.The biggest push is yet to come. Campus Partners chose a developer last week for the south campus redevelopment project, but it will still take years before the so-called University Gateway is completed.Put aside the moral implications of Ohio State razing small businesses, which in some cases have been here for decades, to construct a huge shopping complex. Forget the fact that OSU did little to stem the crime and decay that plagued the area for years, waiting until it festered to the point it could justify taking over.This project is happening, whether we like it or not. If it’s even possible, let’s try to save some semblance of what makes the university district great.It’s not huge chain stores. This is a campus, not a mall. Students can go to City Center, Tuttle Crossing or one of the dozens of other shopping centers in the city if they want to buy Abercrombie and Fitch chinos.It’s locally owned and run small businesses. It’s ethnic eateries with thick-accented owners. It’s CD stores where that rare import can be found. And yes – no matter how much it irks the administration – it’s bars jammed with students drinking, dancing and meeting old and new friends and lovers.It’s frightening how quickly the area is being cleansed of these things. Friday marked the last day of George Psyhogios’ 23 years serving the campus, with his Souvlaki Palace II to be demolished next month to make way for another chain burger joint. Gateway will drive out the Greek Village, Apollo’s and Firdous. There will soon be no Greek and Middle Eastern restaurants left in the area.Even with the glut of CD stores on the campus stretch of North High Street, Singing Dog and Magnolia Thunderpussy stood out among the best. They too fall within the target of Gateway. Magnolia has already gone the way of Stache’s music club and Monkey’s Retreat book and magazine shop, relocating in the Short North.There are few bars left that bring together a broad spectrum of students. There’s nothing special about a place like Quarters – it’s packed out the door on Thursday nights because it’s one of the last places left people under 21 can get into. Playboy’s naming of the Out-R-Inn as the best campus-area bar typifies the fact there’s nowhere cool left to hang out.Gateway isn’t meant to change these things. It’s planned to be filled with “destination retailers” – huge clothing stores and shops that will draw yuppies with large disposable incomes to the campus area. No matter how many times Campus Partners claims otherwise, this project is not intended for students.The Druker Company was the best choice for the Gateway developer, but it was really a situation in which the lesser of three evils was picked. Their proposal at least had a few existing south campus businesses relocated in Gateway, but it will still be a huge and tacky mess.The rest of the campus-area stretch of North High Street is already buckling under an invasion of formula chains. We’ve had to say goodbye to Big Fun and Souvlaki Palace II to make way for the pretentiously wanna-be hip Urban Outfitters and Steak ‘N Shake.The national chain Nebraska Books will open in the fall, competing with Long’s and other long-standing textbook stores. Chains like CVS Pharmacy and Blockbuster Video are inundating the area with locations every few blocks, choking the life out of locally owned convenience and video stores.Gateway will undoubtedly worsen the situation by driving up rent prices to a point at which small businesses can’t survive. A few local businesses might enter the mix and prosper, but they will surely be a minority.The only hope left is that somewhere far from south campus and the leering eyes of a controlling administration something pure and original sprouts anew. It might be north campus or might be away from the area. It might never happen.For most of us, when we return to OSU it will not be the place we knew. With apologies to Akron native Chrissie Hynde, we offer a retooled verse of an old Pretenders song – call it “My Campus Was Gone.”
I went back to Ohio StateBut all the local culture had diedHad been bulldozed and destroyedBy a university that had no prideThe bars of Ohio StateHad been replaced by a shopping mallAnd Muzak filled the airFrom 9th Avenue to Drinko HallSaid oh great, way to go Ohio State.
