Our goal is to create the largest inter-connected park system in the country.
Since RAPID 5 was unveiled, interest and excitement around the vision has been astounding. RAPID 5 received its 501c3 in July 2022. In this short time, a significant amount of work has been accomplished.
Perhaps most important to moving the RAPID 5 vision forward at this early stage, is the successful establishment of a Board of Directors who are committed to helping guide and grow the organization. Our focus in the coming year now turns to the intensive work of strategic and operational planning with the Board. The plan will address building and sustaining the organization and the system. Our outward facing work will quiet to focus resources and staff on these critical planning efforts.
Thank you for your overwhelming enthusiasm. We appreciate your patience and understanding as we build the organization’s capacity to bring this transformational regional vision to reality.
The vision started with the Urban Land Institute (ULI) Columbus and the Mid-Ohio Regional Planning Commission (MORPC) inviting Neighborhood Design Center and five local design firms to gather community input and imagine possibilities for making the region’s unique natural assets a centerpiece for central Ohio’s growth and wellbeing. The five design firms are REALM Collaborative, NBBJ, MKSK, AECOM and EDGE.
Thank you to the 2021 RAPID 5 Project Management Committee:
As central Ohio is on track to become a region of 3 million people by 2050, there is a unique and urgent opportunity to ensure that growth includes plans to preserve and expand people’s access to nature. Connecting people with nature and one another benefits their wellbeing, promotes social equity, spurs environmental stewardship, increases mobility and enhances economic vitality.
RAPID 5 is an acronym for Rivers and Parks Imagination Design. The “5” refers to the five major waterways running north-south and equally distributed through Franklin County – Big Darby Creek, Scioto River, Olentangy River, Alum Creek, Big Walnut Creek.
Over the past decade ULI Columbus and MORPC have convened conversations regarding how and where the region grows with efforts like insight2050 and insight2050 Corridor Concepts. Both organizations were also separately focused on connections between natural resources and wellbeing – ULI through the Building Healthy Places initiative begun in 2013 and MORPC with its 2015 Central Ohio Greenways plan.
RAPID 5 is not a standalone initiative, but one of several major regional initiatives. The region is at the cusp of transformation with efforts like LinkUs, Central Ohio Greenways, Regional Housing Strategy, and many more. Together these efforts will be transformative to the region.
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