INTRODUCTION

The City of Columbia (herein after referred to as the "City" or "Columbia") is the capital and the second largest city in the State of South Carolina, with a population estimate of roughly 131,674. Downtown Columbia is the regional hub for commerce, employment, entertainment, and recreation in the South Carolina Midlands and the Metropolitan Columbia area. Census data and City of Columbia statistics can be found at: https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/columbiacitysouthcarolina.

The City is located in close proximity to Interstates 20, 26, 77 and 126, US Routes 321, 378, 1, and US 277. Columbia's Central Business District allows for easy access to a number of nationally recognized landmarks and tourism sites in the City and the region. Downtown Columbia is home to a number of museum and civic centers including the Columbia Museum of Art, the EDventure Children's Museum, the South Carolina State Museum, the South Carolina State House, the Koger Center for the Arts and the newly renovated Richland Main Library. Downtown Columbia is also a hub for economic and business interests in the region housing a dozen hotels, the 142,500 square foot Columbia Convention Center, an Amtrak station, and the University of South Carolina. The City of Columbia is also home to Fort Jackson, the main basic training center for the United States Army, which brings tens of thousands of soldiers and their families to the City each year. Riverbanks Zoo is located within the municipal limits and Congaree National Park, South Carolinas only National Park, is a short drive away. Columbia is located within a convenient drive to many of the Southeast's large cities: Charlotte, Asheville, Atlanta, Savannah, Augusta, and Charleston.

It has been 25 years since the adoption of Columbia's City Center Master Plan and over 15 years since the adoption of the Innovista Master Plan, which addressed a subset of the City Center geography. In the intervening years, major infrastructure projects have been completed or are underway, thousands of housing units have been built downtown, the City has adopted a new Unified Development Ordinance and Comprehensive Plan, the Covid-19 pandemic has shifted the way cities think about living, working and using public space and transportation has started a major shift to being shared and electric. A new strategic master plan for downtown Columbia is needed to:

• Articulate a current vision for the future development of the downtown area with current stakeholders;
• Utilize market data and analysis to identify needs and key opportunities for public and private investment to leverage this vision;
• Coordinate private and public activities to support high-quality public space that prioritizes pedestrian activity, a dynamic public realm, and fosters urban living and economic development
• Integrate the concepts from planning efforts such as the Public Space Public Life study and infrastructure recommendations from Walk Bike Columbia to facilitate a vibrant, safe, and walkable downtown;
• Create a framework for addressing curb management in a way that benefits all modes of transportation;
• Establish the context to consolidate and rewrite the City Center and Innovista design guidelines to reflect and support the new vision and strategy in a clear and streamlined format.

The desire is to create a plan and guidelines providing a clear and actionable guide for all stakeholders.

For the purposes of this project, Downtown will be considered the area currently covered by the City Center and Innovista Overlay districts, which generally includes Elmwood Avenue on the north to Catawba Street on the south and Pickens Street to the east and the Congaree River to the
west. A map of these areas can be found here: https://planninganddevelopment.columbiasc.gov/design-districts/

For a detailed community profile on Columbia, please visit:

https://www.choosecolumbiasc.com/

https://www.experiencecolumbiasc.com/community/

GENERAL INFORMATION

Project Specific Scope of Services

The intent of this Scope of Work is to provide a framework for proposers to use to develop a more detailed scope of work based upon their professional expertise and experience. In addition to attendance at project meetings, City staff participation will be in the form of direction, guidance, feedback, meeting notification and related public relations duties, and data compilation, but due to limited resources, it is anticipated that the consultant will be the primary actor in most of the tasks associated with this project.

OVERALL

1. Provide project management services to include the preparation of a project management plan to include, at a minimum: tasks, deliverables, schedule, document review process, required resources, quality checks, and reporting.
2. Develop and implement a public participation plan which utilizes a variety of mechanisms and formats for obtaining input from affected and interested parties, including those who don't normally attend public meetings. An emphasis on smaller, interactive methods is preferred.

Phase 1

Draft a Downtown Strategic Master Plan that should, at a minimum, address the following topics:

1. Develop and articulate a current vision and strategy for the future development of the downtown area for the next 10 years;
2. Utilize market data and analysis to determine appropriate mix of uses and identify gaps and how to fill them;
3. Identify key opportunities for public and private investment to leverage the vision and needs;
4. Recommend strategies to coordinate private and public investment and activities to support high-quality public space, prioritize pedestrian activity, and create a seamless city;
5. Integrate concepts from planning efforts such as the Public Space Public Life study and infrastructure recommendations from Walk Bike Columbia to facilitate a vibrant, safe, and walkable downtown;
6. Create a framework to address curb management in a way that benefits all modes of transportation.

Phase 2

Draft design guidelines to address the following:

1. Clarify: New design guidelines should clarify the role of zoning regulations vs. design guidelines. When the design guidelines were originally written, much of the zoning ordinance did not support walkable urbanism. The City recently rewrote its zoning and land development ordinances for the first time since the 1970s and it contains regulations that support improved urban design and neighborhood compatibility. As such, standards such as height and setback regulations are no longer as essential in the design guidelines and should be removed, where advisable while incorporating standards to ensure potential variance requests do not undermine the pedestrian experience. Guideline document(s) should clearly state intent and desired outcome of each guidelines and use graphics to illustrate this intent and/or examples;
2. Focus on the public realm: While high-quality architecture is valued and is a preferred outcome, the desired focus for Columbia's urban design review process is how developments interact with and address the street to promote the above goals. The new guidelines should balance a reduced reliance on the regulation of architectural detail with increased attention to the public-facing, street-level architecture, open spaces, fencing, and signage;
3. Street design: In addition to providing streamlined design guidelines for buildings, a key component of this effort shall also be to provide place-making guidance for the public rights-of-way: the primary places that people inhabit Downtown. . This should include clear expectations for what right-of-way improvements are required for private development, as well as guidance for permanent encroachments to include outdoor dining and parklets, and recommendations for curb management strategies to help balance the demands of on-street parking, bicycle facilities, delivery trucks, ride-share, and micro-mobility users;
4. Streamline and Simplify Sign Guidelines: Currently, signs in the City of Columbia are governed by the UDO and, if in a design overlay, the associated design guidelines. The current sign design guidelines lack clarity and direction and can conflict with the UDO. The consultant will assist the City in the development of a consolidated set of sign guidelines that can be applicable to all design districts that ensure adequate visibility and wayfinding for businesses, maintain a high quality public realm, and are clear and easy to understand and administer.

TIMELINE

The desired timeline from project initiation to the delivery of a public hearing draft documents is twelve months with a preference for nine. This time does not include the adoption process. The Consultant will prepare a reasonable timeline to complete the project taking into account the two phases listed above. If the Consultant believes the scope demands a different timeline, please indicate the duration and why.

DELIVERABLES

The Consultant will develop a Master Plan and Design Guidelines in a printable and electronic format suitable for future amendment with City resources. Staff will work with the consultant to determine the optimum format for the document. The Consultant will provide original files of photos or other images used in the documents and final digital versions of any maps and graphic images required for the documents. All maps, map layers, and shape files must be compatible with ESRI-based products, and all editable text documents must be compatible with Microsoft Office.