Mike Wolanin | The Republic A view of the Cummins building adjacent to the Irwin Conference Center in Columbus, Ind., Monday, February. 26, 2024.
The Columbus Redevelopment Commission agreed to offer a number of parking spaces in the Jackson Street garage to Toyota Material Handling (TMH), who city officials said is on the verge of acquiring the Irwin Office Building and Conference Center from Cummins Inc.
A unanimous vote on Monday allows the Columbus Redevelopment Commission to enter into negotiations with TMH to execute a contract for a graduated rate on 75 parking spaces in the Jackson Street garage. The contract is set to have four five-year renewals, according to Director of Redevelopment Heather Pope.
Toyota’s potential purchase of the building at 525 Jackson St. would bring around 200 TMH employees downtown, according to Pope.
“(Cummins and TMH are) in the process of finalizing things, dotting I’s, crossing Ts, and making sure that they would be good stewards of the building moving forward,” Pope said. “Part of that stewardship is ensuring that their employees have a place to park and they have requested to have what I’m going to call unreserved parking spaces in our garage.”
TMH’s Jill Mishler, who attended the meeting, said the negotiations with Cummins “are contingent upon parking.”
There are two types of parking spots in the city garages, according to Pope — reserved spaces, meaning there is a singular space a person always uses and unreserved spaces, meaning that a person will always have a space in the garage, but it won’t necessarily be the same space.
The Jackson Street garage currently has 400 parking spaces and sits at an occupancy rate between 50-60%, so there is sufficient space in the garage for a long-term renter such as Toyota, Pope said.
The city is offering the spaces with structured pricing. The 75 spaces would be free in calendar year 2025, $25 a month per space in 2026, $50 a month per space in 2027 and Toyota would pay market rate pricing beginning in 2028. The current market rate is $65, according to redevelopment officials.
“From a numbers perspective, the discount amounts to $108,000 over those three years,” Redevelopment President Al Roszczyk said. “But once it goes to full market rate, it’s $50,000 a year for the next 21 years, so it’s a huge win and I don’t think we could’ve picked a better partner to be downtown than Toyota.”
Cummins in February announced that they would be selling the Irwin Office Building and Conference Center, along with the former Sears building, located at 323 Brown St. The buildings have been vacant since the pandemic, with no employees working in either building since 2022.
The redevelopment commission entered an agreement with Cummins to purchase the former Sears building and adjoining parking lot for $4.2 million on March 18. The expenditure was ratified by Columbus City Council members on May 21.
City officials said they intend to move quickly and not possess the building for long, and that the building’s ultimate use is contingent on what comes out of the Columbus Downtown 2030 plan.
Cummins acquired the Irwin Office Building and Conference Center at the corner of Fifth and Washington streets from First Financial Bank in 2010, announcing plans to employ 350 people at the location, The Republic reported previously. At the time, the company said it planned to invest $5.25 million to purchase and equip the 90,794-square-foot building.
The building, which was initially owned by Irwin Union Bank and Trust Co., was designed by famed Finnish-American architect Eero Saarinen in 1954, and features “nine opaque domes” that “act as giant lamp shades” and flooring in some areas with “1-inch thick glazed, split paving brick in a rustic buff color,” according to the Columbus-Area Visitors Center. The three-story glass arcade was designed by Kevin Roche and added in 1973.
First Financial Bank acquired the property after the demise of Irwin-Union Bank during the Great Recession.
