FROM SOUTH SIDE GREEN SPACE TO CANNABIS LAW OVERHAUL: Great Southern Metro Park Soft-Opens With 27 Accessible Acres While Ohio's Senate Bill 56 Takes Effect Friday Restricting Hemp Sales and Public Consumption, and Columbus Rent Drops 4.2% in 2025 But Remains 33% Above Pre-COVID Levels With 6,700 New Units Hitting the Market

Hey, it's Gagan - still the only one in the world! Sorry about last week; we’ve been so busy helping buyers and sellers get into their dream home we totally forgot! (Might be time to hire a full time writer!)

BUT, can I just say…the fact that OVER 200 of you reached out asking if I was ok, and where the report was…INSANE! Thank you so much for the love 614!

Columbus didn't slow down for a single day this week.

This week we've got three stories that cut across green space, policy, and your wallet — and together they paint a pretty clear picture of where this city is in 2026. A long-overdue park finally opening on the South Side. A cannabis law rewrite that affects consumers, small businesses, and everyone in between. And rent numbers that look like good news until you remember where they started.

In today's newsletter:

• Great Southern Metro Park Is Open: The South Side just got its first major Metro Park addition — 27 acres already accessible with trails, obstacle courses, and a limestone quarry overlook. Official opening is April 1, but you can go right now.

• Ohio Cannabis Law Just Changed: Senate Bill 56 took effect Friday — new restrictions on public consumption, home grows, hemp sales, and how you store cannabis in your car. If you haven't read the details, you need to before the weekend.

• Columbus Rents Are Cooling — Sort Of: One-bedroom median rent dropped 4.2% in 2025 to $1,150. Sounds great until you realize you were paying $810 for that same unit in 2020. The leverage is real, but the window won't stay open long.

COLUMBUS' NEWEST METRO PARK IS ALREADY OPEN — GREAT SOUTHERN BRINGS GREEN SPACE TO THE SOUTH SIDE WITH A FULL OPENING APRIL 1

Great Southern Metro Park at 3447 Hirst Drive is in soft opening mode now with 27 acres already accessible — obstacle courses, restrooms, a soccer goal, a swing, and an overlook above a limestone quarry all installed — with an official ceremony scheduled for April 1 and a playground still coming this month. [Axios Columbus]

Here's What's Already There:

Twenty-seven acres of trails are open and walkable right now. Obstacle course stations are installed throughout. Restrooms near the parking lot are already operational.

The standout feature is an observation deck and swing overlooking an active limestone quarry — not the typical park view, but genuinely striking. A "Canal Trail" through the woods will eventually connect to the Scioto Trail and link the park to downtown.

Large sections carry "prairie in progress" signs — meaning the land is actively being reclaimed and will look dramatically different in two to three years as native grasses and plantings take hold.

A playground and additional picnic tables are arriving this month ahead of the April 1 official opening.

The Story Behind The Land:

This site wasn't always a park. Great Southern encompasses the former Heer Park and what was a well-known homeless encampment. The land sits along the backside of the Great Southern Shopping Center, near a sewage pumping station.

That context matters. This isn't a park dropping into an already-affluent neighborhood. It's green infrastructure being built in an underserved South Side community that has historically had less access to Metro Parks than other parts of the city.

The Bigger Picture:

Great Southern is the system's 21st Metro Park. Bank Run Metro Park — between Lockbourne and Obetz — opens May 16 as the 22nd, featuring a 300-person event space, 5K trail, and performance stage on a 166-acre former quarry site.

Both were funded in part by a 10-year levy approved in 2018 that costs homeowners just over $33 annually per $100,000 of home value. That's a remarkably efficient investment for what it's delivering to underserved corridors.

The eventual connection to the Scioto Trail and Scioto River access will be transformative for this part of the South Side. Right now it's a park with potential. In five years, it will be something people drive across the city to visit.

Go explore it now, before the April crowds show up.

OHIO'S CANNABIS LAW JUST CHANGED — HERE'S WHAT SENATE BILL 56 ACTUALLY MEANS FOR COLUMBUS CONSUMERS AND BUSINESSES

Senate Bill 56 took effect Friday, introducing misdemeanor charges for transporting cannabis outside a car's trunk, possible felony charges for growing more than six plants per person, restrictions on intoxicating hemp sales, and public consumption bans on edibles that have been legal for two years — despite a referendum effort that fell short of the 250,000 signatures needed to pause the law. [WCMH-TV]

Here's What Actually Changed:

Public consumption of cannabis — including edibles — is now prohibited and chargeable. That's a significant shift from the past two years when edibles in public spaces were fully legal.

Transporting cannabis outside your car's trunk is now a misdemeanor. Keep it in the trunk, not the back seat or center console.

Home grows are now limited to six plants per person with a maximum of 12 per household. Exceeding that carries potential felony charges.

Intoxicating hemp products — the chemically altered products that produce a high but aren't legally classified as cannabis — can now only be sold at licensed dispensaries. The gas stations, smoke shops, and standalone hemp retailers selling these products have lost that ability as of Friday.

Why This Is Controversial:

Ohio voters approved recreational marijuana in November 2023 with 57% of the vote. Critics of SB 56, including advocacy group Ohioans for Cannabis Choice, argue the legislature effectively overrode a voter mandate by tightening restrictions voters never approved.

The referendum effort to pause the law and put it back to voters needed 250,000 valid signatures collected in roughly six weeks. They fell short. The legal request to block the law from taking effect was denied Thursday.

On the other side, sponsor Senator Steve Huffman argues the bill adds safeguards — particularly around children's access to intoxicating hemp — without eliminating the core right voters approved.

What It Means For Businesses:

Ohioans for Cannabis Choice estimates at least 6,000 small businesses relied on intoxicating hemp sales under the previous framework. Those businesses can no longer sell those products unless they operate through a licensed dispensary.

That's a real economic impact hitting small retailers — convenience stores, smoke shops, wellness boutiques — that built product lines around hemp products that were completely legal when they stocked them.

The Bottom Line:

If you're a cannabis consumer in Ohio, know the new rules before Friday catches you off guard. If you're a business owner in the hemp or cannabis space, the landscape shifted materially this week. And if you're watching this from a policy angle — a voter-approved framework getting significantly tightened by the legislature two years later is a story that isn't finished yet.

COLUMBUS RENTS DROPPED 4.2% IN 2025 — BUT YOU'RE STILL PAYING 33% MORE THAN YOU WERE BEFORE COVID

Columbus one-bedroom median rent fell to $1,150 in 2025 — down 4.2% year-over-year — as 14.4% more apartment inventory hit the market and nearly 40% of landlords offered concessions like free rent or waived fees, but pre-pandemic renters paying $810 in January 2020 are still absorbing a 33% increase even after the cooldown. [Columbus Dispatch / Zumper Annual National Rent Report]

Here's What The Numbers Actually Say:

One-bedroom median rent in Columbus hit $1,150 in February 2026 — down 5% from February 2025. Two-bedrooms came in at $1,400, actually up 1.4% year-over-year.

Columbus ranks as the 65th priciest rental market in the country out of cities Zumper tracks — up two spots from 67th in January, meaning the relative position is actually getting slightly more expensive even as absolute prices dip.

For context on Ohio: Cleveland one-bedrooms median at $1,100, Cincinnati at $1,080, Akron at $790. Columbus is the priciest major Ohio market by a meaningful margin.

Why Rents Cooled:

Columbus was set to deliver more than 6,700 new apartment units in 2025. That supply surge — reflected in 14.4% more available listings at year-end versus the prior year — gave renters options and forced landlords to compete.

Nearly 40% of rental listings on Zillow offered concessions in February. Free rent, waived fees, reduced deposits. That's almost identical to the downtown luxury concession data we covered earlier this year — the dynamic isn't just downtown anymore, it's market-wide.

A February Zillow report also flagged a rise in "accidental landlords" — homeowners who couldn't sell their houses and rented them instead, adding single-family rental supply to an already-loosening market.

The Part That Stings:

None of this changes the pre-COVID baseline. A Columbus renter paying $810 for a one-bedroom in January 2020 is now paying $1,150 for the same unit. That's a 42% increase in six years — the recent 4-5% annual dip barely registers against that trajectory.

Ohio also has a shortage of 266,000 affordable and available rental units according to the 2026 Gap Report. Nearly half of Ohio's 1.58 million renters are paying more than they can afford. The market softening helps at the margins — it doesn't fix the underlying structural problem.

What Comes Next:

The relief is likely temporary. Zumper's data shows the cooldown pace slowing in early 2026. Once the 6,700 new units lease up and vacancy tightens, rent growth is expected to reaccelerate.

The window where renters have genuine leverage — concessions, negotiating power, actual options — is real right now. If you're considering a move or a lease renewal negotiation, this is the moment to use it. That window closes when the new supply gets absorbed, and in a city growing as fast as Columbus, that absorption happens faster than most people expect.

THIS WEEK'S WRAP-UP

Homeowners: Great Southern Metro Park adds quality-of-life infrastructure to the South Side that historically gets underserved by these investments. Parks like this shift neighborhood desirability over time — slowly at first, then all at once. The Bank Run opening in May adds another data point in the same direction.

Home buyers: The rent cooldown data is relevant context for your buy-versus-rent calculation. At $1,150 median for a one-bedroom and 33% above pre-COVID levels, the math on owning versus renting keeps shifting toward ownership for anyone with stable income and a reasonable down payment — especially before the new rental supply gets absorbed and rents climb again.

Investors and landlords: The concession environment is real and market-wide. If you're managing rental properties right now, competing on price and incentives isn't optional — it's the market. The good news is this appears to be a cyclical trough, not a structural collapse. The supply pipeline that created the pressure will eventually lease up.

Bottom line: Columbus this week handed you a new park, rewrote its cannabis rules, and told you rents are down — but only if you forget where they started. A city growing this fast doesn't stay in buyer-friendly or renter-friendly territory for long. Use the leverage while it exists.

See you next week, Gagan Timsina