There was a time, not too long ago, when Ohio State University (OSU) was truly a “State” school. If a young person from Ohio could get their high school diploma with a C+ average, had the financial means through help or loans, and the will to balance school and fun, they would have a good chance to earn a degree from Thee, and do so at the main campus.

The days of OSU students scraping by together in aging but cozy off-campus homes or rowhouses – drinking beer from $10 shared buckets at Mustards or Papa Johns to make sure everyone could pay rent, for instance – is slowly becoming a distant memory.

A halcyon era heartlessly tossed into the dustbin by (rich white) elitists. The good struggle for Ohioans of modest means dashed. Just ask any of the thousands of young people who were recently rejected by OSU. Some were made to choose Miami University as their second choice ironically, which used to be the first choice of many Ohioans. History reveals it was Gordon Gee who eliminated open enrollment for in-state students, and since then, OSU’s average GPA went from 2.5 to 3.6 while tuition has doubled.

This greedy need to be “elite” also meant transforming off-campus, and everyone knows how lame, sterile and corporate south off-campus has become. Now, north off-campus or “Old North” is under assault once again. Old North is where the last remnants of old-school off-campus still exist. Dick’s Den and Ace of Cups, for example.

The encroachment of the so-called “luxury off-campus lifestyle” has been creeping north for some time. Consider the newish Wilson Place, on the eastside of Lane and North High, where “Special attention has been given to students’ unique needs” including “an on-site lobby concierge” (LOL).

Across Lane Avenue from Wilson Place a mixed-used 16-story tower that is actually three towers stuck together was recently proposed by Landmark Properties of Georgia, which specializes in student housing. The footprint is small, says City Hall, but the amenities will be spectacular. Such as upper floor decks where this era of extra privileged OSU students can mount their high horse and gawk at the poor folk below.

Even with its $8 billion endowment, which could help build student housing on-campus since they are required to live in the dorms for two years now, Ohio State has no misgivings with this mixed-used monstrosity forever mucking up and congesting the Old North. Just as The View on Pavey Square ugliness did before.

While specific housing plans have yet to be revealed, this tower will no doubt be jammed with tiny one-bedrooms and studios. City Hall and the local trumpet horn of high-end developers which is the Columbus Underground, are yearning for greater density (building taller apartments and condos) as if in orgasm. Certainly, they’ve lobbied Ohio State to get on board. And the appeal of being secluded in their bedrooms is how many young people these days like it – something high-end developers greedily embrace.

“People now live in 400-to-600 square foot studio apartments and pay an average $1,145 per month. Developers are making a killing,” said Old North and affordable housing advocate Joe Motil about Columbus powerbrokers’ desires to put more humans in tighter storage.

Interesting is how strongarming Old North into submitting to luxury towers hinged on overhauling zoning codes, which the City did last summer by implementing Zone In. Essentially, Zone In allows greater density without parking requirements for developers, and all of Columbus’s cool neighborhoods are in its crosshairs.

Zone In mandates if developers wish to go tall, they must provide affordable housing. How this plays out in a luxury tower directly across from off-campus should be interesting. Every OSU alumnus and current student knows the closer you live to campus, the higher your rent. Landmarks Properties has also proposed an underground parking ramp with 72 spaces, which will make the intersection of Lane and North High an even greater bottleneck in all directions.

Zone In also removes area commissions from the development process. Where Zone In applies, area commissions are no longer allowed to give recommendations or push back on new developments unless they are one of the few commissions with architectural review powers, such as in German Village. Area commissions are resident-based and strictly recommending bodies, they have no legal authority. Even so, they give a neighborhood a chance to speak out against unwanted development.

Before Zone In when the earlier zoning codes were in place the University Area Commission (UAC) and the University Impact District Review Board – the mayor-appointed and City Council approved architectural review board for off-campus – pushed back against Landmark Properties and had success. Which carried over into this latest iteration of what the developer wanted, as the Alhambra Court apartments, a well-maintained group of cozy red-bricked rowhouses built in the 1910s, will remain intact. Previous plans by the developer had this classic off campus “missing middle housing” executed by a wrecking ball.

Nevertheless, chipping away at Old North’s humble and modest uniqueness will become a much more streamlined process under Zone In. “Streamlined” in this sense meaning developers will have their greedy way and no one can stop them.

“As I used to tell them on the area commission,” says a former UAC commissioner who did not want to offer their name for publication, “we are fighting a rear-guard action. Meaning it’s inevitable we’re going to lose, but maybe we can hold out for a while longer.”