No Sponsor, No Statehouse Ice Rink

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Downtown boosters who were hoping to make an outdoor skating rink a holiday tradition in Columbus are disappointed again.

There won't be a rink for the second year in a row because no one will sponsor it.

Ice skating and a Ferris wheel debuted alongside the Ohio Statehouse in 2005, but frigid December temperatures made for thinner-than-expected crowds. The following year, only the portable rink returned, but the weather was balmy and attendance was even lower.

Cleve Ricksecker leads a group of downtown business and property owners and says it doesn't help that downtown Columbus has so few stores left to draw holiday shoppers.

At Boulevard Strategies, retail analyst Chris Boring estimates the retail vacancy rate in the central city is 40 percent.

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