Blog Culture & sights

2026-08-245 min readThe Awesome stay guide editorial team

A twelve-hour plan for the one day of the week when half the city closes, built around three things that are actually better on a Sunday.

The Sunday problem, stated plainly

Upper Arlington is a residential suburb with three small commercial nodes — Tremont Center, the Mallway and Kingsdale — plus the Lane Avenue strip on its southern edge. On a Sunday, a meaningful share of the independent businesses in those nodes either close entirely or open for a short afternoon window, and several of the city's best-known counters, including the doughnut shop at Tremont Center, keep hours that do not favour a Sunday visitor. Nobody publishes a consolidated list, and hours shift, so check individual businesses the night before rather than driving over hopefully.

The upside is real, though. Three things in this area are genuinely better on Sunday than on any other day: the parks, which are empty before 10am; the museums across the river, one of which has long run free Sunday admission; and the roads, which lose their commuter load entirely. Build the day around those and you get a better Sunday than most weekdays would give you. What you cannot do is treat Sunday as a shopping day or count on a late dinner inside the city limits.

8am to 9.30am: coffee, and the breakfast reality check

Start with the assumption that the small independent counters may be shut and work up from there. The Giant Eagle Market District at Kingsdale opens early seven days and has a full coffee and prepared-food operation, which is an unglamorous but reliable 8am answer. Whole Foods on West Lane Avenue does the same at the southern end of the city. Both have seating, both have clean restrooms, and neither requires a reservation or a queue on a Sunday morning.

If you want something with more character, drive eight minutes to Grandview Avenue, where Stauf's Coffee Roasters has anchored the street for decades and opens early on Sundays; the surrounding blocks add bakeries and a proper brunch scene that Upper Arlington itself does not sustain. Budget $6 to $10 for coffee and pastry, $15 to $25 for a full brunch plate. Verify opening times with each business — Sunday hours in this corridor are shorter than weekday ones and change with the season.

9.30am to 11am: the hour the parks belong to you

Sunday morning is the best time all week to be outdoors here. Take Griggs Reservoir Park on Riverside Drive for water and openness: the shared-use path runs for miles along the east bank and at 9.30 on a Sunday you will pass a dozen people, not a hundred. Take Smith Nature Park for woods and quiet, or Fancyburg Park if you have a dog and want fenced space and an easy loop. Northam Park, with its tennis courts and library branch, is the most central and the most likely to have a youth game underway by ten.

This is also the window for the ravine streets. Cambridge Boulevard and the roads dropping east off it are lined with 1920s houses on wooded lots, and a 40-minute Sunday walk there with no traffic is the single cheapest good thing to do in the city. Park on a side street, stay on the sidewalks, and note that most of the interesting frontage is between Miller Park and Lane Avenue. Bring water in summer; there are few public fountains outside the parks themselves.

11am to 1pm: church, or a table you can actually get

First Community Church at 1320 Cambridge Boulevard is the city's landmark building — 1930s Norman-Gothic in stone, with a tower visible above the tree canopy — and Sunday morning is the only reliable time to see inside it. Service times and any visitor guidance should be confirmed with the church directly. Even if you do not attend, the surrounding block at 11am, with cars filling the side streets and the tower bell going, is the most communal thing that happens in Upper Arlington in a normal week.

For lunch, this is the one meal of the day where Upper Arlington competes properly. The Lane Avenue strip carries the widest choice, with Hudson 29 at the Shops on Lane Avenue doing a full sit-down service at roughly $25 to $40 a head. Book, because Sunday midday is the busiest restaurant hour of the week in this part of the city and walk-in waits of 40 minutes are ordinary. If you would rather not wait, buy from the Kingsdale Market District and eat at Northam Park.

1pm to 4pm: the Sunday-specific culture block

Cross the river. The Columbus Museum of Art on East Broad Street has long offered free general admission on Sundays, which makes it the best-value cultural afternoon in the metro — verify with the museum before you plan around it, since admission policies do change. Its strengths are American modernism, a strong photography holding and a sculpture garden that is pleasant to sit in from April to October. Allow two hours. Parking is on-site and paid; expect a few dollars.

Two alternatives if you have already seen it. The Billy Ireland Cartoon Library and Museum at Ohio State's Sullivant Hall shows free rotating exhibitions from the world's largest comics and cartoon collection, and is a genuine surprise for people who arrive sceptical; galleries close on some weekdays, so confirm Sunday hours. Or, with children, COSI on the downtown riverfront takes a full afternoon, with adult admission somewhere in the mid-$20s to around $30. Skip attempting two museums in one afternoon — the drive and the parking eat the time you save.

4pm to 7pm: the market run and an early dinner

Come back west and use the late afternoon for the week's most useful hour: the Kingsdale Market District or Whole Foods on Lane Avenue, both of which are open into the evening on Sundays and both of which are the reason many visitors staying in an apartment or extended-stay room eat well here for $12 a head. The Upper Arlington Public Library's Tremont Road branch typically opens for a Sunday afternoon window rather than a full day; check the library's posted hours before making the trip.

Then eat early. This is the single most important scheduling fact about a Sunday here: Upper Arlington's kitchens are family-timed, Sunday service winds down well before it does on a Friday, and a party arriving at 8.30pm will find limited options inside the city. Aim to sit down between 5.30 and 6.30. If you want a later meal, drive 12 to 15 minutes to Grandview Avenue or the Short North, where Sunday evening service runs later and the sidewalks stay busy.

7pm onward, where to sleep, and the Monday exit

After seven the city goes quiet, which is not a criticism — it is a residential suburb doing what residential suburbs do. The good late option is a drive: Riverside Drive north past Griggs at dusk, or the Lane Avenue bridge and a loop of the Ohio State campus, where the Oval and Thompson Library are lit and students are out even on a Sunday. For a drink, the Short North's High Street is 15 minutes away and is where the evening actually exists. Do not plan on Upper Arlington nightlife; there is very little of it.

For sleeping, remember that Upper Arlington itself has minimal hotel stock. The West Lane Avenue and Olentangy River Road corridor is closest to everything in this plan at roughly $150 to $260 a night, though football Saturdays send it well past $400 and Sunday-night rates in autumn can stay elevated. Grandview Yard sits at $140 to $220 and puts you next to the late-dinner option. Worthington, Hilliard and airport chains run $95 to $150. If you fly out Monday, the airport cluster is a 20-minute drive from Upper Arlington on a weekday morning; allow 35 in rush hour.

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