dbrok

Yeah, I stopped by a couple weeks ago. Here are some photos: My Bar & Grill

I heard that it was opening late '08, early '09. It's not too specific, but Chipotle is apparently planning on a grand opening and media blitz, so you can't miss it when it does open.

Shameless plug for haunted houses and Halloween events around Grand Rapids: http://www.grnow.com/index.php?option=com_...iew&id=1597. I think there are just under 20 haunted attractions listed and over 50 parties at the moment. With Halloween falling on a Friday this year, most of the big bars like The B.O.B. are having 4 nights in a row of costume parties.

Yes, I just received word that a coffee shop called MadCap will be opening up. Here's what they submitted as their GRNow listing: http://www.grnow.com/index.php?option=com_...mp;link_id=3710 They hope to open in October.

I think he talked about doing this 2 or 3 years ago. My impression was that the Gilmore Collection couldn't come up with financing for the project at that time because they stretched themselves too thin building Blue Water Grill and remodeling Mangiamo! plus opening Red Ball. How much of that is true though, I'm not sure. Hopefully it'll come together this time.

Not sure if this was mentioned elsewhere, but a new place called Johnny's Lunch is moving into the old Olive Express location: Johnny's Lunch website They have quite a few locations on the east side Michigan and also New York and Ohio. The menu is hot dogs and burgers, similar to Johnny Rockets. I wonder why they chose to be located next to The Dog Pit.

Has anyone on UP mentioned the new building going in two lots down from The Meanwhile? It's going for LEED certified status and will house a new restaurant called The Electric Cheetah.

A new retro diner opened on Plainfield, just north of Knapp, called Pilar's (in the former Bobby J's location). They have breakfast all day, classic American dishes, Mexican dishes and an ice cream counter. It's also attached to a candy shop. Prices are pretty reasonable; maybe $8 per person for lunch or dinner.

You might want to try flying through Milwaukee on Midwest Airlines. It's a pretty easy airport to navigate and less crowded. All the flights over here are on the small planes also, but they do have 4 or 5 flights per day between MKE and GRR so they might be less full.

Go Java has opened up in the former Hava Java location at 15 Ionia. They have mostly coffee with a few baked items like bagels. Most the lattes seem pretty well priced, under $3 for a small or medium I think.

Yeah, this place is set to open September 10.

I wonder what happened. It doesn't look in the picture like there are any tire tracks.

Do you mean the Junior Achievement Building? I think there's a thread about it on UP somewhere.

Plus I hear it would take a least another $750,000 for renovations. You're looking at no less than $1.5M total.

At Festival of the Arts, BW3's sponsored the United Methodist Community House's food booth by providing at least the paper holders for the wings and also had a BW3's employee down there much of the time. While I was at Festival, someone suggested that maybe they thought this is how BW3's is breaking into the downtown market. Personally, I haven't seen or heard of a company sponsoring a food booth like that at before at Festival, since they're all run by non-profits, and I'm not sure that I approve of their method.

It looks like Marado Sushi will be getting a liquor license in the next couple months.

Yesterday at the groundbreaking ceremony, David Van Andel said that on the back side of the building facing east there will be a four-story glass wall overlooking Crescent Park. He also mentioned he had some ideas for making some enhancements to the park itself.

It might be a second restaurant; a press release said John State was named executive chef and part of his duty will be to oversee 'launching the signature market fresh restaurant, six.one.six'. In the past, he's worked at Disney's Flying Fish Cafe and California Grill.

The new restaurant at the JW Marriott will be called six.one.six. Not sure of the type of cuisine or menu yet.

So at the moment, there's no bar open at American Seating and Level is long gone?

Well, at least it's only a temporary closing this time.

I can't believe the Ottawa Ave exit on 196 is closed again. Does anyone know when this will reopen? The Kent County Roads site hasn't been updated since Jan 31.

Thanks, GRDad. Here's a list of St. Patrick's Day events around Grand Rapids and West Michigan.

I agree. Civitas posted a great photo of what that building looked like before 1900 in post #53 in this thread.

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