Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

It's been a few years since I noticed this, but somehow I never got around to mentioning it: The Pizza Hut attached to the Columbia Travel Center plaza closed up shop a couple of years ago. As I recall, it was not a full Pizza Hut, but one of the "express" type operations.

I suspect it was a highly unpleasant job, but someone apparently climed the sign tower to elide the "Hut" portion of the Pizza Hut placard!

UPDATE 26 June 2023: Updating tags and adding map icon. Also, just noticed I apparently have this Pizza Hut listed twice, once on the Wilson Boulevard address, and once on the Plumbers Road address. Oh well.

Well, if you were reading Columbia Closings Saturday, you'll have noticed that commenter wanda scooped The State by two days on the closing of the Harbison Barnes & Noble.

I'll have to say that this closing is a bit of a surprise to me as this B&N is still open for their standard hours, and always seemed to me to have a pretty good crowd -- I certainly thought that the Richland Mall store, with its already abbreviated hours and declining location would close first.

Of course, though they are still open until 10 and 11pm, you can still see the industry changes that are reshaping the retail (and especially book) market. At this point, Barnes & Noble is sort of an upscale toy store that sells some books. I have to admit that aside from comic strip collections and reference books, I have mostly used this store for show-rooming and coffee these last two years since I got a Kindle. (And while I *can* load BN.com books into the kindle with Calibre, realistically I'm going to end up buying the books I showroom from Amazon..).

Still, over they years, I've bought hundreds if not thousands of dollars worth of books from this store, sipped countless lattes and browsed many magazines -- I'll be sorry to see it go.

The State story implies they will be open through the holidays as apparently the lease, which they have decided not to renew, runs out with the year.

What does this mean for Richland Mall? Well, I hope to be wrong, but if this store can't make it, I fail to see how they can continue much longer there either, especially with the closing of TGI Friday's.

(Hat tip to commenter wanda)

UPDATE 26 January 2014 -- Here are some pix from 12 January 2014:

UPDATE 12 February: The windows are now unblocked, and you can see the interior again as shown in these pix from 9 February 2014:

UPDATE 17 June 2014 -- Work on the remodel has started:

UPDATE 15 June 2023: Adding Map icon.

Here, I believe, is the last posting from the little strip mall on North Woodrow Street near Broad River Road. This Irmo glass showroom is next to the former China Pearl, and is listed in this year's phonebook (Feb 2013), so apparently closed fairly recently.

UPDATE 6 October 2021: Adding "North" to "Woodrow Street" in the title and tags. Adding map icon.

To the best of my recollection, I've never eaten at any establishment in this Five Points storefront, to include San Jose, though I have certainly eaten at other local San Jose locations, and found them to be perfectly OK.

Commenter MB noted the closing, and pointed out that until fairly recently it was Mucho Margaritas, something I must have driven by many times without it registering at all. Already today the sign was down and folks were carting off the fixtures. With the recent closure of Dreams Of Bombay, there are now two adjacent restaurant vacancies in this building. (I don't know what, if anything, is in the upper storey).

(Hat tip to commenter MB)

UPDATE 1 July 2014 -- This will next be the bacon themed restaurant Sizzle. Mmm, Bacon!:

UPDATE 25 January 2023: Add tags and map icon.

Here's a two suite consignment shop in the little Irmo strip that has figured so often here over the past week or so. One more, and I think we're done..

UPDATE 6 October 2021: Adding "North" to "Woodrow Street" in the title & tags. Adding map icon.

When the original Biscuit House on Bluff road closed, there was an announcement that someone had bought the brand rights so as to open new Biscuit House locations inside convenience stores, much as Subway and Blimpie do. I believe that this one, in a Corner Pantry at the corner of Garners Ferry Road and Lower Richland Boulevard was the first such, and it opened sometime after March 2012. Somewhere, I have a picture of this location in operation, but can't put my hands on it right now. At any rate, as far as I know, this just leaves one other, in Irmo, from this initial roll-out.

(Hat tip to commenter Midnight Rambler)

UPDDATE 8 October 2013: As promised, I have found and added the pix of the place in operation.

UPDATE 4 August 2025: Add map icon and update tags.

View Larger Map

I'll admit I'm a sucker for anything mechanical, so I could toss out more of thes pictures, but I'm not going to.

This little automated carwash is on Broad River Road at Riverhill Circle, just across that street from China Hut Ace and just below the 'T' where Greystone Boulevard hits Broad River. I like the way that it seems a little bossy with its "Stop/Back Up/Drive Forward" warnings and the way it keeps up with the situation through observational pronouncements like: "Car Is Soaking".

Read the rest of this entry »

Nothing fishy here... anymore.

UPDATE 6 October 2021: Adding "North" to "Woodrow Street" in the tital and tags. Adding map icon.

I have got to say that their marquee mascot looks the least like a Chinese chef of any illustration I've seen. (Not that there's anything wrong with a European in a floppy hat dilligently applying himself and learning Chinese cooking..)

UPDATE 6 October 2021: Adding "North" to "Woodrow Street" in the title and tags. Adding map icon.

I noticed this little liquor shop in Irmo on Woodrow Street behind the Bi-Lo. It was raining a bit so I didn't get out and peer inside, but I believe that at this point they are still in close-out mode, though the space is already listed with a real-estate sign.

UPDATE 6 October 2021: Adding "North" to "Woodrow Street" in the title. Adding map icon.