Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

Hope your summer is going well and that nobody you know has melted. Posting will most likely continue to be erratic for the rest of High Summer...

I first became aware of the World Golf Hall Of Fame in Saint Augustine because of the attached IMAX theater, which I have made part of my trips to Florida over the last decade or more. I'm not clear if it is still a "real" 70mm IMAX, unlike many auditoriums carrying the branding nowdays (some call them Liemax...), but at the time it definitely was. I recall in particular seeing one of the Christopher Nolan Batman films, with a sequence shot with real IMAX cameras there, and it was just amazing when that scene started. The whole house gave an audible gasp! I also saw The Force Awakens there and was really blown away. I know that in retropect, the movie hasn't aged well, but in my defense a) I thought they had a plan & b) I didn't believe Han was dead (remember they had established the Maz character as important and having something to do with The Force -- I figured somehow she had shifted him away. The more fool me, I suppose). Please do follow that link for some nice night-time shots that complement the ones below. (Especially as the ones below were shot on an overcast day).

Anyway, that is to say my interactions with the World Golf Hall Of Fame complex did not actually involve the actual HOF, being more centered on the IMAX and Caddyshack. Nonetheless, I did form an impression of the place: It was a very nice, green and tranquil oasis just off the busy I-95 corridor. I even considered that it might be nice to just stop there sometime, stroll the grass and lake boardwalk and maybe read for a while in one of the pavilions along the water.

All that sounds, and is, very nice, but if you think about it, silence & tranquility away from the tourist crowds is not exactly what a going tourist attraction aims for, and indeed, I noticed from the first time I visited that the upscale strip-mall housing Caddyshack was having trouble keeping anything else. Even the golf course which to me (a non-golfer) looks very nice, rarely had any players on it that I could see, and the Publix which should have served all the condos of the World Golf Village (which remain) closed some years ago as well.

So I should not have been surprised (though in fact I was) that the HOF closed last September to be relocated to Pinehurst NC. Here is a story from The Florida Times Union, and here is a Golf Week story.

So far, the IMAX is remaining open, but it has reverted to your typical IMAX "Sharks & Dinosaurs" format and has, at least for now, dropped first-run movies, and most operating hours. It appears that the the local county has taken it, and the rest of the grounds over and will attempt to exercise control over the re-development of the site. I guess that is good at some level, but it would appear, at least, that St. John's County has no particular expertise in running a theater. I have not seen anything suggesting Caddyshack, the best known remaining tenant, will close, but frankly it's not a great eatery, so I'm not sure how it will draw without theater audiences and what tourists came through. We will see. In the meantime, this exit off I-95 will probably be known henceforward as The Buccee's Exit...

(As a side note, I drove through Pinehurst once while I was living in Fayetteville, and my impression was that there was nothing there. Now maybe I just missed it all, but it did not strike me at all as a place you would put a tourist attraction.)

The I-95 "Attraction" sign is now blank

The "Challange Hole" is now the "Goose Poop Hole

This was the Publix complex. Looks like the Post Office has taken part of it