Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

As above, this BI-LO opened on 15 November 2013, giving them about a three year run after taking over from The Pig.

I don't understand the rationale for closing this particular store, as it seems to have some pretty big plus factors to me. The groceries in this area are Kroger on Forest at Beltline, Trader Joe's at 4516 Forest, Fresh Market and Publix at Trenholm Plaza, and arguably Wal-Mart at Forest & I-77. Of those, Fresh Market and Trader Joe's are upscale specialty stores that are a different market than a general grocery, Publix is cramped and has bad parking, Kroger has bad parking and so-so location, and Wal-Mart .. is Wal-Mart. Against that, this spot has good parking, a large layout, and lots of built-in customers as soon as the re-purposing of Cardinal Newman is complete.

On the other hand, BI-LO is not in the most robost shape, and has presumably thought about all these issues.

At any rate, the sell-off was almost complete when I went in on Saturday 24 September. Remaining were only two endcaps of odd frozen goods, and one shelf of deeply discounted (and not particularly popular) items near the registers. The rest of the store was already a hollow shell.

UPDATE 9 August 2017 -- The teaser sign for Lowes is up on the plaza sign board and the store itself has now been designated a construction area (though I have seen no activity as yet):

UPDATE 31 October 2017 -- As mentioned in the comments, construction for Lowe's has begun, and the building is basically ripped open:

UPDATE 17 February 2018 -- Starting to look like a Lowes:

UPDATE 19 March 2018 -- Shaping up:

UPDATE 25 June 2018 -- Nearly there:

The Seafood Academy was the follow-on operation to the much lamented (by me, anyway) TGI Friday's in Richland Mall.

Since I'm not a fan of seafood, I never partook of this new incarnation, which, according to their sign, is now relocating to East Point Plaza at 7535 Garners Ferry.

Getting inside the mall for some of these pictures was kind of sad. More than half the doors to the interior were marked as out-of-order-use-next-door. If they can't afford to fix the doors already, losing a front facing store is just adding insult to injury.

(Hat tip to commenter Bobby)

UPDATE 9 August 2017 -- Looks like the new location is finally about ready to open:

I mentioned a while back that this place was a convenience store while I was growing up. Since then, it has been a number of things but most recently a garage of some sort. It's kind of amusing that the building at the top of the hill went exactly the opposite way: from garage to convenience store.

Well, after mailing out the flyers in May, the Richland Mall Bank Of America is finally closed. As you'll recall, they closed the drive-through in March 2015 at which point the writing was probably on the wall.

I don't know why, but I had it in my mind that the ATM would remain, though in the event that turns out not to be the case. At any rate, I believe that Trenholm Plaza is now the only Forest Acres BOA location.

UPDATE 8 May 2018 -- This building has now been sold, though there is no indication of what is planned there:

UPDATE 30 August 2018 -- As commenter Dennis Craighead notes in Have Your Say, this building is being razed. I guess building something there demonstrates some belief that the whole Richland Mall property will not just be plowed under at some point..

I remember at one time having to figure out whether this little Latin Dance club behind the D's on Beltline was in fact a Mexican Restaurant or a nightclub. In the event, it proved to be the later, which was a little disappointing to me. As far as I know they were not affected by the 2011 fire at D's or the October 2015 flood, but I could be wrong.

(Hat tip to commenter Sidney)

UPDATE 13 February 2017 -- Here's an instructional video from the club:

This small urban clothing botique is in the storefront that was the final location for Forest Lake TV. It's listed in the February 2015-2016 phonebook(*), and I think I would have noticed it being vacant for many months as I drive by there several times a week, so I'm going to peg the closing as "late 2015".

(*) For some reason I still have not received a February 2016-2017 phonebook..

Not too long after noting the move of the Boozer location, I had occasion to mail something and dropped by the forest drive location of Nutrition Warehouse. Unfortunately, I found it closed and vacant. This is a shame, since while I never perused the vitamins and supplements the store offered, the contract Post Office was more convenient than the Trenholm Plaza USPS and generally had much faster service.

The Picture Place was for many years in the old Forest Lake TV storefront in Forest Lake Shopping Center. I know I had at least one photo framed there, and I think my mother had some art framed there as well.

As with everything else in that shopping center, the 4 October 2015 flood which roared through Nine Mile Branch and Gills Creek devastated their building as you can see in the first pictures above.

Fortunately, since since 19 November 2015 the store has been operating from their new home in Forest Park in the former Oreck / All Vacuums suite.

Well, this has been talked about, and dreaded, for ages, but Cardinal Newman High School has finally left Forest Acres for Alpine Road. The kids went home from this campus for Christmas vacation, and "returned" to the new one. I know that Brueggers, Groucho's and other area restaurants will miss the afternoon influx of the diverse, chatty but very polite mass of students, as will I, and evenings will be somewhat less interesting without the muted roar from the football field. And then, of course, there's the question of "What Next?" The property is apparently already under contract, and to be re-zoned, and it's hard to imagine that whatever replaces the school will be an improvement in the eyes of local residents.

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Was apparently going on by Doctor's Care on Forest Drive about 2:30pm on the 24th. There were K-9 units and a Sheriff's Department chopper overhead. I checked The State, WIS and WLTX, but didn't see anything about it..