Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

It seems to me that there used to be a number of "day old" bakery thrift stores around town, but I can't recall seeing any recently. This one on Parklane not from from the old Sounds Familiar location was completely unknown to me. It appears from the signage and construction permit that it will reopen as Panda Chinese Restaurant, which will make three (that I know of) in the general area.

(Hat tip to commenter Miz T)

Well, I suppose it wasn't too surprising that after S & S closed at Richland Mall and Piccadilly closed at Dutch Square, Piccadilly closed at Columbia Mall sometime early this month.

It can't have been great being located in-between two dead anchors, Penny's & Dillard's, but I don't think being near Macy's or Sears would have made any difference. I think cafeterias are kind of a dying breed, and you can't compound that by being in a dying mall.

(Hat tip to commenter Bobby G)

Well, another of the old-style "southwestern" Taco Bell locations has bitten the dust. This one is on Decker Boulevard sort of across from Dent Middle School and next to the old Popeye's / Aloha / Best China/ etc location. While I like the look of this older Taco Bell, the lot and building did have the disadvantage that the drive-through was done through the passenger side window, which is not optimal.

I also like that the manager (or whoever was assigned to do it) was apparently a gardener, taking care to put the "what variety is this" stakes out by the flower plantings.

With the closing of this building, the Taco Bell franchaise moves down towards Two Notch several blocks, setting up shop in a new building at the corner of Decker and Trenholm Road extension on the lot formerly housing Grandy's (whose forlorn building was finally torn down to make way for the new one).

Read the rest of this entry »

Well, let's see if I can manage to do a closing on a place that actually is closed today!

Schlotzsky's Deli on the corner of Parklane Road and O'Neil Court has been an off and on stop of mine for the last year or so. I like their sourdough buns and its a nice sunlit location to watch the traffic pass.

Last time I was there, they said they would be moving soon though they weren't sure yet to where other than the Dentsville area. In the meantime, it appears this space will become Kaboto Express.

Read the rest of this entry »

I was at Schlotzsky's on Parklane having lunch today when a guy came in looking for the DMV. Naturally, I sent him across Two Notch to Decker Mall: D'oh!

I realized my mistake as I drove down O'Neil Court just a little later, and saw that the DMV had relocated to the old Pro Golf of Columbia location in The Shops of O'Neil Court.

I suspect this has something to do with the purchase of Decker Mall by Richland County, though I would have expected the two different levels of government to work out a deal of some sort for the space.

V.I.C. Fashions was in the little Food Lion/Rite Aid strip shopping center in-between Decker Park Road and Brookfield Road. I don't know what V.I.C. stood for, but according to their still extant Myspace page:

We specialize in urban wear, New fashions, shoes, novelty items, anything thats hot, we have! From Request to Diesel, we have all the latest designs and fashion in stock.

I like the facade and walkway of this plaza. It has an old-time look sort of as I recall the original Forest Lake Shopping Center looking.

Decker Park Road connects Decker Boulevard with the unpaved Kneece Road (which itself connects Brookfield Road and O'Neil Court).

There's not a whole lot on Decker Park: side access to the Food Lion plaza, a U-Haul self-storage operation, a small recording studio, and a hair salon.

For many years however, this was the home of the German Gasthaus restaurant. Aside from maybe Mr. Dunderbanks in the mall, this was the only German restaurant in Columbia that I knew of. I'm afraid my only trip to Germany didn't lead me to seek out German food at home (we were working something like 19/7 and all I recall is limp bacon, almost as if it had been boiled, at the hotel buffet), and I never made it here. I believe the place burned down in the mid 2000s, and was never re-opened .

While I was stuck in traffic Wednesday afternoon on Two Notch at I-77, I noticed that Golf Headquarters, in the old Galaxy World building, is gone, or has been bought out.

The signs for Edwin Watts Golf are still quite temporary looking, and I'm pretty sure I drove that stretch in daylight quite recently, so I'm calling early this month as the changeover date. It continues to amaze me how much commercial activity is centered around the most boring game in the world -- (with apologies to my college roommate..)

UPDATE 7 January 2013: Fix street address from 7813 to 7814. Add pictures.

This smallish building on a Two Notch side Columbia Mall outparcel was obviously once a bank. I really like the design, especially the endpiece which sits closest to Two Notch, and which looks like a grooved VHS cassette stood up against the rest of the building. It's just a nice little grace note that gives the building a certain retro aesthetic (it was supposedly built in 1967 which would predate the mall itself by around ten years).

WIllis Chiro Med was in the building for a number of years, something I would vaguely notice driving by. I'm not exactly sure when they closed, but given that they are listed in the current 2011 phonebook, it must have been well into 2010.

The State:

Richland County plans to buy a strip mall on Decker Boulevard and relocate yet-to-be-determined offices there as a way to address a cramped courthouse and administrative offices.

This, of course, is the former home of Kroger Sav-On, Land of Oz, Little China Buffet, Richway/Gold Circle/Target, Flipside and many other things over the years.