Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

I did a closing for the Two Notch Catherine's back in 2020, and thought I had done one for this one, but apparently had not. As far as I can determine, all Catherine's are now closed. Although the company was bought after it went bankrupt, the new owners have elected to keep the brand alive online, but not run any actual stores.

Recently the church owning Intersection Center announced the purchase of Dutch Square, and it's unclear to me what that will mean for the future of retail there. They may elect to use the vacant slots, like this, for church functions and keep the current retail renters on (in fact there is still some retail at Intersection Center), or perhaps the will use the whole mall as leases expire. We will have to see.

Curiously, this property came up in the comments just after I got some pictures of it last weekend while I was at the H. Rubin site. It looks like both the businesses here had been here a good while. In the case of Boost Mobile, that goes all the way back to when it was Suncom. As far as I can tell by looking at Google Streetview, both businesses apparently lasted into 2023. Curiously, Streetview does not have the color scheme that LoopNet has for the phone side of the storefront.

To me the building looks very much like it began life as a convenience store, but I have no memory of that.

(Hat tip to commenter Gypsie)

Whitehall TV was an old-school television repair shop across from the former Clusters Of Whitehall just about where Bush River Road turns into Tram Road. I don't really know anything about the place, but I do know that people rarely get TVs fixed today as they don't have tubes or really any replacable parts at all anymore, which can't have helped things.

Google reviews suggest the place has been closed at least seven months, and commenter JohnR thinks it's about a year, so I'm just going to put 2022 as the date.

(Hat tip to commenter JohnR)

UPDATE 8 September 2023: Change reference "Tram Street" to "Tram Road".

UPDATE 9 October 2023 -- Here are some post closing shots:

When I first became aware of this spot, it was a photography studio, and apparently maintained the grounds to have nice settings for photo shoots. I was going to do a closing on it at one point, but somehow never made it happen. I believe that after the photography studio, there was at least one other business on the site before StoneBridge Gardens.

It's a shame they closed before Spring really took hold, as the grounds were quite beautiful in March.

Here is the LoopNet listing where the place was being song as a "Specialty Property". Some nice shots there.

(Hat tip to commenter Gypsie)

As with the Circle K on Garners Ferry, this one, on Bush River Road just north of I-20 is undergoing some kind of pump-plaze remodeling.

I have stopped at this location a number of times, and I recall thinking that in the beginning it was a bit upscale for the chain, but the rest of them have passed it now with the latest upsizing and updating. One novel feature it has or had was the the extra wide sliding glass doors.

I was getting gas at the Murphy's in the old Eckerd site at the corner of Broad & Bush the other day, looking at an accident at the stop light when I noticed that this TitleMax was apparently closed.

I didn't drive over there because the intersection was wholly blocked (which is why, I think, you see people turning around in the lot in the second picture), but the sign was definitely blacked out. LoopNet also lists the building as "For Lease" (and has a nice picture), but I'm getting a bit of a conflicting signal from the store's Facebook page, which still has posts from as late as today. Of course they're pretty generic, so they could be pre-scheduled.

Anyway, I think it's safe enough to do a closing, but next time I drive by I'll try to see what the front door says.

UPDATE 23 March 2023 -- Definitely closed:

Shopping center St Andrews Center (the former Clusters of Whitehall) suffered a fire during the night of 16 January 2023. I have not seen any update on the cause, but the initial reports were fairly sketchy. Here is one from The State with a picture of the blaze in progress.

Looking at the buildings on 21 January, it appeared to me that the damage was mostly confined to the west building, on the side that fronts Bush River Road. Basically that comes down to two businesses, a night club, Sugar Daddy's Jazz Cafe / Red Beans & Rize Jazz Cafe and a hair salon, Hair Power. The next storefront away from those two is a church, which was reported by commenter Gypsie as planning to go ahead with their next service as scheduled.

(Hat tip to commenter Homer)

UPDATE 8 February 2023 -- It looks like the smoke damage to the church was worse than they thought at first, and they are currently meeting at another location:

I have seen many movies at Dutch Square over the years. This includes at the original Dutch Square Theater (where Mrs. B's is now) and this one (which is actually in the old Tapps location. I forget the most recent film I saw here, but I do remember two things about the experience: First it took a lot longer to get tickets than I expected, or than it should have taken, and second, it was obvious the theater was either overbuilt or understaffed -- they had a whole cafe area that was completely unused. It was also about this time that I showed up for a movie, got my ticket and walked to the auditorium and found a completely different movie playing. Apparently I had bought the only ticket to the movie I wanted to see, and I was a few minutes late, so they decided, What the heck? Forget about what we advertised and throw some more guys for Movie B in here!.

According to The State & WLTX the theaters will be re-opening on Thursday 1 September under Bow-Tie Management (The door signs say 2 September). I don't know the company, but the exercise of re-opening can be pretty iffy. I know it failed with Columbia Mall and B & B in Fernandina. On the other hand, so far it seems to be working for Movies Behind The Mall.

(Hat tip to commenter Steve)

Well, here's another bank branch closure. This one is at the corner of Saint Andrews Road and Old Bush River Road in Irmo. The real estate listing is here.

About the only other thing I know about it is that it was robbed in early 2018.

(Hat tip to commenter Gypsie)

UPDATE 21 May 2024 -- Razed and on the way to being rebuilt as a Murphy's:

This is one of the times it would be nice if the AT&T still deigned to give me a phonebook yearly as I have no real idea when this place closed. The latest Yelp reviews are all quite old, but I can't believe the actual closing date is that long ago, so I am going to punt and say 2021 until I hear otherwise.

At any rate, this Boozer Shopping Center storefont was a sewing machine sales and service operation and had apparently been there for quite a while.

UPDATE 26 February 2022: Commenter Gypsie found evidence that this place probably closed in 2016, so I am updating the closing date in the title to that.