Columbia Closings   What’s not in Columbia anymore

I already did a closing on this building on Meeting Street in West Columbia near Triangle City for when it was Bell's Hamburger Drive-In, but I noticed a while ago that the follow on operation (which was not the immediate follow-on!) Chiva Auto Sales is now gone as well.

That gave me a chance to get some more shots of this place, without all the cars parked outside, and the guy wondering what the heck I was doing sitting inside. However, the place is tightly fenced off now, so I still can't get any close shots through the building windows. It will be a shame if the next owners tear down the building and marquee which absolutely scream of a certain era, but I can't imagine it being suited to much other than used-car office these days..

I really like the sign here at the former WECO Billiards. It has a similar aesthetic to Varsity Billiards and Red Wing Rollerway.

This site for the current owners of the building (note the clever URL) says it was built originally as a grocery. It was still operating as a billiard hall in the February 1997 phonebook, but by the time of the next one I have here at home (February 2007), the listing was gone. Since then it appears to have been a thrift store, and now houses a number of operations as detailed at the previous link.

When I did the closing for Rudy's Upper Deck, commenter Bobby P. wondered how much longer the adjacent Subway would be able to make it. Unfortunately, the answer turns out to be "not long". I don't go to Subway too often as the booths and atmosphere don't really suit me, but they do make a decent sandwich.

This makes it three vacant storefronts in a row (Subway, Rudy's and Fast Cash Advance) at The Shoppes At Meeting Place, and at least one more non-contiguous one.

(Hat tip to commenter Peter)

UPDATE 18 January 2012 -- Some sort of work is going on here:

UPDATE 5 April 2012 -- Open again, yet still closed the day I drove by:

Here, next to Rudy's Upper Deck in The Shoppes At Meeting Place is another of Columbia's many defunct personal finance storefronts. Of course, in these times, it helps to be too big to fail..

I never really got into baseball trading cards and memorabilia (though they intersect somewhat with the comics book world). I just remember how Charley Brown always wanted, and never got a Joe Shlabotnik trading card (though Lucy could find them at will).

Rudy's was in The Shoppes At Meeting Place, a little strip not too far west of Sunset, which has had a number of comings and goings over the years, most notably for me, Ye Olde Comic Shoppe.

(Hat tip to commenter steve)

The humble tee-shirt is an American institution, and while I have never bought one myself (though, come to think of it, I do sell them), I have heard the name Eat More Tees off and on for years locally. It's one of those names that sticks in your mind because it sort of makes sense and sort of doesn't make sense.

At any rate if you want to eat more now, you'll have to go to Rosewood, as this West Columbia location (right across from the vintage WECO sign) has moved.

Here's another of the Columbia area's many car title loan businesses that have gone defunct over the past couple of years. The sign says simply Car Title Loans but online I've seen both of America and of South Carolina tacked onto the end. Whatever the name, I don't believe it was was there all that long -- I have noticed this building off and on over the years, and I think that for a long time it was some sort of mobile-home & camping service center with propane and repair parts.

Arnold's Professional Garment Care (or Arnold's Cleaners as the building signage indicates) looks to have been in this building for a good many years. The plaza, at the North West corner of Meeting and 12th Streets is a bit of a hard luck location, losing its grocery long ago, but Arnold's kept going until this location (there are others) closed on the first of February. If you had clothes there, don't panic -- they've been taken to the North Main Street store.

(Hat tip to commenter Sam)

This little strip-mall, The Shoppes at Meeting Place used to be home of Ye Olde Comic Shoppe, and a number of other operations over the years. It's kind of interesting in that it seems that each storefront has a first-level street number, ie: the first storefront is 501 Meeting Street, the next one is 503 Meeting Street, etc instead of "501-A, 501-B etc.

I don't know anything about Alternative Health Center other than it was apparently already gone by August of 2008, judging by the pictures from the Ye Olde closing. It still gets google hits though.

Title Cash of South Carolina is still listed on the strip-mall marquee, and so departed more recently. It sounds like a standard cash-for-car-title loan place. Curiously a number of these seem to have gone under recently, even though it's the kind of thing you would expect to do better in hard times.

I notice that while the 501 Meeting Street storefront seems to have only one door, it has two papered-over business signs, so it's entirely possible that it's a suite with two halves. I've tried enlarging and different enhancements, but I can't read what's behind the sign covers..

I'm not sure when this plant store on Meeting Street closed -- there was a sign on the door, but none of my pictures of it came out because of glass reflections and light ink. According to their website though, they opened (or planned to open) in the Spring of 2009, so I'm guessing they were there about a year. Again, from their site, the place was to be more than a nursery, with local peaches and other produce as well as plants and trees. It sounds a little like the niche that Grice's was in.

To me it seems like a pretty good location (It's true that there are big-box stores (and Wal Mart) not too far away, but you have to go through the bottleneck of lights in Triangle City and the big merge on Augusta Road to get to them), but apparently in the event, not good enough.

UPDATE 9 Sept 2010: Changed closing date in post title from 2010 to 2009 based on comments.

UPDATE 20 July 2011 -- It's now a drumming studio: