Dining dwindles
Edmond’s old main drag is kind of dragging with the closing of several more restaurants late in the year.
Edmond’s old main drag is kind of dragging after another wave of restaurant closings late last year. They screeched to a stop on top of the 2017 shuttering of Pepe’s Mexican Restaurant and relocation of Outback Steakhouse to Memorial Road and the demise of Applebee’s and other eateries. Broadway Avenue from downtown south to 33rd Street has seen better days. The most recent casualties are national, regional and local. • Long John Silver’s, 630 S Broadway, closed. The franchiser is based in Lexington, Kentucky. • Rib Crib, 2601 S Broadway, closed. The barbecue chain is based in Tulsa. • Colby’s Grill, 511 S Broadway, closed. It was owned and operated by an Edmond couple. Sagging performance may not necessarily be the only problem. Traffic isn’t lacking: Four of the top 10 busiest intersections in Edmond are along Broadway, at 33rd Street, 15th Street, South Avenue and Comfort Drive. Colby Mason said on the Colby’s Grill Facebook page that he closed in November after his landlord sold the building. The sale could have been part of a bigger effort to accumulate property in the area for redevelopment, said Janet Yowell, executive director of the Edmond Economic Development Authority.
She noted that recent closings have been older buildings.
“If you want to go back a little longer in time, add Santa Fe Cattle Co., Marie Callender’s, Pepperoni Grill, KFC, Golden Corral, El Chico, Goldie’s to (the) list of restaurant casualties on the old Broadway corridor in Edmond,” said Mark Inman, senior vice president and retail property broker with CBRE.
Restaurants are going where the people are, he said, especially where they live rather than commute. Housing sprawl has scattered stores and restaurants.
“Ten to 15 years ago, Edmond primarily had one retail corridor, which was Broadway. Now, Broadway has to compete with four or five retail corridors within the Edmond trade area,” Inman said.
Retail growth around Second Street and Bryant Avenue, Danforth Road and Santa Fe Avenue, Covell Road and Kelly Avenue, and 15th Street and Interstate 35, he said, is “creating fragmented traffic patterns and fragmented dining and shopping.”
Vacated eateries aren’t necessarily being replaced by new restaurants. AAA Insurance is in a new $1.74 million building where Pepe’s was at 1701 S Broadway. The Wash Factory car wash, at $1.75 million, is going in where Applebee’s was at 3521 S Broadway.
Closings along Broadway are probably fallout from the general growth in restaurants, which account for 40 percent of retail, said Jim Parrack, senior vice president and head of the retail property
division of Price Edwards & Co.
“And, you would expect the fallout to hit poor operators/concepts and less desirable locations first,” Parrack said, “which brings us to the issue of the corridor.
“If you exclude the larger neighborhood centers at 33rd and Broadway, the Broadway corridor in Edmond has always been a bit of a mixed bag. Much of this can be attributed to it being a high-traffic commuter route that is located between two major retail corridors — Memorial Road between Western and Portland and the Second and Broadway area in Edmond.”
Parrack said high traffic on Broadway, if not fragmented by spotted, concentrated pockets of stores and restaurants, might support a retail power center.
Inman said dining and shopping on Broadway, existing or new, will increasingly compete with Quail Springs Mall and Memorial Road, and even Penn Square Mall and Oklahoma City’s Midtown, because of road improvements.
In any case, whether Broadway Avenue’s best days are in the past, or this is a lull, Yowell said “it’s prime for redevelopment.”