Troy demolishes building next to famed pub
Fate of former South End Tavern, closed since 2013, unknown
A building attached to the former South End Tavern was demolished Monday.
Part of the building’s wall collapsed sometime Saturday. No one was injured.
City spokesman John Salka said Monday the city is still working to determine whether the other two buildings on the property at 757 Burden Ave., which make up the former tavern itself, will have to be demolished as well.
The popular restaurant, famed for its corned beef and cabbage dinners, was operated over 79 years by three generations of Burkes, all named Marty.
That string ended in the summer of 2013, after a citywide property reassessment threatened to nearly quadruple the buildings’ tax bill.
For many years, it was a popular stop for workers from the nearby steel plants and other South Troy factories.
Even after the factories closed, it continued to draw customers. The tavern cured its own corned beef, and each St. Patrick’s Day would go through more than 1,000 pounds of it.
The reassessment, however, led to Marty Burke’s decision to retire after 41 years in the business.
He had hoped to sell the business, but the city foreclosed on the property a year ago, said James Conroy, a commercial real estate broker who previously had the listing. The asking price by then had fallen to just $110,000.
When it first was listed, the asking price was $395,000, according to the Albany Business Review.
When the tavern closed, it still displayed a prominent “Ladies Entrance” sign over the separate entrance to the dining room. While women had been welcomed in the bar since at least the early 1970s, the sign remained.
The “Ladies Entrance” sign and the South End Tavern sign both are now on display at the Rensselaer County Historical Society in downtown Troy.