PARK
hurrah.”
Woodland, who also owns Woodlands Tavern and Woodlands Backyard, and partner Ed Hastie bought the Park Street complex from Jeff Corso in 2013. Soon after, Woodland heard about the planned redevelopment of the property.
He isn’t bitter. The businesses did well, and he has had time to notify the 50 or so employees at the complex of what was happening. He will, however, miss the music venue that was developed at Saloon.
“I’m a little bummed that we’re not going to have Saloon,” Woodland said. “We will be leaving a void in the city.”
He’s hoping to re-create the venue elsewhere.
“We’ve talked about finding a space to facilitate an 800 to 1,200 person capacity venue,” he said. “We will be looking for that over the next year.”
In addition to the bars, the 30,000-squarefoot complex includes restaurants and dance floors, all of which are connected.
It long served as a hub of nightlife in the area around the North Market, but over time, Arena District and Short North development has crept in all around it.
He said it was no surprise when Continental Real Estate Cos. announced in 2015 its plans to develop an eight-story AC hotel on the site.
Continental is expected to break ground on the project soon and finish construction sometime in 2019. Continental’s David Kass did not respond to a request for comment.
Even the North Market announced plans earlier this year to build a more than 30-story tall tower on its parking lot.
Woodland is moving on to new projects. He plans to put an air dome over the volleyball courts at Woodlands Backyard in October to allow the popular recreation leagues to operate year round. The dome would be removed during warmer months.
“It will do really well for us,” Woodland said. “We are going to have our hands full with the sports dome, and we might bring some sort of music element into that.”
As for finding new homes for the bars at the Park Street complex, that’s not going to happen. Woodland said those spots were unique and can’t be replicated. And while he will look for a way to bring the concept of Saloon to another place in the city, he isn’t hopeful.
“It is crazy right now, with the development in the city, to find an economically viable space,” Woodland said of the concert hall. “It has to be big, and you have to have the parking for it. That’s why Park Street was perfect.”