710 Bookstore Closing

It appears moving to another location was not enough to save 7110 Bookstore. After over 50 years in Carbondale, the business announced it would close its doors at the end of the day on May 25.

710 lost its long time location on S. Illinois when the Evolve apartment complex moved into downtown Carbondale. It first moved a few blocks south into the strip of stores occupied by Harbaugh's Cafe and Kampus Cuts, got rid of most of its textbooks and other school supplies and primarily focused on SIUC apparel. Last year, the store moved again to a second floor location on S. Wall but seems to have not been able to draw traffic there either.

Blocked Off Parking and 710 Building

If you haven't been downtown in the past few days, the entire old 710 building and parking area are now fenced off, pending demolition of the building and construction of the Carbondale Flats complex. In case you didn't know, most of that parking area west of the 710 strip belonged to the building owners. They had entered into an agreement with the city several years ago wherein the city installed parking meters and maintained the property in exchange for sharing the revenue from the meters.

The size of the parking area was far larger than needed most of the year for 710, Varsity Barber Shop and other occupants of the strip mall. Instead, students would use it to park free, rather than paying for a campus parking sticker, as the area sat across the street from the SIUC campus. Eventually, 710 decided it might as well generate revenue, as well as keep people from using it for long term parking at no charge, and in went the meters.

This will certainly affect a number of the businesses in downtown. While many of them have access to parking, much of it is shared with other businesses and can be difficult to access. The 710 lot is readily accessible from several directions and never filled, except during the first week or so of classes.

Carbondale Flats Project

The city announced that Tartan Realty has closed on the 710 Bookstore property. Construction of the 360 bed Carbondale Flats complex was scheduled to start yesterday and expected to finish in 14 months, roughly fall of 2015. 710 Bookstore, the last remaining business in the block, has moved about a block south to the vacant UniversiTees building, near Kaya and Harbaugh's Cafe.

One problem that may impede the development has been the refusal of the owners of the now vacant Attitude Designs building to sell in order to include the property in the development. Another difficulty, which I have not seen addressed yet, is the parking for the complex. 360 beds means 360 residents which means, unless college students change a lot in the next year, 360 additional cars needing parking in the downtown area, as close to the apartment as possible. I see no way to fit an additional 360 parking spaces adjacent to the Carbondale Flats development.

Downtown Development

The proposal made by Tartan Realty to build a 300 unit residential/commercial building where 710 Bookstore means several major changes to the downtown area and raises a couple of concerns.

One likely change would be the closing or drastic reconfiguration of 710 Bookstore.  As noted in the linked article above, the owner already plans to close the business, while store manager Randy Johnson says he is pursuing options to keep the business open.  Since the proposed apartment complex has plans for commercial spaces at the north and south ends, one scenario calls for a drastically shrunken 710 Bookstore to move into one of those spaces.

A second major change involves the expansion of the building footprint. According to the plans I have seen, the building would roughly double in size, removing approximately three rows of parking spaces from the south end of Illinois and University Avenues, reducing the limited amount of parking there even further.

This parking reduction points out a major problem with the development as it stands: parking.  From what I understand, the developer plans for .1 to .2 vehicles per unit in the building, meaning the company expects to need parking for 30 to 60 vehicles. The only parking planned for the building is about 80 spaces for retail use, meaning those 30 to 60 vehicles would have to park off site.

The projected tenants of the facility, however, are upper-class SIUC students, almost all of which will have their own vehicles, taking us from a projected rate of .1-.2 vehicles per unit to .5-.9 per unity, meaning parking spaces are needed for 150 to 300+ vehicles. Where will they go?  There is a reason why much of the new residential building has gone up on south 51, east Hwy 13 and East Grand Avenue.  Unlike downtown, there is plenty of open space there, enough to put in both the apartments and the parking to go along with them.  Any new apartment complex in the downtown area will have to provide for the parking needs of its residents.

Pinch Penny Moving?

Though the agenda has not been posted as of Monday night., one of the items scheduled for the Liquor Advisory Board this Thursday night is a request to transfer of the liquor license for Pinch Penny Liquors to a new location, 701 East Grand, the location of the closed Saluki Bookstore.  It would appear that, instead of 710 Bookstore taking over the space during the redevelopment of their current location, Pinch Penny has decided to abandon its long time location and move across the street, making it a bit more difficult for those drinking at Pinch Penny Pub to pick up a 12 pack or a craft brew before hitting the road home.

The new location certainly given them a lot more space to expand their selection, which, according to the reviews I have read, tops other stores in the area in terms of regional beers and wines. Parking should improve as well as the store won't have to share parking spaces with the other businesses in the current complex.

Saluki Bookstore Sold

The Saluki Bookstore building on East Grand now has  a "Sold" sign in the front window and a blog reader emailed that they had seen what looked like work being done on the HVAC equiptment.  If I was a betting man, I would wager that 710 Bookstore will move there for the year or so it will take for the $20 million downtown development that Mayor Fritzler expressed concern about Halloween disrupting.

710 Rebuild

Apparently the plan is to fence off the area come July 1, with a projected re-opening of the store, with up to 5 stories of residential living on top, come August 1 of 2014.  No word yet on where 710 Bookstore will move to in the meantime.  My guess, and it is only a guess, would be the still empty Saluki Bookstore building on East Grand.  Still close to campus and already laid out for use as a bookstore, though it has nowise the space that 710 does.