Slog Comments
Enjoy Your Retirement, Fremont Ruiner
5
How dare he spend his years taking risks and building a business and then sell it to take time off from the stressful restaurant industry? How dare he!
7
Restaurants don't do that well in Fremont. People keep opening them, they keep going under. The Greek place was also huge--a tough space to fill.
8
If Fremont was the center of your universe, perhaps you should be glad for the opportunity to open up your worldview a little bit.
9
Oh dear, I actually agree with the troll....
The fun and interesting Fremont HAS been gone for years. It was Adobe that finally did it in. A bank is the perfect representation of Fremont nowadays.
The fun and interesting Fremont HAS been gone for years. It was Adobe that finally did it in. A bank is the perfect representation of Fremont nowadays.
11
Boo fucking hoo. I was sorry to learn that Costas Opa had gone under, too, and I haven't lived in Seattle for seven years. But fuck that "How could he do this to us" bullshit. Assuming that the restauranteur owned the building and wasn't a tenant, he was a businessman, and he did what businessmen do. He got the best deal available to him. (And if he wasn't the landlord, then it was what the landlord did.) He owed Fremont nothing. Certainly not a more comfortable retirement just so another here-today-gone-tomorrow trendy restaurant could try to make a go of it. God only knows how much work, time, and his very life he put into that place.
Fuck this little whiny prick.
Fuck this little whiny prick.
12
Absolutely @2 and 9!! Fremont has not been the self-proclaimed "center of the universe" for many, many years. I can recall selling vintage clothes to a great vintage shop there in 1990 (Mike's Old Clothes) and they were leaving because "Fremont has lost its soul" as I was told by the guys there. And just when I was holding onto some semblence of Fremont still being awesome, let's not forget how the awesome business DELUXE JUNK got fucked over by landlords just less than six months ago. Ballard being the new Bellevue and Wallingford being soooooo boring, north of the ship canal will be known for some great places to eat and, and - I am not sure.
17
Best memory of Costas: went on a first date there with and I knew in the first 10 minutes I wouldn't go on a second. During the painful dinner, a fire started, and the restaurant had to clear out. Saved me!
18
Um, have you been to Bellevue? Crossroads versus Downtown are two very different places, and even immediately south by southeast of Bellevue Square is not quite like Downtown. Even the general area between 140th NE and Bel-Red Road is an odd mix of Elite Cash and newfound, often immigrant-based, businesses that give the lie to Bellevue as sterile.
Which I think points to the real concern - once an area is deemed "hip," the money follows as best it sees value in investing there. How best does a neighborhood like Fremont maintain that uncertain balance? It's unlikely to live forever on the laurels of cheap-cost/cheap-access businesses, but if the money chases away any possible new iterations of what makes the neighborhood beloved....
Which I think points to the real concern - once an area is deemed "hip," the money follows as best it sees value in investing there. How best does a neighborhood like Fremont maintain that uncertain balance? It's unlikely to live forever on the laurels of cheap-cost/cheap-access businesses, but if the money chases away any possible new iterations of what makes the neighborhood beloved....
19
Nah, that building isn't owned by Costa, he was a tenant, that's all. It's owned by the Bellottis, who most notably have kept Seattle's oldest gay bar the Double Header alive down in Pioneer Square for decade upon decade.
Nobody appears to have sold anything to anyone. It's a change of tenancy coincident to a) Costa aging to where he just wants the one restaurant in the U District, and b) nobody other than Chase stepping up to sign a lease with the owner.
Nobody appears to have sold anything to anyone. It's a change of tenancy coincident to a) Costa aging to where he just wants the one restaurant in the U District, and b) nobody other than Chase stepping up to sign a lease with the owner.
20
I would have said this about the cafe on the north side of the block.
@7 is correct but that's true of almost any place in any city. Turnover is high.
@7 is correct but that's true of almost any place in any city. Turnover is high.
21
At least I got to enjoy Fremont the last few years that it was still somewhat cool back in the mid to late 1990's. Oh well. Whatcha gonna do? Bitch on line? That's what we thought.
22
@19 Re: the two Costa's. Same family, different owners. That, according to my daughter who worked there for several years.
23
@13 To be fair - on any given afternoon, Costas was half-filled with Adobe employees eating lunch. Assholes may own the buildings, out-of-town corporations may rent them, but it's mostly just fremont & seattle people working there, eating and buying shit and being bummed when good places close.
26
What kind of asshole demonizes someone for not wanting to run a restaurant anymore? Oh, boo fucking hoo, he's not propping up your fading idea of what the neighborhood should be. Start your own goddamn restaurant if you think it's owed to the neighborhood.
28
@15, spell-check doesn't recognize "restauranteur" unless you've added it, not in Chrome, Firefox or IE. Because it is wrong.
29
PS: in the future, the center of the universe is going to be White Center or Auburn, and business there is going to be conducted mostly in Spanish. Hipsters will be largely extinct, and all neighborhoods north of the ship canal and below, say, 80th are going to be the exclusive domain of the rich white yuppie; in fact, all retail spaces in these neighborhoods will be wine or artisanal-cocktail bars or high-end restaurants that have been open less than two years. Get used to it. Bring lots of money. You have lots of money, right?
Bellevue is already considerably more diverse than anything in near north Seattle, as @18 points out.
Bellevue is already considerably more diverse than anything in near north Seattle, as @18 points out.
31
Costas Opa didn't close because of gentrification, it closed because it wasn't a good restaurant.
32
@ 28, I didn't add it, I promise. (I use Firefox.) If it's wrong (which is believable given the number of correctly spelled words Firefox redlines), well, nobody (including you) has a perfect record when it comes to typo-free Slog comments.
33
Yeah, it's been gone for years. I used to love to go there, but even the Solstice Parade is sterile and fake now.
35
Remember when Seattle was covered with one huge forest with huge trees. From San Francisco to Juneau and into Missoula was one huge forest. (Well me neither, but you get my point). You're an idiot for thinking one business replacing another is evil.
37
Cry mother fucking whine. Those guys who built Fremont didn't do it for you; they don't owe you anything; your feelings on the matter should not be considered.
In the worst sense of the word, this I, Anon is Taker-Entitlement. Open your own restaurant, build something for someone else. And after 10 or 20 or 30 years when you're tired and your kids are grown and someone gives you the chance to never work again in your life, think back on this time, when you were busy telling someone else that they shouldn't do it just so you could enjoy the false authenticity. And then take the money.
In the worst sense of the word, this I, Anon is Taker-Entitlement. Open your own restaurant, build something for someone else. And after 10 or 20 or 30 years when you're tired and your kids are grown and someone gives you the chance to never work again in your life, think back on this time, when you were busy telling someone else that they shouldn't do it just so you could enjoy the false authenticity. And then take the money.
38
@35 I remember when the Eastside was mostly forest. And Issaquah was a fun artsy town.
Used to drive from Ballard to Issaquah in 20 minutes.
Used to drive from Ballard to Issaquah in 20 minutes.
39
Here's what I don't get: Why do we need yet another Chase branch? In this age of direct deposit or using your phone camera to deposit, why does anyone even need a local branch? And if you do, there are plenty of Chase branches already.
40
Im personally unhappy about Chase being there but boys snd girls: Fremont isnt quite dead yet...or, if dead, could be deader. Wright Bros Cycles is still with us for instance.
.. And perhaps I shouldnt admit this but: the loss of the rendering plant and re-chroming facility were gentrifications I could live with at the time.
.. And perhaps I shouldnt admit this but: the loss of the rendering plant and re-chroming facility were gentrifications I could live with at the time.
41
I think you all sound extremely naive about the actually devastating impact of gentrification. Seattleites are so lax about it, like "Oh, whatever, a big bank is opening where there used to be a fun restaurant, but it will all be okay somehow." While I agree that the "that restaurant owner screwed me over"angle of this letter is annoying, gentrification is a real thing and hell, it's just gearing up in this town. I got priced out of my hometown as did pretty much everyone I know, almost got lost in my own neighborhood because it was rendered so unrecognizable, and every business I ever loved or cared about is now a bank, a condo, or some other useless generic soulless place. Although you might argue that Seattle's history and character is too boring to save (I might), just recognize that things aren't going anywhere good right now.
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