No Candy Rama downtown?
This is appalling news, outlined in this Post-Gazette story by Mark Belko:
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/07304/829842-85.stm
They're being booted from their building in the name of downtown progress after 55 years in business.
Candy Rama used to have another location at the corner of Fifth and Wood. They closed that when kids waiting at a nearby bus stop would swarm in and steal. They had a nice, large location in the Clark Building on Liberty, but that closed earlier this year.
When former mayor Tom Murphy was preaching a scorched earth approach to downtown development via the doomed Nordstrom project, he sneered, "Do we want Candy Rama to define downtown?" Maybe not, but we certainly want Candy Rama to be downtown. It's one of those uniquely Pittsburgh experiences that has survived for generations. People comb speciality websites to find rare treats that are in regular stock at Candy Rama.
The owners have apparently been unable to find a location that makes economic sense. If I ran the Union Trust Building -- in one of the few areas that gets regular foot traffic, thanks to Macy's -- I'd be on the phone to the Candy Rama people and putting out a red carpet for them to rent some of the vacant space at street level.
With any luck at all, the front page publicity will lead to some sort of deal that will allow Candy Rama to keep a presence downtown. How can we lose a first-class candy store when we have a kid mayor?
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5 comments:
Those damn kids and their bus stop!
Uh, aren't there also plenty of bus stops at the about-to-close Candy Rama location, not to mention the Union Trust Building?
Seems you've got a thing about Liberty Avenue and the people (of color?) who frequent it.
1. What do Candy Rama's locations on Fifth Avenue have to do with Liberty Avenue? Are you the same loon who tries to find a hidden agenda in every post?
2. Uh, there are bus stops all over downtown. Only a few of them are trouble spots because high school kids of all races congregate there and become an issue. One of those stops was on Fifth and Wood, and it's a fact that the Candy Rama store on that corner was blatantly robbed on a daily basis.
3. If you want to jump to conclusions to make baseless accusations, at least have the courage to put your name on them.
That's what they get for helping the downtown during the hard times. Everything is rigged for big connected players.
Nordstroms downtown? Hooray!
er... wait...
Someone with some property should offer Candy Rama the space of a rent controlled storefront simply out of nostalgia. Wouldn't that be nice?
Where is the Pittsburgh spirit?
Gina
People should read this.
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