LensCrafters Open

LensCrafters here in Riverdale Park Station is finally open.  They said it was slow permitting and then they had some issues with the construction.

Good to have another non-food retailer here.

Riverdale Park Station Retail Updates + Pilates

First the bad news.   

Cafe Azul was evicted from Riverdale Park Station.  

This is the first and only retail location in Riverdale Park Station to close.  

They had issues paying rent and all their stuff was actually put out in the street on 11/14/2023

Also Le Fantome has been struggling mostly due to issues with management.

They have went through 4 different ordering systems in just over the first year it has been opened and during each conversion ordering was down for period of time, during the last conversion you could not order for 2 weeks unless you went in the store which is not very conducive for ghost kitchens.

They finally installed ordering touchscreens/kiosks which was desperately needed to keep the ghost kitchens alive, but by the time they were installed most of the ghost kitchens had already failed.   Also the kiosks didn't work very well and eventually were removed after only a couple months in service in Fall of 2023.  They still have not been added back as of today (01/06/24).  

All of the ghost kitchens except Vegan Junk Food have closed due to the lack of ordering kiosks and ordering system issues but there are still three vendors in the visible locations in the food hall.

These are the concepts that closed, in order of when they closed over the past year.  I may have missed one:

·        Mokbar
·        Bombay Kitchen
·        Laoban Dumplings
·        Alta Calidad
·        Fish Scale
·        Mission Burger
·        Greek Aroma      (this is really missed by me!)
·        Sonny and Sons
·        Money Muscle BBQ 
·        Mr. Bake Sweets    

The building itself is very nice and the location gets lots of foot traffic, they just need more effective management ASAP and need to fix the ordering kiosks and get them back and stop changing ordering systems so often.  It has a lot of potential to be good under the right leadership.

Now for the good news!

Riverdale Park Station is getting a Pilates Studio next to District Taco.

https://www.clubpilates.com/location/riverdalepark

Since Gold's does NOT offer Pilates this makes a lot of sense.  

This should also help out Le Fantome with even more foot traffic.

Also Le Fantome still has Horu Sushi which is probably the best sushi I have tried and was the only survivor from the original 10 Le Fantome kitchens for a good reason.  If you not tried Horu Sushi you should.  Really top notch.

They also replaced Sonny and Sons chicken sandwiches with what I think is a better chicken sandwich place, Hot Lola's.   Hot Lola's has very good chicken sandwiches' and you can choose your spice level which is nice.   

The also just added Holy Croque which is mostly French food like Croque Monsieur sandwiches.

In other retail news, Lens Crafters looks done.  Construction finally started at the end of 2022 and it looks like they are getting ready to open.

Yogi Castle which was announced way back in 2022 had lots of permitting problems and just got the permits it needed at the end of 2023.   Construction still has not started there so it's going to be a long while before this opens.   I am not sure how these businesses are willing to wait so many years to open and it seems like permitting around this area must be a very high bar.

The last thing that is coming here is Removery which is a laser tattoo removing business.

Construction on this is completed and it is slated to open in 10 days on 1/16/2024.

In addition, the retail leasing company also subdivided the empty location next to the FedEx Office location to make it available to rent just half of it, probably because no one has taken the leap to rent that whole space.

Glad to see more of these locations filling in.  It's been a slow process but it's getting there.

Cafe Azul opens on April 29th! (2023!)

Cafe Azul finally opens on Saturday, April 29th!

1.5 years later than expected but it’s finally happening.

Le Fantome is open!

Eater officially announced the other restaurants that will be in Le Fantome.

The article is really well done and is a must read:

https://dc.eater.com/2022/8/19/23313035/what-to-eat-at-riverdale-marylands-exciting-new-international-food-hall

I went tonight (Sunday, 8/21) the the pre-opening event and tried the three restaurants that had stalls.

Mokbar was my personal favorite but the sushi from Horu Sushi was also pretty amazing.

They also have a full bar in there.

The three restaurants with full time "stalls" on display are Sonny and Sons, Mokbar and Horu Sushi.

Bombay Kitchen, Dayo’s Kitchen, Fishscale, Greek Aroma Mediterranean Grill, Laoban Dumplings and Mr. Bake Sweets will all just have their kitchens in the back and they are not open yet, they will open in another week (or so) according to the manager.

The plan is to have kiosks where food from any of the other restaurants without stalls can be ordered and they will bring it out to you. 

This one food hall will have Greek food, New Orleans food, Sushi, Mexican, Nigerian food, Seafood, Chinese food and bakery to boot!

Riverdale Park Station continues to become the destination in really all of PG county.  This really is a huge win for the community.

Riverdale Park Station scores a bakery!

First Eater announced back on June 7th that Le Fantome at Riverdale Park Station was getting three top restaurants. 

I profiled that Eater story HERE 

Now on Instagram Le Fantome just announced that Mr. Bake Sweets is coming to Riverdale Park Station!

Finally a bakery in this area!

Information about the company is here:

https://www.mrbakesweets.com/

And here is the Instagram post:

I know they have also been working on crowdfunding a bakery down in Riverdale Park Town Center and they just hit their funding goal HERE, but this seems like this bakery at Riverdale Park Station is going to be a reality a lot sooner and may also be a bit fancier and more focused on sweets/cakes.

Le Fantome at Riverdale Park Station Scores Three Top Chefs!

There has not been much to blog about for a while until today.

Le Fantome first announced on this blog HERE back in February 2021 is getting ready to open in August of 2022 and DC Eater just broke the news of the first three restaurants that would be there.

-  Mokbar:  A Korean restaurant with three popular locations in NYC.

-  Sonny and Sons:  Top Chef Season 7 winner chicken sandwiches.

-  Horu Sushi:  A popular high end sushi restaurant. 

The full write up is featured in Eater at the link below:

https://dc.eater.com/2022/6/7/23157359/a-new-riverdale-food-hall-nets-nycs-hit-korean-eatery-mokbar

This is a huge win for Riverdale Park Station.   These are the types of restaurants people will travel to eat at.

Given that we already have the only Whole Foods in the area, Burtons, Denizens, District Taco and now places like Cafe Azul have packed up shop and moved from Hyattsville to here Riverdale Park Station it really is becoming quite the destination.

Cafe Azul has been making progress on their location but at an extremely slow pace.  Would venture to guess Le Fantome actually opens first given that they are actually working every day on Le Fantome but Cafe Azul the work is more sporadic.

I believe the success of Riverdale Park Station is due to a lot of factors I laid out early in this blog.   It's next to the MARC train and easily walkable to the College Park Metro (and eventually Purple Line) and even though it's an extremely walkable area they still built a 6 story parking garage anyway to make it so people can drive here.

A European Wax Center opened next to the Hair Cuttery and I suspect the last few open retail spots here will probably fill in after the food hall gets up and running, the Pilot House apartment building is almost completed rented out as well.  Currently only 7 units for rent out of 227 units which with a building of that size will probably be as "Fully Occupied" as you can expect. 

Cafe Azul opening date and RPS retail update

First the news folks have been waiting for.... 

Cafe Azul has confirmed they are opening in early December 2021.

Very excited to have a new option in only a month from now!  One month from arepas.

Also an update on the Food Hall I announced here back in February 2021:

http://riverdaleparkstation.blogspot.com/2021/02/hospitality-hq-to-open-food-hall-at.html

Obviously this did not open in the Summer of this year as they originally had planned.

It has taken longer than expected to get the 9 vendors signed up for this space.

Apparently they have recently made great progress getting chefs and now expect a second quarter 2022 opening.

PG County Redistricting Update - November Meetings

 Next round of public meetings are in November:

Community Conversation Schedule

• Tuesday, November 2 at 6:30pm - 8:00pm (English)
• Tuesday, November 9 at 6:30pm - 8:00pm (English)
• Saturday, November 13 at 10:30am - Noon (English with Spanish Interpretation available)

You can sign up for one of the virtual meetings here:

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/pgcps-comprehensive-school-boundary-initiative-fall-community-conversations-tickets-190530841877

PG County has proposed redistricting schools

PG county has proposed redistricting schools.

There are three options that are being proposed. 

One of the three options (Option 1) moves all of Riverdale Park Station from University Park Elementary School to Riverdale Elementary School.  

Option 1 also moves Calvert Hills out of University Park Elementary over to Paint Branch Elementary.

You can see the impact of these three options by entering your address here:

https://www.wxyplanning.com/pgcps-boundary-tool/

Boundary changes will be implemented beginning School Year 2022-23. 

You can provide feedback via this online form:

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/Boundary2

A second series of virtual meetings will be held in Fall 2021 to refine the draft boundary scenarios.

Follow what is going on here, where they should announce when and where those meetings will be:

https://www.pgcps.org/about-pgcps/boundary#getinvolved

Cafe Azul coming to Riverdale Park Station

RouteOneFun shared last week that Cafe Azul was coming to Riverdale Park Station and then back on Thursday, 4/29 Cafe Azul posted this:

Today (5/3) Hyattsville Wire has posted the same thing.

I would still like to get confirmation from the developer or from the leasing agent and not just directly from Cafe Azul but it seems very likely that they are coming to Riverdale Park Station.

I had never been there because parking was so difficult/impossible at their Hyattsville location directly on Route 1 but multiple people have raved about their food to me.  

It is another food option in a development that already has a great deal of them and another large one with 8 vendors on the way in Hospitality HQ across the street.   But at least it is something different and very popular.

I do think Riverdale Park Station really needs a few non restaurant options to draw people here and hopefully the opening of the apartment can draw that in.