Ah, but will said restaurant also feature live theater?

wow, it's like an atomic bomb made out of assholes! what will win out? the trendy overpriced fare served by bored hipsters, or the group of dribbling sycophants who will be lining up out the door to praise the place.

i expect serious magic here, people...

i don't see there being a mention of prices in the article kinkos, how do you know it'll be overpriced? oh wait, you don't.

how 'bout you go back to mcdonalds and shove another quarter pounder down your hole.

Awesome! You can scope dudes on their way to BP until midnight...

The attitude and service at the Volunteer Park Cafe eats more ass than a crack whore.

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

how very exciting

and somebody is getting richer

wow

I'll tell you what's odd, fellows...a substantial endowment!!!

Well, @2 does sort of have a point, namely, will all the artists displaced by the gentrification of the Odd Fellows Hall into an upscale hipster/corporate retro trendoid establishment be able to afford to eat in a place that will no doubt attempt to cash-in on the "artistic cache" of the space - seeing as the artists who made it trendy in the first place can no longer afford to keep spaces there?

Not that the arts community is, like, BITTER about once again being displaced from a building that tries to sell itself on the basis of its "artistic cache" or anything...

(And for the record, I do like Linda's establishments, but this is really a sore spot with me - not to mention a lot of other people in the arts community).

jesus people! what a bunch of sticks-in-the-mud! eeyore!

i think it sounds pretty good. kudos to these two with the guts to envision and open a risky enterprise like this, on a block that could really use it. You'd prefer what? Another SCCC satellite office? A new wing of BP? A bridge-and-tunnel nightclub?

The Volunteer Park Cafe is deeply flawed. But Linda creates great spaces that fit the vibe of the neighborhood. They could easily have gone with a chain. I'm reserving judgement.

Sad really how Freehold got functionally evicted. Best of luck to the new tenants, they will need it. Capitol Hill has two draws for visitors: 1) The community college and Seattle U and 2) The arts.

The arts on capitol hill are going away very very rapidly. Which leaves, well, students. Students are characteristically more interested in lower end/less expensive establishments meaning the bottom is about to fall out of the mid/high end restaurant business on capitol hill. Give it two or three years tops and there will be serious vacancies on broadway.

Vincent @4: and you can do that until 2 AM from the booths at Havana across the street.

Plus, it'll have a great view of the KFC/soon to be Jack in the Box across the street!

@11:

I wish things were that cut-and-dried, but the fact is, most of the art spaces are being displaced because of the rapid growth of residential development, which is increasing property values, which in turn drives out the funky arts groups that made the neighborhood desireable to live in in the first place.

Of course, those with a will to survive will find other cheap digs (although the irony of Freehold moving into the old Speakeasy space, which used to be Aha! Theatre before it got pushed out of Belltown by increasing development during the dotcom boom should come as some small comfort) in some other depressed part of town - at which point the cycle will no doubt repeat itself, as it generally does.

The City finally seems to be waking up to the issue, as recent meetings held around the Hill and at City Hall would indicate, but until arts tenants are recognized, not only as valuable amenities in the neighborhoods they serve, but in addition as magnets for economic development in and of themselves, you'll continue to see this sort of cyclical displacement.

everything used to be something else, boo hoo. if you can't cut it as an artist, find another job...many artists do.

and i didn't buy my place on capitol hill because of "the arts" or because it was close to the "drink and vomits", i bought because it was walking distance to my job in downtown. i want to have good restaurants and nighttime activities when i'm in my neighborhood - these new restaurants are helping to provide some of that.

i'm sorry, but if your art isn't good enough to help support you living in this neighborhood, find a part of town that is more conducive. land and business owners shouldn't have to give up their pursuit of the good life because of the choices you make.

Ah, thanks for yet another installment of "vapid, clueless yuppies and the developers who cater to them", @15.

landowners are not only NOT giving up "the good life" by displacing arts organizations, they're cashing in on the vitality of neighborhoods created in large part BY arts organizations within their midst, then selling their spaces out from underneath them when they get the first chance, mainly because people like you (or the constituency your possibly fake personna represents) continue to be suckered in by the marketeers' appeal to your desire to live a "vibrant, in-city lifestyle" made possible in large part by the presence of these very organizations.