Chuy's Clarksville Taking Shape

The popular Tex-Mex chain Chuy's is getting closer to opening its second area location. After opening their first location last year near Oxmoor Center, their latest location will be just across the river in Clarksville. They will set up shop in the Clarksville Station shopping center. The center is located just off I-65 on Veterans Parkway right next to Walmart and Cheddars. This location will not be a stand alone location. Various reports mention opening dates ranging from March to April. It looks like the exterior is almost complete. If the first location is any indication, parking might be a challenge at the new location. According to a Business First article, the Texas based chain is leasing a 7,700 square feet of space.

Coyle Commons Open For Business

Right next to the new Buffalo Wild Wings and Rite Aid on Veteran's Parkway in Clarksville you can find a small new strip mall. It's all part of Coyle Commons, aptly named after the neighboring car dealership. The area next to the car lot was supposed to be part of its expansion plans, but once real estate prices shot up, it was more lucrative to create more retail space. Coyle did expand though. Their new building is a refurbished building near the Outback Steakhouse in Clarksville.

Coyle Commons main tenant is a Verizon Store. The other spaces are still vacant. It also housed the Buffalo Wild Wings hiring office during the restaurant's construction. It has since been vacated again.

Clarksville's Suburban Lodge Update

Clarksville's new hotel cluster right next to I-65 in between Veterans and Lewis and Clark Parkway is slowly taking shape. Exterior work at the Suburban Lodge project seems to be complete. The only thing left to do on the outside is to put up signage.

Exterior construction at the close by Candlewood Suites is almost half way done. Construction on the third hotel to be built on that site has not yet started.

Buffalo Wild Wings Clarksville Now Open

The Buffalo Wild Wings in Clarksville has finally opened its doors. Its grand opening happened last week's day after Thanksgiving, which I think is a great day to open a restaurant, because when you have family at the house you don't want to cook, so you go out to eat. The store is located behind the new Rite-Aid drugstore on Veterans Parkway across the way from Best Buy. As I have mentioned before, the wings restaurants is a pretty looking true stand-alone version with a nice porch on the side.

Kentuckiana Medical Center Parking Lot Work

Over at the construction site of the Kentuckiana Medical Center in Clarksville the heavy equipment has moved to the adjoining lot. It looks like things are wrapping up at the main building. From the looks of it we should expect some sort of final opening date to appear on the horizon here shortly. As for the construction equipment, they are currently working on another access road from the highway. They have already poured the gravel base for it.

It also looks like they are getting ready to add another parking lot next to the building. Since they were also talking about an additional medical building, it also could be the prep work for getting that started.

Clarksville's Colgate Plant's Future as a Rendering

Last week the city of Clarksville released their plan of what is going to happen with the Colgate Plant. Eventually the site will become a mixed use development consisting of condominiums, shops, anchor tenants and a conference center plus hotel. The tentative name for the development is Clark's Landing. It will stretch from the Colgate site almost all the way to the river. Don't plan on seeing anything going up soon though. Planning is still underway and it could take up 15 years to develop it all. Yesterday the city released a couple of renderings of what it could look like. Here are some of the designs, don't count on it looking like that though. Oh yeah, I counted the floors on the hotel behind the clock. I counted 18.

Clarksville's Buffalo Wild Wings is a Stand Alone

Clarksville's as well as southern Indiana's first Buffalo Wild Wings is the last building to be completed at the newly built Coyle Commons shopping center. The new Buffalo Wild Wings is a stand- alone restaurant which might be another first for the area since I can't think of another one in Kentuckiana. Most of the restaurant's locations in Louisville are in strip malls, except the one on Bardstown Road. The southern Indiana location will have 6,030-square-feet and a nice little patio area. By the time it's all built, the company will have spent almost two and a half million dollars on the project. It's located right next to Coyle's car dealership near the west end of Veteran's Parkway. You can't really see it from the road though, since it's kind of hidden by a new Rite-Aid pharmacy.

UPDATE (11/13): The store now has a sign outside telling us it will open its doors on 11/29!

Kentuckiana Medical Center Exterior Done

Workers at the Kentuckiana Medical Center off of Veterans Parkway in Clarksville seems to have finally completed the exterior. But if you look through the windows you'll notice that the inside is far from being ready to welcome its first patients. The center was supposed to open late summer 2008, but that date has passed, so now we are just going to have to see when it opens. Once completed the center will have 40 to 60 beds as well as a level 1 and 2 ER. There was also some medical offices in a different building planned on the site, but work on those has, as far as I can tell, not started.

Due to the fact that the center is being constructed by Koetter Construction, they hope some of the medical business will spill over into their Jeffersonville Town Center development close by. They already adjusted their plans for the northern part of that development to include medical offices.

Clarksville Hotel Cluster taking Shape

Clarksville's new hotel cluster right off Veterans Parkway is starting to take shape. Eventually they will put three hotels on a parcel of land next to the Outback Steakhouse. There are currently two hotels under construction. So far one floor of a Candlewood Suites hotel is built. Next to it the Suburban Lodge already has four floors plus a roof up. Each of the hotels under construction will have 110 rooms. The third planned hotel will be a Holiday Inn Express with 90 rooms. Construction of that might start early next year.

Clarksville Eastern Boulevard Revamp

Clarksville city officials held a groundbreaking ceremony last Saturday to commemorate the kick off of construction on a newly redesigned Eastern Boulevard. Local businesses complained for years that Boulevard does not meet modern standards. In the next two years Clarksville will add a turning lane, new light fixtures, a sidewalk and improve intersections. The whole project will cost the city more than 5 Million dollars. The hope is that the Boulevard will return to its old glory. The designer in charge of the redesign was also in charge of the Lewis and Clark Parkway redo. So we can expect the two to tie in perfectly. Work will start in the next two weeks.

Clarksville's Colgate Plant

Great news for Clarksville's former Colgate plant. According to a news story on Fox41, three developers are vying for the property, after it was reduced in price (from 13.3 to 9 million). Their goal is to turn it into a multi-use development. I think an ideal use for the property would be a conference center. Both Jeffersonville and Clarksville conducted studies recently coming to the conclusion that Southern Indiana is in great need of a conference center with an attached hotel of at least 200 rooms. A nice high rise on the Indiana side could take full advantage of the beautiful Louisville skyline. I am surprised there aren't more high rises on the Indiana side right now.