Greene Counties' New Downtown: Food, Drink, & Lodging

An earlier post considered the area around Fairfield Commons and WSU as a "Defense Edge City" since a lot of the offic growth was driven by defense contractors (and the prosperity of Beavercreek was due to defense spending ). So this was urban sprawl subsidized in-part by the defense budget.


A closer look at office development is forthcoming. But here is a look at services; food, drink, and lodging, as best as I can see (may have omitted some places).

Food & Drink

Mapping out the food & drink places plus the cineplex (2o screens) it's impressive to see the development here. Nearly everything is a chain and the few independents are ethnic eateries of various sorts plus a coffeeshop and Fox and Hound (which started out in Washington Towship).

Another notable thing is the intense cluster of places across from Wright State, in the little strip center across from the Nutter Center, which are mostly local. One can speculate about the impact of WSU on the this and other places Colonel Glenn strip in terms of food and drink, being cheaper ethnic stuff and a more fast food orientation. Colonel Glenn also developed a bit earlier than Fairfield Commons, too.

WO Wrights is the only place here that actually has live music (as far as I know) so perhaps catering to a young adult crowd. There doesn't appear to be any other bars or nightclubs in this area aside from perhaps One Eyed Jacks, which used to be a Cold Beer and Cheeseburgers) and Fox and Hound (if its anything like the OH 725 location it should be really hopping on weekends).



(click on the map to enlarge for more detail)

Around the Fairfield Commons area there more major chains, and they extend south to Kemp Road (not shown is a little Subbys at Kemp & Fairfield). The local Milanos on Kemp & Fairfield is the gateway to the strip, which hasn't built-out yet. Not shown here are hotel restaurants (Holiday Inn & the Hilton) and eateries inside the mall.

Hotels

The first mover here was a Holdiay Inn from the early 1980s. Notable is the cluster of extended stay hotels along the Colonel Glenn corridor. There is a new hotel under construction here, but no name, yet. South I-675 there are three hotels on Pentagon Boulevard, with the mid-rise (4 or 5 stories?) Hilton Garden Inn being the newest. Some of these hotels exceed three stories so give a bit of height to the edge city.



Presumably this impressive little hotel complex is catering to business travel, but also some some leisure travel associated with the Air Force Museum and Nutter Center.

One can see how this has become a true second downtown for the Dayton Region, duplicating the Dayton Mall edge city in a somewhat more planned fashion.

Though The Greene is more high-concept in retail and food/drink, this Fairfield Commons/WSU area just has more places to go. What's interesting is how this mimics the old historical downtown, with more secondary and local places tucked away on smaller strip centers or the fringes of the edge city and big national chains closer to "Main Street" , i.e. the mall itself. This was how places sorted in the old pre-suburban downtown, with secondary retail and short order places on the side streets (which are now fringe strip centers) and the national chains and better restaurants on or near Main Street (the mall and vicinity).