Here's an update on the old Ballard Denny's, the historic Googie-style diner that is threatened by the wrecking ball and slated to be replaced by a large condo project. Earlier this fall, the Denny's closed. The building is boarded and vacant, awaiting its fate. That could be determined in a matter of weeks.

The city's Landmark Preservation Board has scheduled a nomination hearing on the building for Wednesday, Jan. 2, 2008 at 3:30pm in Room 4060 of the Seattle Municipal Tower, 40th Floor, 700 5th Ave. The public is invited to attend and speak.

By Leigh Hornbeck | Albany Times Union | Dec. 12, 2007

Nearly seven months to the day after the Prospect Mountain Diner burned to the ground, a shiny new diner arrived to take its place.

"It's a much better experience seeing these trucks here instead of fire trucks," said Pat Humphrey, the diner's manager, who saw the old building destroyed by fire in the early morning hours of May 11. Investigators never found the cause of the fire, but speculated it was started by lightning.

Hundreds of photographs taken during the six decades the diner was open were lost along with an antique sled Humphrey's father used as a child and a 23-pound lobster that had been mounted on the wall.

"But no one was hurt," Humphrey said. "That would have been really hard to live with."

Humphrey and the diner's owner, Art Leonhard, traveled from Ohio to Rhode Island and Maine to look at new diners. They were hoping to buy a diner similar in vintage to the one destroyed by fire - it was shipped to Lake George in 1950 - but ultimately Leonhard bought a new diner from a company in Atlanta so they could be sure it would meet modern building code.

By Jorege Barrientos | The Orange County Register | Dec. 11, 2007

Seal Beach, CA
Nena Weems remembers cruising the Los Angeles streets in a hot rod when she was a teenager, going to a diner and splitting a soda pop with friends.

The opening today of Mel's Drive-In diner in the landmark Parasol building in Seal Beach sparked that nostalgia, she said.

"It reminds me of the old days,'' the 68-year-old Bellflower resident said. "It brings back a lot of old memories.''

Weems joined dozens of hot rod and classic car enthusiasts and hundreds of Mel's and Parasol building fans who showed up for the diner's opening day. Dozens were lined up outside before the diner opened at 5:30 a.m.

Craving diner-comfort foods? Somer's Diner has opened in the space on Prospect Avenue once famously known as Ruthie & Moe's.

Owned by Sam Khouri Jr. and Brian Rooks (they are partners in the Somer's on West 150th Street, too), the place will keep diner-type hours: 6 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Friday, serving breakfast and lunch.

The owners say diners will see some familiar faces, as about 60 percent of the staff from the old Ruthie & Moe's is working at Somer's. You'll see some familiar favorites on the menu too, including mac and cheese, meatloaf, matzo ball soup and those densely delicious chocolate brownies. Soup specials and wraps will round out the menu.

Inside, the place has been renovated, but a lot of the fixtures remain, including the blue bar-counter. Somer's, by the way, is named for Sam's sister, Somer.

See related articles at the following links:
Hartford Courant on Lake Compounce
Pittsburgh Tribune Review on Idlewild
Follow-up Kennywood story from the P-G
More follow-up from the P-G

By Ann Belser | Pittsburgh Post-Gazette | Dec. 11, 2007

Kennywood Park is being sold.

The families that own the park have agreed to sell the West Mifflin amusement park, nearby Sandcastle water park, Idlewild & SoakZone in Ligonier and other holdings to the Spanish-based company Parques Reunidos.

The company owns amusement parks throughout Europe and entered the U.S. market this year by purchasing water parks.

 Photo courtesy Brian Butko

Employees of the company were told this morning at a meeting at the Bradley House of Catering in Baldwin Borough, according to a company spokeswoman.

The companies expect to close on the deal in March.

Included in the deal are Lake Compounce Theme Park in Bristol, Conn., and Story Land in Glen, N.H.

The purchase price is not being disclosed, according to a news release.

Kennywood Entertainment has been a closely held family business since F.W. Henninger and Andrew McSwigan purchased Kennywood Park from the Monongahela Railway Co. in 1906. The Henninger and McSwigan families, now in fourth and fifth generation, have remained owners.

By Andrew Brophy | Connecticut Post | Dec. 9, 2007

Fairfield, CT
Gary Zemola's dream of opening a diner is on a front burner.

Zemola, 42, owner of Super Duper Weenie on lower Black Rock Turnpike, won approval last week from the first of two town zoning boards he needs to open "Zemo's Diner" on Duka Avenue.

The portable diner, which Zemola bought on eBay, was manufactured by the Jerry O'Mahony Diner Co. in Elizabeth, N.J., in 1954 and as recently as 2003 operated as the DeCoven Diner in Duncannon, Pa. The diner is now in storage in Monroe, where Zemola has nearly completed restoration.

Last week, the Zoning Board of Appeals approved Zemola's request to open the diner behind Fairfield Lighting and Design with four fewer parking spaces than town zoning regulations require.

The plan still needs approval from the Town Plan and Zoning Commission.

By Thomas Caywood | Worcester Telegram & Gazette | Dec. 9, 2007

The Sherwood’s Diner served a lot of coffee and eggs for nearly two decades on Foster Street before it was closed in 1969, put in storage, moved to Auburn to become an ice cream parlor, closed again, vandalized, picked over for souvenirs, left to rot for a decade, and eventually mothballed by the American Diner Museum in Providence.

An ambitious plan concocted three years ago by a correction officer at a Rhode Island juvenile detention center aims to get the rusted and rotted former Worcester landmark back in hash-slinging condition — while also teaching at-risk teens about carpentry and self-respect.

Next spring, young people locked up at the Rhode Island Training School in Cranston will begin a roughly $80,000 ground-up restoration of the diner and two others in partnership with the diner museum. The youths are part of a vocational program of the Juvenile Correction Division of the Rhode Island Department of Children, Youth and Families

When last spotted in its ancestral home, there was the Munson Diner, steel and chrome shining off the streetlights, noirish blue exterior like a ghost from the ’40s, loaded onto a flatbed truck and lumbering toward the George Washington Bridge, bound if not for glory, at least for Liberty, a faded resort town in the Catskills.

It was May 5, 2005, and, as it turned out, getting a 50-foot-long, 30-ton diner onto a truck was the easy part. One of its new owners and a cameraman were taken off the George Washington Bridge by the police as they tried to film the big event without a permit.

The diner hit not one, but two highway bridges on the way up. And when it finally arrived, dinged up but more or less intact, the crew lowered it triumphantly onto its new foundation ... backward, with the vintage neon sign and steel facade facing away from Main Street.

Photo courtesy Brian Butko

The Diner in Plainfield may be serving up its last burgers and pork tenderloin sandwiches Saturday.

After 22 years, owner Ray Piercy cites health problems and competition from new chain restaurants as reasons for closing.

"I get a little nostalgic about it, and I'll miss the regulars. Some of them come in twice a day for breakfast and lunch," said Piercy, 69.

The roadside eatery is in one of those classic silver trailers that became icons from the 1940s and '50s, when Americans rumbled on two-lane highways like U.S. 40 across Indiana.

Located at 3122 E. Main St., near the Hendricks-Marion county line, The Diner will be offered for sale along with an old motel and 1.75 acres with frontage on U.S. 40.

The property isn't yet listed with a real estate agent, but Piercy said he'll ask $1.75 million for the prime piece along the heavily traveled commuter corridor.

The Diner is known for its classically prepared tenderloin sandwiches.