Another national retailer coming to BullStreet
Starbucks is coming to BullStreet.
The Seattle-based national coffee chain will build a freestanding store with outdoor patio seating and a drive-thru in the burgeoning retail-residential complex near downtown. Starbucks will be next to REI Co-op, which is under construction.
The new 2,500-square-foot store is scheduled to open in the spring of 2021. REI is set to open late spring 2020.
Starbucks will front Bull Street, where 42,000 cars pass by each day.
“I’m happy to report that Starbucks is coming, and it will be positioned perfectly to accommodate commuters as well as those who live and work in and near the district,” said Robert Hughes, president of Hughes Development Corp., the Greenville-based master developer of BullStreet, the name given to the 181-acre former state mental health hospital campus.
The traffic signal at Bull Street and the street currently known as Williams will be completed before the Starbucks opening, according to Hughes Development. Freed Drive currently connects Bull Street to the entry plaza of the Segra Park minor league baseball stadium, but the road is being reconfigured with the construction of REI.
The outer shell of the 20,000-square-foot REI building on Freed Drive will be completed in January, Hughes Development said, at which time REI will begin upfitting the interior.
Starbucks joins a growing list of tenants at BullStreet:
▪ Construction is underway on the largest private development project to date in the district — the $30 million, 196-unit Merrill Gardens senior living complex. It is scheduled to be completed this year.
▪ The Terranova group of Greenville is building 28 luxury town homes along Calhoun Street. Five have been completed and sold in the TownPark development.
▪ Capgemini, a Paris, France-based technology company, is housed in the First Base Building, along with the Ogletree Deakins law firm, Founders Federal Credit Union and the Central Carolina Community Foundation.
▪ Bone-in Barbecue is serving up high-end eats in the historic Ensor Building, the hospital’s former morgue and medical lab.
▪ Co-working space SOCO in the historic Bakery hosts the COLAToday hyperlocal newsletter and other startups.
▪ S.C. Department of Natural Resources has its archeology center in the Parker Annex.
▪ Downtown Church has converted the Central Energy facility into an event venue.
Also, developers are working to convert the historic Babcock Building into 208 apartments, slated for 2022, and two other mixed use developments have been talked about, although work has not begun on any of the three projects.
Columbia City Councilman Howard Duvall called the accelerated number of projects “remarkable.”
“We’re converting a huge, deteriorating and desolate property into a growing and vibrant community that’s creating jobs, contributing to the tax base and adding immeasurably to the region,” he said.
This story was originally published October 31, 2019 at 4:00 PM.