Walking along the New River in Fort Lauderdale will soon look different without one of the city's longtime staples that's set to close.
The owner of the Historic Downtowner and Maxwell Room announced on social media that the restaurant will be closing next month.
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WATCH HERERestaurant owner Roger Craft announced on Facebook over the Labor Day weekend the longtime eatery will close Oct. 6.
“This decision was not made lightly," he wrote. "I carefully weighed the hard facts and numerous complex issues against every possible solution and alternative. In the end, there just wasn’t a reasonable or viable option to keep the business going at this location.”
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“We have a lot of memories here, a lot of friends over the years that have passed on so this place has meant so much to us,” said Joann Kratky, who has been coming to the restaurant for 30 years.
The building, which includes The Historic Maxwell Room, is 100 years old. It started as a retail and gathering space known as the Maxwell Arcade in the 1920s and survived the hurricane of 1926.
Although the facade changed drastically by the time it was The Downtowner, it has maintained the same footprint and lodged itself in locals' hearts.
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“It’s disappointing, I just moved here but my boyfriend and I come here often,” said Allison Greenbaum, who moved in nearby last year.
“We’re disappointed, this was our hang out. We’re boat people and this has been a hangout forever. So it’s sad to see it go,” said longtime customer Jerry O’Hare.
But it was never designated as an official historic site. Ellery Andrews, the deputy director of HISTORY Fort Lauderdale, said it would be hard to get the building listed as a historic site now because it has changed so much over the decades.
“It is sad to see our historic landmarks and our historic buildings be developed, it isn’t anything anyone truly wants to see especially a place that has been used as a site for so long, and a landmark,” Andrews said.
Craft told NBC6 he doesn’t know what plans the property owner has for the site, but many locals speculate it will turn into another high-rise building. It is a valuable location along the river that sold for $15 million in 2021.
“If you look around, it’s a vertical horizon. There is no more land left and the land that is left is extremely profitable, so at this point everyone is building upwards. When you look at the skyline it’s completely evolved and changed. There are cranes everywhere,” said Alona DiPaolo, Chief of Staff for the Broward County Property Appraiser.
The last event scheduled at the restaurant is Craftoberfest, a street festival on Sept. 28.
There is at least one wedding planned at The Historic Maxwell Room that is still scheduled. Craft told NBC6 that other events on the calendar at the venue after Oct. 6 will be canceled.
