Loveland’s Dining Options Continue to Dwindle, as a Longtime Restaurant Locale Changes Completely

That corner restaurant location at Orchard’s Shopping Center in Loveland, that’s been home to several restaurants and bars, will not see another restaurant or bar- for the foreseeable future.

Longtime residents of Loveland will remember, maybe even worked at, ‘Springfield’s.’ It was a restaurant in the Orchards Shopping Center back in the 80s. That location was known as ‘Out ‘A Bounds’ for a long time; most recently, it housed ‘The Happy Hour.’

Getting dinner or a drink at any restaurant or bar at that spot, is over. It looks like the owner of the building is re-fitting it to no longer be a restaurant or bar. He’s looking to make it more available to smaller businesses.

Like they say, ‘change is hard.’ It IS kind of sad to see the location not be a ‘spot’ anymore. It’s one of those ‘if these walls could talk’ kind of thing. Imagine all the first dates, all of the family dinners to celebrate special occasion, all the times friends would gather to get caught up and have a drink. Good times. Was it ever called ‘Good Times’?

There really are not that many real restaurants in that area. Applebee’s. That is pretty much it, as sit-down places go. Think about all the area around Orchards- in all directions there’s a lot of space, but no dining options. Let’s go further: Think of the whole town- north of Eisenhower and west of Denver Avenue all the way out to Wilson. How many restaurants exist? Maybe six- and that’s a stretch. Do we blame it on the development of the I-25/Hwy 34 area? Is it zoning? What’s the deal?

You can say ‘Loveland’s not that big of town, just drive downtown or out to the interstate.’ As the city expands out to the west and to the north, getting in the car and driving 25 minutes out to the interstate is almost crazy. You might as well just drive to Fort Collins, right?

What’s holding Loveland back?