Mo' Better Blues And Park Avenue's Promise

The lack of a Shield's Pizza may have doomed the Kales Building's owners, but a new soul food restaurant angling to fill the Albert Kahn icon in Grand Circus Park hopes to finally hit it home in the buzzing Park Ave. Corridor.

If Mo' Better Blues — named after the 1990 Spike Lee musical drama and supposedly set to open on the corner of W. Adams and Park Ave. — plays its cards correctly, it could wander right onto the edge of the new Olympia Entertainment sports complex.

Park Avenue, a one-way drag of former theatre workshops and empty downtown gems (the old Y.W.C.A. prime among them), will be the locus of the recently announced Red Wings arena and entertainment district set to connect the northern edge of Downtown with the Masonic Temple's neighborhood.

Beyond occupying a large slot on the Grand Circus roundabout, Mo' Better Blues could provide a natural link to the growing entertainment district that includes Park Bar, Cliff Bell's, the Colony Club and the Town Pump Tavern, among others. Even better, it could convince the owners of the abandoned Park Ave. Building that their property is worth more occupied than empty. Plus, as the Illitch Group continues to snap up property across the Fisher Freeway for its new Red Wings arena, the Park Ave. corridor could be a natural part of the 'walkable entertainment district' so desired by city leaders in the neighborhood.

· New Red Wings Arena Revealed, Massive Development Planned [Curbed Detroit]
· Lack of Pizza Helped Put Kales Building in Financial Disarray [Curbed Detroit]
· Owners of restored Kresge headquarters default on loans [Det News]
· Kales Building [Official]