Dominick's on Broadway burns to the ground,
future of site uncertain
By Ronald Roenigk
Publisher
A spectacular fire brought down a Lake View grocery institution Sunday when Dominick's Finer Foods, 3012 N. Broadway Ave., burned to the ground during an extra-alarm fire. The Father's Day inferno found the store's aisles sparsely populated when an alert employee, deli manager Dave Bodor, called out over the store's intercom that there was a "fire in aisle 8." The 20 employees and approximately 20 customers in the store at the time were all evacuated without harm.
Bodor's announcement is credited with getting customers and workers out of the store safely. "Five minutes after we got out of the store it seemed like the whole store was engulfed in flames," he said.
There were two injuries, neither life threatening, from the fire that brought over 150 firefighters and 15 trucks to the scene. As of Tuesday, Broadway Ave. north of Wellington Ave. was still blocked to through traffic and the site remains a mess as fire investigators go through the wreckage.
The fire, which started about 5:30 p.m., was visible from the Loop north to Edgewater and spread quickly through the store. The site was still smoldering until late Monday afternoon. The back wall of the 34-year-old store still stands but is unstable, which caused a forced evacuation of two buildings adjacent to the site. As a precaution, Commonwealth Edison shut off power to 135 customers surrounding the store and those residents were without power until late Sunday night.
The Fire Department has not determined the cause of the fire, which reportedly started in the false ceiling and spread to the paper goods in aisle 8. Investigators from the police Bomb and Arson Unit and the Office of Fire Investigation were still digging through the rubble Tuesday. Reports of a disgruntled customer and/or mentally ill person starting the fire are unsubstantiated at this time. If Dominick's had an operating sprinkler system it apparently did no good as the conflagration consumed the store a short while after the evacuation.
The future of the property is uncertain and there is no guarantee that Dominick's will rebuild at this location. But area shoppers have found other nearby grocers including the Lincoln Park Market, 2500 N. Clark St., and The Market Place Food Store, 521 W. Diversey Ave. "We had a record Monday," said Peter Stellas, owner of The Market Place. "We'll be able to handle the extra demand and I think folks will find our prices, services and quality equal or better than Dominick's."
The Broadway site also housed a MidAmerica Bank branch, Pizza Hut and the Lake View East Chamber of Commerce. While the adjacent properties were relatively unscathed, the Lake View East Chamber office has been temporarily relocated to the Lake View Citizens' Council's office at 867 W. Buckingham Pl. (773-880-5822).
Dominick's does not own the valuable real estate — fronting Broadway — that the store sits on, as it was never sold to Safeway as a part of their purchase of the Dominick's chain. Approximately five years ago the property's owners had floated a plan to tear down the store and replace it with a new store topped by 44 condos. That was until Ald. Bernie Hansen (44th) heard about it. Hansen nixed that proposal, downzoned the property and retired from office for health reasons. The fate of the large lot is now in the hands of the current alderman, Tom Tunney, area neighbors, and Dominick's which still holds a lease for the site. But it is safe to say that Lake View grocery shoppers will not buying food at this location for at least a year or more. |
