Joe Downtown: As work comes to temporary stop on Container Park, tenants begin to come into focus

By Joe Schoenmann

Thursday, March 21, 2013 | 12:30 p.m.

Though work on the downtown Container Park came to a stop this week, the array of businesses that will make it home is coming into focus.

The mall-like structure at Seventh and Fremont streets will increase by up to 30 the number of new businesses downtown when completed.

The brainchild of the Downtown Project, the retail/restaurant/tavern space is being constructed mostly of prefabricated cubes manufactured by local company Xtreme Manufacturing and will occupy most of a city block.

With an estimated completion date in October, the outdoor space will be home to eateries Pork ‘n’ Beans and Big Ern’s barbeque (now under a tent on Seventh between Fremont and Carson Avenue), taverns The Boozery and VIP Bar, a wine-seller called Bin 702, and a walk-up coffeeshop, The Beatnik.

A lineup of potential retail stores hasn’t been finalized but there is talk of using some spaces for product demonstrations.

The park’s biggest draw is likely to be the “immersion dome,” an inflatable. temporary dome whose white walls can be used as a screen to project an almost limitless number of scenes, landscapes and other images that will surround visitors.

Sources say work was temporarily stopped as the city and Downtown Project work on permit approvals.

Joe Schoenmann doesn’t just cover downtown, he lives and works there. Schoenmann is Greenspun Media Group’s embedded downtown journalist, working from an office in the Emergency Arts building.