35 Popular Restaurants That Won’t Reopen After the Pandemic

Citing cancellations for its catering business as well as declining restaurant revenues, this eight-year-old establishment — named one of Cleveland Magazine’s best restaurants of the year in 2019 — announced in mid-March that it was shuttering permanently. The catering company will continue to operate.

Opened in 1960 across the street from now-defunct Forbes Field, then home of the Pittsburgh Pirates, this iconic institution in the center of the University of Pittsburgh campus has apparently served its last burgers, dogs, and famous fries. Though there has been no official announcement, reports confirm that “The O,” as it was known, has been emptied out, and its website no longer operates.

Though its 15-year-old Providence location will reopen, the East Greenwich iteration of this “American brasserie,” launched in late 2014, will not. The owners cite “current conditions.”

The Knoxville branch of this four-unit chain announced in late March that it would not reopen after closing in the face of the coronavirus crisis. A second Babalu location, in Birmingham, Alabama, has also shut down for good. Another Tennessee location, in Memphis, and the fourth unit, in Jackson, Mississippi, are expected to reopen when possible.

Opened as a gas station and beer bar in 1933, this Austin institution evolved into a full-scale restaurant and leading music venue, spawning a second location in 1996. That one closed in 2018, and now the original Threadgill’s is for sale and will not reopen.