PI Update: Near Misses

Last week the Blog bragged about the 2009 prediction that Rock'nRoll Beach Club and Motion would get torn down and a lighthouse-style restaurant would be coming to Pleasure Island to replace them.  Of course The Boathouse now stands exactly where our sources told us it was going.  Today we look at other Schussler Creative restaurants that the Blog speculated might be coming in this September, 2009 article.  One of them was Backfire BBQ featuring Orange County Choppers.  This one never happened.  Perhaps the agreement with tenant Harley Davidson prevented it.  But we did get The Smokehouse BBQ walk-up restaurant at House of Blues instead.

We also speculated several times that Hot Dog Hall of Fame was coming to PI.  This never happened either but a similar concept with the same name did end up opening at Universal CityWalk.

Aerobleu is a aeronautical concept from Schussler that we speculated could be part of the mix on a reinvigorated Pleasure Island.  It's not coming but aviation-themed The Hangar (specifically Jock Lindsey’s Hangar Bar) is coming instead.  And instead of a post-WWII theme, we're getting a pre-WWII Indiana Jones/Adventurers theme.  I think that's a win.

Lastly we listed Winter Wonderland, a restaurant where it's winter all the time and Water Fire Ice, a polar lounge. There are already two ice bars along International Drive, so the latter would certainly be redundant.  As for a restaurant that features winter, it still seems like a cool idea!