by AArdvark » Thu Jun 23, 2011 6:13 pm
Tdarcos wrote (in the wrong thread):
Flack wrote:
People all over the country are bemoaning how there are no true arcades left. I have one 5 miles from my house that I rarely visit. I should go there more than I do.
I don't know if people are bemoaning it, but there are only two outdoor drive-in theaters within 100 miles of where I live, one (I've never been to) is the Fork Union Drive in, located near I85 in Fork Union, Virginia; and the Bengies' Drive In, located in Essex, Maryland just outside Baltimore.
The owner, D. Edward Vogel, is famous for saying over the PA system that if you're leaving early before seeing all three of the films on the schedule (that you paid for), "You're Stupid!"
According to a pseudo public-service-announcement they show before the main feature, there are only about 400 drive-ins left in the United States. Part of the problem is the distributors don't like them because they run more films than a regular theater for the same admission fee and thus they pay less than a single-film regular "walk in" one.
I remember going to several drive-ins back in the late 1970s back in Long Beach, California. Enormous increases in Real Estate values caused them to close down and be sold. I think from San Diego to Santa Barbara there isn't a single drive-in theater any more, the real estate just became too valuable. Despite the fact that in Southern California the weather is so mild you can run films every single night. A drive-in theatre like the Bengies in Baltimore has to close during the winter.
This sort of problem drove almost every farm in Southern California out of business as the land became way too valuable plus property taxes went up. So the legislature instituted a change in the rules: if you ran a farm in California in a city or other urban area, you got a complete exemption from property taxes for ten years as long as you agreed to use the property for farming for the 10-year period.
So it was wierd: I'd ride the bus in Orange County, pass through these areas of tall office buildings, and then a plot of land about two blocks long and maybe 3 wide, and they were growing strawberries on it! Like a normal farm. In the middle of a bustling city. Across the street on every side from the farm was another 10-or-more-story office building. The farm even had a fruit stand next to the road where you could (if you were driving) pull over and buy some baskets or bushels fresh picked (that's how I knew it was a strawberry patch.)
_________________
"The lessons of history teach us - if they teach us anything - that no one learns the lessons that history teaches us."
Tdarcos wrote (in the wrong thread):
Flack wrote:
People all over the country are bemoaning how there are no true arcades left. I have one 5 miles from my house that I rarely visit. I should go there more than I do.
I don't know if people are bemoaning it, but there are only two outdoor drive-in theaters within 100 miles of where I live, one (I've never been to) is the Fork Union Drive in, located near I85 in Fork Union, Virginia; and the Bengies' Drive In, located in Essex, Maryland just outside Baltimore.
The owner, D. Edward Vogel, is famous for saying over the PA system that if you're leaving early before seeing all three of the films on the schedule (that you paid for), "You're Stupid!"
According to a pseudo public-service-announcement they show before the main feature, there are only about 400 drive-ins left in the United States. Part of the problem is the distributors don't like them because they run more films than a regular theater for the same admission fee and thus they pay less than a single-film regular "walk in" one.
I remember going to several drive-ins back in the late 1970s back in Long Beach, California. Enormous increases in Real Estate values caused them to close down and be sold. I think from San Diego to Santa Barbara there isn't a single drive-in theater any more, the real estate just became too valuable. Despite the fact that in Southern California the weather is so mild you can run films every single night. A drive-in theatre like the Bengies in Baltimore has to close during the winter.
This sort of problem drove almost every farm in Southern California out of business as the land became way too valuable plus property taxes went up. So the legislature instituted a change in the rules: if you ran a farm in California in a city or other urban area, you got a complete exemption from property taxes for ten years as long as you agreed to use the property for farming for the 10-year period.
So it was wierd: I'd ride the bus in Orange County, pass through these areas of tall office buildings, and then a plot of land about two blocks long and maybe 3 wide, and they were growing strawberries on it! Like a normal farm. In the middle of a bustling city. Across the street on every side from the farm was another 10-or-more-story office building. The farm even had a fruit stand next to the road where you could (if you were driving) pull over and buy some baskets or bushels fresh picked (that's how I knew it was a strawberry patch.)
_________________
"The lessons of history teach us - if they teach us anything - that no one learns the lessons that history teaches us."