Third Street restaurant opens

Sham Ahad told me Saturday at Borderland in East Aurora he is hosting a soft opening from 6-9 p.m. tonight at Power City Bar and Grill, 444 Third St. All are welcome and there will likely be food samples, interesting people and self-important politicians posing for photos.

Ahad, a London native, has been the proprietor of Mother Clucker’s food truck for the last several years. I wish him well.

Ahad is trying to grind out a living and joins the fray on Third Street, with Wine on Third, Donatello’s and The Craft making a living in addition to five Indian restaurants. Gaelan Baillie is making a go of a Daredevil Museum. K&R Events is trying to make an event space work.

Archives and Gold Bar are open a few nights a week and still trying with high end cocktails and simple snacks but I don’t know if it is sustainable with such limited hours.

John Paul Meteer continues to grind on building out Hammer & Crown Brewing in the former Rust space but is now facing a year-end deadline before losing IDA money. His rush is the same one happening at the Museum of Kashmiri History near Pine Avenue.

Out front, in the trees on Third Street rest broken lights, a one-time vision of vibrancy that will never bring back Unc’s.

There is nothing that gives any indication Radio Social will ever happen in the Imperial Garage and Niagara Mohawk buildings which were gifted to Montante Development by USA Niagara Development in the hopes of a multi-million dollar project that has never started.

Meanwhile, on the street, the Bradford pear trees lining the sidewalk are throwing up suckers, ready to bloom again next spring and smell like a cross between a dead animal and intimacy, offering no benefit to anything.

The misguided plastic vision of urban planning gone wrong stands as a testament to ignorance. Bradford (Callery) pears bring no fruit, host no beneficial insects, cast scant shade, grow like weeds and wait to cleave limbs in an ice or wind storm.

The only hope for Third Street in a city where the administration sees no benefit to tourism is investment from people like Sham, Baillie coming out of their own pockets to give it a go in spite of a do-nothing administration.