Why this will be the last year for Constitution Yards beer garden as you know it

Pour one out if you must: 2024 will be the final year for the Constitution Yards beer garden as you know it.

The popular Riverfront beer garden will have to find a new home next year, to make way for a planned luxury apartment building at its current site.

Constitution Yards is, of course, Wilmington's first beer garden since Prohibition, a shipping-containered fixture on the Christina Riverfront since it opened in 2016 in Justison Landing Park. At the time, the garden was hailed as a much-needed public amenity to draw new residents to the city and breathe life into the Riverfront.

Since then, the 30,000-square-foot beer garden has been home each summer to plastic cups frothing with Delaware craft brews or frozen cocktails, not to mention axe throwing, lawn games, near-constant local music on the weekends, and a whole lot of dogs.

But whatever its popularity, this year will be the beer garden's last at Justison Landing Park, says Megan McGlinchey, executive director of the Riverfront Development Corp., the public-private entity that has long steered development along the Christina and Brandywine riverfronts.

"There are plans to relocate Constitution Yards to another location on the Riverfront at the end of the season this fall," McGlinchey wrote in response to inquiries.

Where a new Constitution Yards would reopen is less certain.

In the beer garden's place at 308 Justison St., according to plans filed with the city, will be an apartment complex designed and built by developer Buccini-Pollin Group. For more than a decade, BPG Group has had an agreement with the city of Wilmington to take ownership of the land — and plans to build atop it.

Now, those plans have finally come due. Here's what we know about the plans for the Wilmington Riverfront, and the future of Constitution Yards.

What does BPG want to build where Constitution Yards now stands?

According to plans submitted to the Zoning Board of Adjustment in April, BPG plans a 7-story, 162-unit apartment building on the northern third of what's now Justison Landing Park.

The remainder of the property would remain public park space controlled by the Riverfront Development Corporation. There are no current plans to keep Constitution Yards in its current place. Instead, renderings show brick, trees and walking paths.

BPG brought plans for the apartment building before Wilmington's zoning board of adjustment in April to request they be allowed to build one story taller, and a little bigger than city code would usually allow.

The planned 93-foot-tall building would be slightly shorter than its neighboring buildings. But without a variance, city code on the riverfront would typically allow buildings only six stories tall. Other variances sought involve the size of the building's footprint, and the location of a loading bay.

No decision was reached during that April meeting, however. After some neighbors complained they hadn't gotten enough advance notification, BPG senior vice president Michael Hare proposed that the city delay consideration of these variances till the next zoning board meeting.

That said, neighbors who arrived to comment seemed far less concerned about the potential height of the building than about parking, and the potential end of Constitution Yards.

Constitution Yards is a "treasure," said one neighborhood commenter, reading a statement. It's an economic driver for the area, she said, and "one of the few unique offerings that the Riverfront provides."

Why does BPG want to build on top of Constitution Yards now?

If anything, this riverfront apartment complex has arrived much later than expected.

Plans for the proposed apartment building have been in the works since 2006, said Hare, long before Constitution Yards existed. But the financial collapse of 2008 put those plans on hold as the real estate market went into free-fall.

In the meantime, BPG and the Riverfront Development Corporation put the fallow land to use as a space for entertainment, and public amenity for residents of downtown and the new Riverfront apartment buildings. This has included a winter skating rink on the site.

After a 2015 News Journal article about missing pieces in Wilmington's entertainment landscape, including beer gardens, a new idea came to the fore.

"We said, 'What about beer garden in the summer?" BPG's Hare remembered. "So Constitution Yards was born."

The Riverfront Development Corp. and BPG brought in Connecticut-based hospitality company Imian Partners to run the beer garden.

This also inspired a change to state law. At the time, beer gardens could serve alcohol only under temporary event permits. In 2017, then-state Rep. Helene Keeley, D-Wilmington South, introduced a successful bill that would allow for permanent beer garden licensing.

Constitution Yards was conceived as a "semi-permanent" stop-gap, Hare said, until economic conditions allowed for apartment construction.

As other BPG buildings in Wilmington began to fill, and the future looked rosier for another Riverfront apartment building, those long-delayed construction plans are coming back into focus. So BPG returned to its plans for an apartment building at 308 Justison St.

Constitution Yards is now also part of BPG's plans for the future, Hare said.

More beer gardens: See the new Rail Haus indoor-outdoor beer garden in Dover

What will happen to the Constitution Yards beer garden in 2025?

Constitution Yards will remain open as usual in 2024, and will close when the weather gets cold, same as ever.

Next year the location is more of a question mark, but the design of Constitution Yards allows it to be portable.

"It can be relocated," said Hare, "and it is our intent to relocate the beer garden."

BPG and the Riverfront Development Corporation have not yet determined the best new site for the beer garden. Initially, BPG hoped the beer garden could anchor a planned development on the east side of the Christina River, Hare said.

"But obviously those plans aren't going to be ready yet," Hare said. Instead, BPG will likely choose among a few other parcels along the western banks of the Christina.

Though a beer garden was never in BPG's initial plans for riverfront development, Hare said, Constitution Yards has become an pivotal component of the area.

"Once you see people living there, you realize there should be green space, open space on the riverfront. It cries for it," he said. If all goes well, the Constitution Yards will move to a new location without a gap year.

"We recognize it has as a following," Hare said. "We're proud of it. And we want to see it definitely as a part of the riverfront moving forward. We always close at the end of fall and reopen in the spring, and that is our plan again this year. Next year, we won't miss a season."

Matthew Korfhage is business and development reporter in the Delaware region covering all things related to land and money: openings and closings, construction, and the many corporations that call the First State home. Send tips and insults to [email protected].

This article originally appeared on Delaware News Journal: Constitution Yards beer garden will close, move locations after 2024