The Starlite Drive-In is up for a second life. It was shut down in October with plans of redeveloping the land, but now it has been bought by a local. He intends to keep it open as a drive in.
This announcement was made by the group at a news conference on Friday at the downtown headquarters. There is no disclosure of the purchase price. The Landmark agent Marc Knowles brokered the deal and even contacted the buyer for purchase of the drive in. the buyer doesn’t want to give away his identity.
Knowles said,
He’s got children he takes to the drive-in and he wants to continue to take them to the drive-in. it was a personal decision to buy the Starlite.
The drive-in operations will be leased out to Blake Smith, Admiral Twin of Tulsa’s co-owner, by the buyer of Starlite. Previously, Smith was also a part of the joint offer for purchasing the Starlite Drive-In outright for $750,000. He wants the drive-in to be reopened by the month of February, only if he is able to acquire new digital projectors costing $175,000.
The existing Barco DP4K-32B projectors which were purchased with extensive fundraising campaign back in 2013 were sold by Bucinski for $25,000, way below the original price.
James Clendenin, city council member representing south Wichita, had to go to great lengths for negotiating the deal and there are chances of more involvement by the city. There will be a proposal of extending a loan of$200,000 to the Starlite Drive-In for purchasing new projectors in its 18 December council meeting.
The proceeds of the sale of the downtown Hyatt will help return the money. According to Clendenin, each council member was supposed to allocate $1 million. The supporters of the drive have led a pledge drive for raising funds for the purchase of new projectors.
Source: Kansas.com and Landmark Real Estate
