This weekend marks the grand opening of Centennial Fine Wine's newest store, the corner of Ross and Greenville Avenues. BD got a quick tour of the store a few days before opening, and it is absolutely amazing. According to a Centennial press release issued about six months ago...

Once the renovations are complete, this store will boast one of the largest wine and spirit selections in the area with a tasting bar to host casual weekend tastings. Other upscale features of this store will include a walk-in humidor, specialty cheese selections and a full gourmet center in order to accommodate every type of occasion.

In other words, they are targeting the people who actually live on and around Lower Greenville Avenue. And not the transient drunks who come here from far-flung places like McKinney and Plano every weekend.

The old-timers in the neighborhood will tell you this was the first location of Safeway Supermarket, before it moved (1969??) to the space now occupied by the empty Whole Foods building. After that, the store was a Western Auto Warehouse, then Dan's Pawnshop (we think there was something else between Western and Dan's, but can't find it in our records).

This is what the same building looked like one year ago, as shot from the same corner by the tire repair shop. A few days after BD posted this photo, the City cited the building's owners for the graffiti.

What absolutely amazes me is that the same neighborhood association leaders (but not the members, because these so-called leaders never ask what they think) were considering ways to stop the building from getting a TABC permit. One person told BD...

We have too many liquor permits down here already. Where do you draw the line?

This same person admitted she had never been to a wine tasting in her life, and had no idea you were supposed to spit the wine out, not swallow it.

You stop drawing lines when you realize the TABC permit for this store is not the same type of permit issued to a bar (oops, restaurant) to serve liquor. It's what we called back east a package permit. You also buy a reality check and know that Dallas has no power to prevent the permit from being issued. If they get a Certificate of Occupancy, they get a TABC permit. And unless you have had the pleasure of sitting through a 10-hour TABC hearing and being able to prove this store - even though it had not opened - was a threat to the health, safety or welfare of the community (and they will not let any Lowest Greenville bar patrons use their parking lot either), then your chances of stopping the business from opening were somewhere between nil and not in this lifetime.