Mellow Mushroom to sprout in Avondale, despite opposition

It was debated, fought and criticized by many area residents, but a new Mellow Mushroom Pizza Bakers restaurant finally will open in Jacksonvilles Avondale neighborhood Monday.

After demolishing a former gas station building and fending off angry community activists for months, owners of the Mellow Mushroom pizza shop chain finally have finished construction of the new restaurant at 3611 St. Johns Ave. The eatery is among several others in the Shoppes of Avondale stretch of St. Johns Avenue.

We are thrilled to bring Mellow Mushroom to Avondale, said Mellow Mushroom owner John Valentino in a news release Wednesday. This is an ideal setting for our guests.

While Valentino sees the new restaurant site as ideal, many living near the area have not.

Multiple appeals challenging the Mellow Mushroom construction were filed with the city by citizen groups We Love Avondale, Riverside Avondale Preservation, and three property owners near the Shoppes. All argued the Mellow Mushroom didnt meet its parking obligations.

In most of Jacksonville, a restaurant must provide one parking space for every four seats, plus one space for each employee. Mellow Mushroom would have 198 seats and 14 employes, so the standard regulation would require 57 spaces. But in Riverside-Avondale that obligation is half, so its required to provide only 28 spaces.

The citys planning department determined Mellow Mushroom has vested rights to seven parking spaces from businesses that previously occupied the buildings it will use. That means the restaurant must provide 21 other spaces, which Mellow Mushroom says it would with the new parking lot.

Their cookie-cutter model is not going to work in a neighborhood like ours, Carmen Godwin, executive director of Riverside Avondale Preservation, said in an October Times-Union report on the controversy.

Mellow Mushroom officials say theyve been able to incorporate the Avondale artsy feel by using woods in most of the dcor along with brick and contemporary jazz-inspired art. There also will be a retired fire truck parked on the side of the building.

The Mellow Mushroom in Avondale will be open seven days a week.

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Mellow Mushroom to sprout in Avondale, despite opposition