Another restaurant has closed on the Red Line south of Broad Ripple

Some restaurant owners say the Red Line has helped their businesses; others give it mixed reviews. For sure, one area along College Avenue has seen two neighboring restaurants go under, the latest being SoBro Café.

The health-focused restaurant, with lots of vegan and vegetarian dishes, at the intersection of College Avenue and 52nd Street closed Jan. 12. Around the corner, Taste Café & Marketplace, 5164 N. College Ave., shuttered in fall 2019.

Both restaurants were along the Red Line route, and their owners have said the rapid-bus line’s construction phase contributed to sharp declines in business.

But SoBro Café owner Helger Oomkes said he was also ready to focus on wider distribution of his popular Bhota Chai tea served at the café and elsewhere.

“The external factors contributed (to the closing), but they’re just one of the factors,” Oomkes said.

Red Line + BlueIndy

In December, SoBro Café co-owner and chef William Lake told IndyStar that other than a slight boost in business when the Red Line opened in September and offered free rides through Nov. 30, SoBro Café had not recovered from slowdowns during the construction.

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From spring 2018 to late summer 2019, when roads were blocked and traffic was slowed by ongoing work, Lake said he had to cut staff and close on Tuesdays.

That was the second hit the restaurant had taken from public transportation projects since opening in 2011.

A couple of years ago, the place lost street parking by the front door to BlueIndy cars. Oomkes was among Indianapolis restaurateurs who said nixed parking spaces hurt business. Oomkes told the city in 2017 that SoBro Café business slipped between 12 and 20 percent "for no apparent reason other than parking became more difficult."

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“When BlueIndy came in, it definitely impacted our business to a point from where it was a financially viable business to it was all of a sudden, ‘OK, we’ve got to work to keep this going to a harder degree,’ ” Oomkes said.

“The city supported with finances and such to create these (public transportation) things and (supplied) no support for this business, at least, and actually took it to the other direction.”

Where to get SoBro’s chai

In April, Taste Café & Marketplace owner Deidra Henry told IndyStar that sales dropped 35 to 40 percent from the previous spring, when Red Line construction began. She called the decline a “drastic, drastic decrease overnight.”

At Broad Ripple, Louie’s Wine Dive restaurant and Hoitea Toitea tea house locked up in September, with owners saying Red Line construction didn’t help their business.

Despite SoBro’s closing, Oomkes is optimistic.

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Pumping added effort into SoBro Café delayed Oomkes' plans to grow his Bhota Chai business. Many SoBro Café fans responding to news of the closing on the restaurant’s Facebook page wanted to know where they could find the spicy black tea blended with milk.

Bhota Chai is on the menu at the new Prufrock Coffee shop, which moved into Anabelle’s Garden market and cafe at 5168 N. College Ave., next door to former Taste Café. Anabelle’s was another business that closed in the past year.

You also can find Bhota Chai by the bottle at The Garden Table restaurant, Homespun store on Mass Ave. and via Market Wagon online farmers market and food delivery service.

Oomkes first served the tea from a community center during a 2001 poetry reading. He eventually would like to have a storefront and microbrewery-like setting for the brand.

“For me, SoBro had its life cycle. Whether those outside influences were part to blame on that or not, it’s ran its course," Oomkes said, saying it served the community by bringing healthy food to a state better known for deep-fried pork tenderloins sandwiches.

“The chai product that we cook here? That’s been more of my main focus from the start.”

Follow IndyStar food writer Liz Biro on Twitter: @lizbiro, Instagram: @lizbiro, and on Facebook. Call her at 317-444-6264.