Edmonton Journal

Iconic eateries dodge wrecking ball

Owner sells Highlevel Diner, Sugarbowl to operators at half the assessed value

Todd Babiak
The Edmonton Journal
Sunday, November 4, 2007

EDMONTON – There are few corners more resonant and soulful in Edmonton than 109th Street and 88th Avenue. The commercial buffer between the university and Old Strathcona includes a bike shop, a fitness company, a travel outlet and two of the city’s finest spots to eat, drink and write the great Canadian novel — the Sugarbowl and the Highlevel Diner.

This summer, the operators of these institutional eateries learned that a major developer had offered their landlord a magnificent sum to buy the property on the corner that houses the diners. Patrick Turner, who has owned the brick-and-mortar of Highlevel Diner since 1979 and the Sugarbowl since 1962, has never sold a piece of real estate in his life.

“But this was a lot of money,” Turner said, in his office at the intersection of downtown and the river valley. The developer, he said, “was not interested in getting into the restaurant industry. He wanted to knock it all down and build condos.”

Turner went to his favourite restaurant in the city, the Highlevel Diner, and told the staff what he’d been offered. Kim Franklin, who operates the diner, spoke to her staff and to Abel Shiferaw, who worked there for 10 years and has run the Sugarbowl for 11 years. And they panicked.

“We could never, ever match or beat that price,” said Franklin. “All I could think about is all the people working here, their families, what it would be like to lose this place.’

Franklin and Shiferaw spoke to Franklin about the offer and he assured them he wasn’t interested in selling.

But the block held so much potential, with its sweeping views of the river valley and downtown Edmonton, that someone would soon make Turner or his heirs — he is a spry 85 — an even more spectacular offer.

And after some contemplation, Turner decided to sell the Highlevel Diner and the Sugarbowl to the restaurant operators for less than half of what he could have received from any number of developers.

“Now the whole block is safe,” Turner said. “The corner piece is secure and the middle piece is secure. Now no one can tear it all down.”

“I thought about it,” said Turner, who shares his office with his daughter and secretary, Linda Gerald and with Xena the warrior princess, a small white poodle, who greets visitors and sleeps on a chair. “I care about Kim and Abel, and all of the people working there. And to be honest, I have enough money. So I asked them to get it appraised.”

Shiferaw said he went from desperation to astonishment. “How many people, in this day and age, would do what he has done for us? For once it wasn’t about money. He thought about the people, and the community. It’s unbelievable. This is a story I will be telling my grandchildren.”

On Dec. 5, the Highlevel Diner will celebrate its 25th anniversary. The Sugarbowl isn’t quite as old, but is equally iconic. For generations of students and artists. It has been the place in Old Strathcona to drink coffee, eat cinnamon buns, drink exotic draught beer and argue the night away.

Ian McGillis wrote his bestselling novel, A Tourist’s Guide to Glengarry in the café. Another bestselling author and journalist, Curtis Gillespie, uses the Sugarbowl as his office. Dissertations and academic studies have been written in the Highlevel Diner. The cozy restaurant is the historic site of untold first dates and marriage proposals.

And the block of attached brick and stucco storefronts are architectural testaments to depression-era and Moderne storefronts in Edmonton. Much of it has disappeared in the city’s revolving, boom-and-bust drive to contemporize à la vinyl siding.

Turner arrived in Alberta from England in 1929. Not a good year, he said. “We starved a bit.” After a very short stint on a farm, his family came to Edmonton in 1930. He went to Oliver School, where he learned — among other things — how to type.

“And that saved my life,” he said. During the D-Day raids, in the Second World War, his commanders had him typing instead of operating a Sherman Tank — many of which were torn apart by German Panzers. “I’ve always felt a bit ashamed for that. But you have to do what they tell you.”

There is a photo on the wall of Turner’s office, of the young soldier with Winston Churchill and General Montgomery, just days after D-Day. There’s also a map of the world, with pins indicating the countries he’s visited.

“I’ve been everywhere, but I’d never live anywhere else,” he said.

With his former partner, Diane Ellerbeck, Turner helped bring a chef from Cuba, Antonio Parra, to Edmonton. Parra now works at the diner and lives rent-free in a suite above Turner’s office. Last week, Turner and Parra — an amateur opera singer — attended Carmen together.

“There are other things,” said Franklin, over a glass of wine at Turner’s favourite table in the diner. “One year they shut down the Highlevel Bridge and that just about killed us. (Turner) said, ‘I know these are bad times, Kim. Just pay me what you can. Pay me 50 cents.’ And we made it through.”

For now, Turner is keeping his other 34 properties, which includes an apartment block where he sold the Edmonton Journal as a kid. Most of the buildings he owns, Turner said, he ended up buying because he couldn’t sell them as a realtor. “No one else wanted them.”

A few years ago, there was talk that the university would expropriate Garneau up to 109th Street, which would have swallowed up the Sugarbowl and the Highlevel Diner, along with a number of American Foursquare houses, historic Garneau School and the Garneau Theatre. People drove in from the outskirts of the city to sign the petition to block the expropriation, and the loss of an historic neighbourhood.

In July local developer John Day bought the Garneau Theatre. At the time, Day said he would not knock down the red-brick Moderne building, which is on Edmonton’s historic register.

Back in Highlevel Diner on Wednesday, Turner took a sip of that celebratory wine he shared with Franklin and Shiferaw — now his friends, not his tenants. “There are some benevolent landlords out there,” he said, with a sly smile. “But they’re rare.”

tbabiak@thejournal.canwest.com