I’ve been eyeing the “Coming Soon” sign sitting innocently at a local Starbucks development. I’m not a trendy suburbanite, I just like coffee a great deal. While their’s is not the best I can get, it certainly beats gas stations and many of the pseudo coffee houses. There is some fear from locals that a Starbuck’s could mark the end of a great little place called, “Coffee Shop of Horrors,” but I’m not betting on that. Starbuck’s is popular, but for the same reason, the local coffee house will still be visited by the usual crowd. When I was in high school and hanging out at St. Ive’s, the last thing me and my friends wanted to do was go hang out in the man’s “establishment.” St. Ive’s was the original (not counting their roots, Sweetwater Coffee) coffee house in Gainesville. They’ve grown to expand their commercial interests and lost their local crowd. It’s a shame because they were the only local roaster. In the beginning, they roasted coffee in a mid-sized copper roaster near the front door. The unit took up a great deal of space in the foyer, so I think that led to its ultimate migration to their larger roasting facility. At any rate, Starbuck’s is not the end, it is a beginning. It is a landmark event because Starbuck’s is an urban cafe and Gainesville is clearly not an urban town. Could this be real signs of Gainesville’s expansion? The way things are going, I think Atlanta will eventually be known as the area north of Macon. I just hope we get access to MARTA our here.