27th and Pine Lake is bustling with life, retail

The marketing director for SouthPointe Pavilions still thinks about it sometimes when she sits at the intersection bustling with retail shops and restaurants.

Lattimer said RED Development, the company that built SouthPointe, started with a mission: Build it and they will come.

When Old Navy, one of SouthPointe's first stores, opened in 1998, the shopping center still had board sidewalks, she said.

Fast forward almost 20 years.

"We really are seeing huge levels of development," Lattimer said.

A couple of years ago, people considered the Wilderness Hills area a mile to the south "too green," or not ready for development, she said. Today, the leases are starting to fill up.

It's the same thing with all the restaurants popping up in the area.

"I really think it's cool that while we are in competition there is this huge synergy that happens to make everything flow," Lattimer said.

Hacienda Real opened in 2014 and the former Macaroni Grill site is to be converted into a Chick-fil-A, complete with a double-lane drive-thru.

In the strip mall on the south side of the street, Zoup! opened in 2014, and Jersey Mike's Subs is open.

Nearby, there's a new HuHot Mongolian Grill and Five Guys Burgers and Fries.

Michelle Mota, who lives near Bennet, said her family likes the shops at SouthPointe -- including Barnes & Noble -- so they end up stopping and eating in the area. It’s convenient, she said.

And she's noticed more options popping up, she said on a recent Friday as she headed to PepperJax Grill.

And Mota is excited about the Chick-fil-A set to open this summer. She’s eaten at the chicken chain before, in the South, and "yes, they are good," she said.

"It’s nice to see a little bit of variety," Mota said.

Ryan Funke, who owns Five Guys, agrees.

When it comes to restaurants, he said, it's kind of the same theory that leads car dealerships to go up near each other.

Funke said his family does the same thing a lot of families do. One grabs Chipotle. Another gets Noodles & Company. It's just the way it works, he said.

"If we can get you to that area there's going to be something for everyone," Funke said, almost like an extension of the mall food court concept.

He thinks the Chick-fil-A, and a Slim Chickens a mile to the west, will be great additions, too.

"We just need you to think about us every so often," he said of Five Guys.

And, if the first week was any indication, south Lincoln residents are thinking about burgers and fries.

Five Guys opened at the end of January after searching two years for a spot to set up shop in the area.

Despite back-to-back snowstorms, the new location had a strong opening week, better even than his other locations, Funke said.

"It seems to be that that corner at 27th and Pine Lake is the mecca of everything that goes on in south Lincoln," he said on a recent Friday morning.

Later in the day, Jeff Marcotte was busy at the then-still-under-construction Jersey Mike's Subs, known for baking its own bread and freshly slicing high-quality meats and cheeses.

He's excited about opening in south Lincoln, giving out free sandwiches during the five-day grand opening and reaching customers Jersey Mike's hasn't served yet.

It just made sense to look to the 27th and Pine Lake Road area for a new location. It's a growing part of town, Marcotte said.