Walk Mill Avenue on a September evening and the contrast is hard to miss. A marquee glows for a restaurant built around a celebrity chef's take on ancient Rome. Two doors down, a storefront sits dark behind butcher paper, its "coming soon" sign promising a brewery that will not open for another month. Keep walking toward Fifth Street and you pass a bank building from 1912, quiet, recently sold, its future decided not by a restaurant group's real estate scout but by a city council vote just three days away.
Most people who live near downtown Tempe have registered one half of this story or the other. Either they have noticed the wave of new dining concepts landing on Mill, or they have heard something about the city buying old buildings. Few have connected them. They are the same story, told from opposite ends of the same half-mile: private capital is racing to fill Mill Avenue's ground floor with the biggest names it can attract, and at the exact same moment, the city has moved to make sure two of its oldest buildings never join that race at all.
What actually opened this year
The restaurant news has been loud, and most of it is real. Roman God of Fire, a collaboration between celebrity chef Scott Conant and Pretty Decent Concepts, opened at 52 E. Rio Salado Parkway at the end of July, its dining room built around towering custom statues and a menu of handmade pasta and wood-fired Roman pizza. It marked Pretty Decent Concepts' first ground-up build in the Valley, led by ASU alum and co-founder Teddy Myers.
A few blocks over, Urban Hip-E Fresh Kitchen opened in late August at 950 S. Mill Avenue, a fast-casual concept from Sonya and James Gorraiz, two Phoenix-area natives who spent more than a decade building restaurants in Colorado before bringing the format home to the street where they grew up.
Here is the fuller list of what has actually landed, and what is still pending, as of early September:
- Roman God of Fire — 52 E. Rio Salado Parkway, open since late July
- Urban Hip-E Fresh Kitchen — 950 S. Mill Avenue, open since late August
- Phantom Fox Beer Co. and Goat and Ram — moving into the former Illegal Pete's space near Fifth Street, officially opening October 8 after earlier target dates slipped from spring into fall
- Culinary Gangster — planned for the southeast corner of Mill and Fifth, below Varsity Tavern, originally aiming for a March or, failing that, August opening, still pending as of late August
- Novel Ice Cream — slated for the former House of Tricks space on Seventh Street, originally targeted for spring 2026, still not open as of late August
- Carmen — a coastal Mexican concept from restaurateur Julian Wright, planned for the former Anoche Cantina space, also still pending
Notice the pattern inside that list. The concepts with outside backing and press coverage, the celebrity chef, the brewery with an existing Mesa following, are the ones that actually opened on schedule or close to it. The smaller, locally rooted concepts, the ones announced with just as much fanfare, have slipped repeatedly. Getting a lease signed on Mill Avenue in 2026 is not simply a matter of having a good idea. It is a matter of how much capital and patience you can absorb while you wait for a space to actually turn over.
Two blocks away, a different kind of landlord
That waiting game is exactly what Tempe's city government decided not to leave to chance for two of its oldest commercial buildings. The Tempe National Bank building at 526 S. Mill Avenue, built in 1912 and originally established in 1901 by a group of pioneer business leaders that included future U.S. Senator Carl Hayden, has changed hands. So has the adjacent Tempe Hardware building at 520 S. Mill Avenue. Both were purchased by the city from Wexford Developments, a Calgary-based developer that is also behind several high-density residential projects nearby in downtown Tempe. The city closed on the bank building in January 2026 and on the hardware building in June 2026.
The money for both purchases traces back to a bond measure Tempe voters approved in November 2024. Question 2 authorized up to $248.5 million for parks, municipal infrastructure, and historic preservation, part of a larger $581.5 million bond package. In other words, Tempe residents voted two years ago to set aside public money specifically so the city could step into deals like this one when the moment came.
The moment came in early 2026, and the city took it. Mayor Corey Woods has framed the goal plainly: use city ownership to offer small businesses affordable rent in a corridor where commercial rents typically run high. The Tempe National Bank building offers nearly 10,000 square feet of commercial space. The Tempe Hardware building adds roughly 2,000 square feet more. Together that is almost 12,000 square feet of ground-floor Mill Avenue real estate that will not be marketed to the highest bidder.
What used to be there, and why it left
The bank building's most recent tenant tells you something about why the city moved when it did. Darkstar Theater, a two-story EDM nightclub and live music venue, closed in early 2026 after operator Scott Price chose not to renew his lease, doing so in anticipation of the city's purchase. Price publicly supported selling the building to the city, arguing it would protect the structure's historical character while opening the door to new uses downtown. He has since redirected his energy into a different venue concept, RePUBLic, elsewhere in the market.
That is not a story about a business failing. It is a story about a tenant reading the writing on the wall and choosing to exit on his own terms before a public purchase reshaped what the building could become.
Two buildings, two very different processes
| New Mill Avenue restaurants (private lease deals) | Tempe National Bank & Hardware buildings (city-owned) | |
|---|---|---|
| Who decides the tenant | Property owners and developers, market rent | Tempe City Council, ordinance and public vote |
| Funding source | Private capital, restaurant groups | 2024 voter-approved bond, Question 2 |
| Rent structure | Typical Mill Avenue commercial rates | Designed to be affordable for small, local operators |
| Timeline so far | Openings slipping months past original targets | Purchases completed Jan. and June 2026, lease ordinance vote Sept. 10 |
The vote that decides what fills them
The Tempe City Council held public hearings on August 31 on ordinances that would let the city negotiate and execute lease agreements for both buildings, with a final vote scheduled for September 10. That is a matter of days from now, not some distant planning milestone. The council's stated intent is to fill both spaces with small, local businesses rather than the kind of regional and national chains that increasingly dominate the rest of the avenue, a goal the January 2026 council action tied explicitly to preventing redevelopment that would be inconsistent with the buildings' historic character. Purchase prices for both buildings were capped at fair market value based on appraisals, a detail the council built into its original authorization back in January.
Mayor Corey Woods has pointed to the contrast directly: city ownership is meant to help small businesses secure affordable rent in a corridor where commercial rents typically run high.
What this means if you already live here
Longtime Tempe residents have been vocal about what Mill Avenue used to feel like. Four Tempe High School graduates strolling the avenue this year reminisced about losing places like Long Wong's and the 60s Lounge, smaller, scrappier spots replaced over two decades by bigger operators. That sentiment is not nostalgia for its own sake. It reflects a real pattern: as rents rise, the businesses that can afford Mill Avenue's ground floor skew toward the ones with the deepest pockets, whether that is a celebrity chef's restaurant group or a national brewery chain.
The city's move on the bank and hardware buildings is a direct answer to that pattern, not a symbolic one. It sets aside nearly 12,000 square feet, at the literal center of the strip, specifically so a coffee shop, a bookstore, or a small local restaurant can compete for space without bidding against a company with investor backing behind it. Whether that plays out as intended depends on what the council approves on September 10 and which local operators step forward once leasing begins. For now, it is the clearest signal in years that not every square foot of Mill Avenue is available to the same buyer.
If you are watching this corridor because you love the neighborhood, or because you are weighing what its next chapter means for property nearby, keep an eye on both threads. The restaurant wave will keep making headlines. The quieter one, happening inside two buildings the public already owns, might end up mattering more.
If you are thinking through what any of this means for a home purchase or sale near downtown Tempe, Inspired Real Estate Life can put together a Personalized Market Plan built around what is actually happening on the ground here, not just what the listing portals show.
