{"id":398073,"date":"2026-09-12T18:14:31","date_gmt":"2026-09-12T18:14:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/398073\/"},"modified":"2026-09-12T18:14:31","modified_gmt":"2026-09-12T18:14:31","slug":"whataburger-opens-in-fort-myers-drawing-crowds-and-causing-traffic-on-us-41","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/398073\/","title":{"rendered":"Whataburger opens in Fort Myers, drawing crowds and causing traffic on US-41"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Whataburger opens in Fort Myers, drawing crowds and causing traffic on US-41<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/1789236870_928_7fc880bf-cd22-4c7d-9015-6429e9cd20e1_1755287884.file.png\" width=\"48\" height=\"48\" alt=\"Tyler Watkins\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.gulfcoastnewsnow.com\/news-team\/b08f64a5-6773-4e39-927a-6219912f22b8\" aria-label=\"Isaias Soto profile page\" class=\"css-15eikfp\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/1789236871_560_b08f64a5-6773-4e39-927a-6219912f22b8_1779987268.file.png\" width=\"48\" height=\"48\" alt=\"Isaias Soto\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><\/a>FORT MYERS, Fla. \u2014<\/p>\n<p data-node-id=\"0\">Whataburger has officially opened its first Gulf Coast location in Fort Myers, drawing enthusiastic crowds eager to try the Texan burger chain.<\/p>\n<p data-node-id=\"1\">The CEO of Whataburger and Lee County leaders gathered to cut the orange ribbon at the 24-hour restaurant on Thursday.<\/p>\n<p data-node-id=\"2\">Gulf Coast News crews at the restaurant saw more than 100 drivers lined up on South Cleveland Avenue (U.S.-41) and Kenwood Lane to be the first customers, and 80 guests waited in line to order inside. <\/p>\n<p data-node-id=\"3\">Another Whataburger location is planned to open in Estero near Coconut Point.<\/p>\n<p data-node-id=\"4\">DOWNLOAD\u202fthe free\u202f<a href=\"https:\/\/qrco.de\/gcnapp\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Gulf Coast News app<\/a>\u202ffor your latest news and alerts on breaking news, weather, sports, entertainment, and more on your phone or tablet. And check out the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.verylocal.com\/wbbh-ft-myers\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Very Local Gulf Coast app<\/a> to stream news, entertainment, and original programming on your TV.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Whataburger opens in Fort Myers, drawing crowds and causing traffic on US-41 FORT MYERS, Fla. \u2014 Whataburger has&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":398074,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[158619,1185,30207,209,211,210,158431,42251,158617,2344,104,10124,158623,76085,28,897,536,4329,4266,158618,213,356,158621,158620,5221,7586,12969,197,158622,1284,34138,7859,221,22802],"class_list":["post-398073","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cape-coral","tag-24-hour-restaurant","tag-alert","tag-burger-chain","tag-cape-coral","tag-cape-coral-headlines","tag-cape-coral-news","tag-car-line","tag-coconut-point","tag-debbie-stroud","tag-download","tag-entertainment","tag-estero","tag-first-gulf-coast-location","tag-first-location","tag-florida","tag-fort-myers","tag-gulf-coast","tag-gulf-coast-news","tag-gulf-coast-news-crew","tag-kenwood-lane","tag-late-news","tag-lee-county","tag-major-traffic","tag-orange-ribbon","tag-restaurant","tag-restaurant-opening","tag-ribbon-cutting","tag-sport","tag-texan-burger-chain","tag-thursday","tag-u-s-41","tag-us-41","tag-weather","tag-whataburger"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/398073","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=398073"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/398073\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/398074"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=398073"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=398073"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=398073"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}