{"id":324319,"date":"2026-06-05T16:31:09","date_gmt":"2026-06-05T16:31:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/324319\/"},"modified":"2026-06-05T16:31:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-05T16:31:09","slug":"wtf-happened-to-the-old-barbecs-space-in-dallas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/324319\/","title":{"rendered":"WTF happened to the old Barbec&#8217;s space in Dallas?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t<img width=\"1240\" height=\"698\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/The-Eye-WTF-Photo-by-Lauren-Drewes-Daniels-e1777407946782.jpg\" class=\"article-thumbnail-image wp-post-image\" alt=\"The Eye art piece in downtown Dallas.\" decoding=\"async\" fetchpriority=\"high\"\/><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t\tGot a question? We&#8217;ll go see about it. \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>Photo by Lauren Drewes Daniels<\/p>\n<p>Recently, as part of the Observer\u2019s new column, the <a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dallasobserver.com\/opinion\/introducing-weekly-wtf-reader-question-column-40654968\/\">Weekly WTF,<\/a> a reader asked what\u2019s going on at the old Barbec\u2019s restaurant space. <\/p>\n<p>For a little background, Barbec\u2019s was a longtime family restaurant serving classic comfort food in northeast Dallas. The restaurant was originally built in the \u201960s as a Howard Johnson\u2019s restaurant. In 1978, Barry and Becky Brown opened their co-joined eponymous restaurant, Barbec\u2019s.<\/p>\n<p>The Browns sold the restaurant in 1999, but it continued as a neighborhood diner famous for its beer biscuits until 2020, when a fire destroyed most of the interior. The space has been vacant since.<\/p>\n<p>The only sign of life was some paperwork filed for a Popeye\u2019s a few years ago. Luckily, that didn\u2019t pan out because, honestly, the restaurant has timeless Mid-Century elements. Asymmetrical roof lines with overhangs don\u2019t go with fast-food fried chicken. <\/p>\n<p>Sign up for the Food Alerts newsletter to get the latest stories delivered to your inbox<\/p>\n<p>THANK YOU!<\/p>\n<p>You&#8217;re all set.<\/p>\n<p>CLOSE\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>Currently, the space is for lease. An Instagram <a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/reels\/DTLKGcugHr8\/\">post<\/a> gives a tour of the remodeled space. The fire damage to the interior has been repaired, and, per\u00a0<a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/reels\/DTLKGcugHr8\/\">Peggyfindi<\/a>t, a new roof and HVAC system have been installed. <\/p>\n<p>Got a question for us? <a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dallasobserver.com\/opinion\/introducing-weekly-wtf-reader-question-column-40654968\/\">Holler<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" height=\"555\" width=\"1024\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/Barbecs-Dallas-Photo-by-Lauren-Drewes-Daniels.jpeg\" alt=\"Barbec's in Dallas\" class=\"wp-image-40684317\"  \/>The longtime Dallas diner, Barbec\u2019s, has sat empty since a fire in 2020. <\/p>\n<p>Photo by Lauren Drewes Daniels<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Got a question? We&#8217;ll go see about it. Photo by Lauren Drewes Daniels Recently, as part of the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":271451,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[102,104,103,100987],"class_list":["post-324319","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-dallas","tag-dallas","tag-dallas-headlines","tag-dallas-news","tag-weekly-wtf"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/324319","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=324319"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/324319\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/271451"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=324319"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=324319"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=324319"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}