Tobacco Road, Miami, Making Way for the New (video)

The Final Toasts at a Gritty, Beloved Miami Tavern - NYTimes.com: Oct. 27, 2014 "....Four thousand patrons attended the raucous farewell party, which drained the bar of all its beer and nearly all its liquor... A roster of beloved local bands played for free, a tribute to a bar that had offered one of the best intimate spaces for live music, blues in particular..... Mr. Rivera is hoping the crowd will follow when he opens a new Tobacco Road, but sequels are often freighted with unrealistic expectations. “The Road always represented the best part of Miami,” said Coz Canler, who for 30 years was the lead guitarist of The Romantics, as he sat near the stage and listened to bands play on the last night. “It was real. It even smelled like it. All that wood.” Many bemoaned the transitory nature of the city. “We have no appreciation of our history here in Miami,” said Luis Prieto y Muñoz, a 32-year-old Miami lobbyist who first drank at Tobacco Road when he was 18. “And we’re not good at keeping it.” But Patrick Gleber, 55, who was one of the bar’s owners, disagreed. “This is what Miami’s about,” he said. “The old makes way for the new.”"

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