news-record.com

GREENSBORO — The city will buy the Coliseum Inn and the Canada Dry building on High Point Road for a total of $5.3 million.

City Manager Mitchell Johnson signed the agreements late on Thursday.

The City Council pushed for dramatic action to help turn around the area, Johnson said.

"They had started to become very concerned about the economic decline of the High Point Road corridor," he said.

The city will buy the motel with $2.1 million worth of economic development funds. It will be demolished and a later resold to a developer, Johnson said.

Canada Dry will sell for $3.2 million, $500,000 less than owners were asking for the property last year.

Last year, the property was offered as a possible site for an Atlantic
Coast Conference Hall of Champions. It is unclear how the
city will use the space adjacent to the Greensboro Coliseum Complex.

The Canada Dry property is owned by Susan Robinson, the wife of News & Record Editor John Robinson, and her brothers, W. Hardy Spence and Royall Spence III. The family, which owned Canada Dry of Greensboro, sold its franchise to distribute soft drinks in 1998.

Contact Amanda Lehmert at 373-7075 or amanda.lehmert@news-record.com