photo by Bruce Fingerhood, from the Carload Flickr pool

One of America’s best drive-in theaters, as voted by the readers of USA Today, has announced that it won’t be reopening for 2017. The Motor Vu of Dallas OR recognized last year that encroaching residential development might result in this shutdown, and the owners had hoped that a crowdfunding program would give them a reprieve. After disappointing initial returns, they pulled the plug on that campaign.

Yesterday on the Motor Vu Facebook page, the owners posted videos of the drive-in’s fences coming down and photos of equipment for sale. (Including a digital projector for just $15,000, which ought to work well for someone else’s last-minute conversion from film. But I digress.) “Thank you to all of our wonderful customers who helped us make wonderful memories,” read one post. Sorry to see such a class act go.