Alas, they won’t be seeing us next March.
Photo © Jim Good, used by permission

The Kansas City Star recently reported that the I-70 Drive-In has closed permanently, according to an email from the drive-in’s owners. Just a few years ago, I wrote that its future was uncertain, but that was before it invested in digital projection. Normally, that’s a clear sign that the drive-in intends to continue for a long time to repay that investment, but the owner, B&B Theatres, told the Star that “an arrangement with the landlord could not be reached”.

The good news, or maybe it’s glass-half-full news, is that the Kansas City metro area still has two other active drive-ins, the Twin in Independence and the Boulevard in Kansas City KS.

I have a history with the I-70. Once upon a time, I took the wife to see A League of Their Own there, and whenever I hear about watching a drive-in movie in the rain, that’s the memory that surfaces for me. That movie taught us that there’s no crying in baseball, but crying about drive-ins remains optional.