Where there’s smoke

Approaching it from the east in the dark, as we did, we found ourselves staring right at Flames’ building, which sits on the southwest corner of Whipple Avenue and El Camino Real. The building is adorned with both the business’ logo — an orange flame sporting a snarling face — and its name, spelled out in large, brightly lit red letters. Add to that the shop’s half-dozen or so large front windows outlined in white lights, and you have a truly eye-catching display.

For years the building housed a liquor store — Village Bottle Shop — but, in 2016, the building’s owners seemingly decided that small tech offices would be a more profitable use. That appears to have been a poor choice, given that although the building seemingly did have one or two tenants for brief periods of time, for most of the last 7 1/2 years it appeared to have been empty. But it seems the owners have thrown in the towel and the building is once again a retail space.

Flames Smoke Shop appears to be a conventional tobacco retailer. For smoke of a different kind, one need only cross El Camino Real and the Caltrain tracks to get to Airfield Supply Co., Redwood City’s newest cannabis dispensary. Newest, that is, until just this week, when Flor Peninsula — another dispensary — opened at 620 El Camino Real, just one block down from Flames Smoke Shop.

A while ago, the Redwood City Council decided to allow a limited number of cannabis retailers to operate in the city. In October of 2022, city ordinances were amended to implement that decision. The city capped the number of such businesses at six, and then began accepting applications for cannabis storefront retailers. Scoring each on a number of criteria, the original plan was to advance the top 12 to the next round of review. However, so many applications were received that the city raised that first-round number to 18. From those, the city granted permits to the four businesses that best met the city’s criteria. All four opened in 2023, and are currently doing business.

In mid-2022, Redwood City’s city manager elected to issue two additional cannabis retail permits. One went to Flor Peninsula, the business that just opened in a remodeled building that was a used-car dealership and, before that, a restaurant.

I give Flor credit for doing a nice remodeling job. The building still has its original structure, but new windows and doors. Those, plus new materials on many of the exterior walls, make the building more attractive than before. Finally, there are no garish signs drawing one’s eye to the business (so far, anyway). Just a few tasteful banners, which I presume are temporary.

I neither use cannabis products nor know much about the viability of businesses like these. I somewhat naively assumed that four would be more than enough for Redwood City. So, I was surprised when Flor began remodeling their building. Well, then, perhaps five will satisfy the market? Not if Element 7 has anything to say about it. Element 7 is the sixth holder of a Redwood City cannabis retail permit and, just this week, I observed that the spot they plan to occupy — a small liquor store/deli on Woodside Road, at Central Avenue — is now vacant and has been partially gutted. Although the applied-for building permit needed to remodel the space has not yet been issued, I’m now guessing that construction will begin soon, and that it won’t take long.

These businesses are completely legal and have a right to operate, but as a nonsmoker I admit to some amount of disappointment. To me, their very existence seems to alter the character of the city in a way I just can’t get excited about. Fortunately, all of these retail spaces are low key in appearance (with the possible exception of Flames’ signs and lighting), and are easy to ignore. And if the tax revenue the city receives from them is anything close to what the city anticipates, well, that’s something.

Greg Wilson is the creator of Walking Redwood City, a blog inspired by his walks throughout Redwood City and adjacent communities. He can be reached at greg@walkingRedwoodCity.com. Follow Greg on Twitter @walkingRWC.