Hoping to create a new destination in downtown Simpsonville, investor and developer John Dickens, along with Spectrum Commercial Properties, is shopping around ideas for a new $6 million proposed mixed-use project called The Village at Jennings’ Station.
Dickens seeks to create a development on the 2.6-acre parcel that can serve as “a catalyst to the revitalization of downtown Simpsonville.”
“There has been a lot of interest and we’ve been courting a few local restaurant chains,” said Richard Cox, associate broker with Spectrum Commercial Properties. “The renderings are just conceptual at this point and will be finalized depending on need.”
The property is located at 211 NE Main St., near Curtis Street, and was once the home to Jennings’ Service Station.
Jennings’ Service Station was opened in 1967 by brothers Waymond and Wade Jennings “during a time when Simpsonville was just a little mill town full of salt-of-the-earth people working towards the American Dream,” said Clifford Jennings, Waymond’s son and operator of the store from 1987 until it closed in 2007.
The Jennings’ store was one of a handful of filling stations in the area and offered a little bit of everything, from supplying fuel and automotive supplies and service to helping out residents with community credit and check cashing.
“You always knew when it was noon around the store,” Clifford Jennings said. “There wasn’t much constant action in town, so you knew how to tell time by when people would start showing up at the station. From the manager of the Feed N’Seed to the Cryovac or the mill [employees], you knew when people were heading to work.”
After assuming management from his father and uncle in the 1980s, Jennings began offering more repair services to keep up with the growing local economy. The store remained a popular location in Simpsonville until health reasons led Jennings to close the store in 2007.
Cox said the developers hope to start construction on the project later this year.
