The days when one could stop by “The Riv” for a cold one on the way home from work on a Friday are long gone. Now, too, is the former Riviera Lounge itself, which succumbed to the 2011 flood.

The Riviera, The Riv, or whatever name patrons chose to call the popular bar had a great following in its day. Now it is but a pile of bricks – which friends of the bar are carting off as a reminder of the good times they had there.

Chris Lindbo, who purchased the bar after the flood, had tried to save it but no buyers came forth. So he was handing out bricks last week while the building came down.

What a nice gesture from Lindbo. We hope that people appreciate that he took the time and made the effort to do that.

It’s nice to know that some of the bricks will be used to repair the nearby former Piggly Wiggly store, which Lindbo also owns.

And that a Dollar General will be built on the site where the Riviera Lounge had stood since the early 1960’s.

Numerous other buildings in Minot have come down in much less dignified ways. For example, the old Washington Elementary – the grounds now as much an eyesore as any flood-damaged lots left in the valley. Imagine yourself a former Washington student, driving past that mess trying to recall pleasant memories of your time there. Sad.

We in Minot love our old buildings. At times people advocate strongly to save specific ones or critcize when they are razed.

Two structures that come to mind would be the Flat Iron Building and the International Harvester Building, both icons of downtown. Some people still think those buildings could have, should have been saved.

But sadly, like the Riviera Lounge, it was not to be.

Going back even further in history, it’s unfortunate that Minot could not have saved many other remarkable buildings that evidently proved too impractical or so out of date that they couldn’t be preserved. Imagine a downtown with the old Elk’s Home still standing, or the original First Baptist Church nearby.

But then, we would not have had the Wells Fargo Building or the former Midwest Federal Building, built on the same lots respectively.

Call it progress if you will, or call it a shame when a building close to our hearts finally falls. In the case of the Riviera Lounge, its time had clearly come.

Now we look forward to having a Dollar General near Oak Park. It promises to be a good fit with the neighborhood and with a good share of northwest Minot.