Elis Giannini says goodbye to Geneva Cycle Shop as demolition proceeds

For 59 years, Elis Giannini sold regular and specialty bikes from his shop, Geneva Cycle Shop, 12 E. State St., Geneva.

On Sept. 23, he watched as demolition began on the bike shop and a former resale shop at the southwest corner of Illinois Routes 38 and 25.

“I was a jumble of contradictory feelings,” Giannini said. “I was uncertain of how I should feel.”

He had negative feelings about the building being torn down. He felt gratitude for being able to celebrate 59 years there and because the Shodeens let him stay until the end of August.

“The Shodeen guy was very good to me,” Giannini said about David Patzelt, president of the Shodeen Group.

“I was highly uncertain of how I should feel,” Giannini said. “These feelings were particularly strong in both directions.”

Another factor for Giannini is he is not a morning person. He said he did not sleep until after 6 a.m. that Monday and then he had to be on-site at 10:30 a.m.

“I stayed about five minutes and went home and went back to bed,” he said. “I’m a zombie in the ... morning.”

The Shodeen Family Foundation – as 4 Estate State Street Holdings LLC – bought the 1.4-acre former Mill Race Inn property at 4 E. State St. in 2014 for $550,000, property records show.

The .39 of an acre that Giannini owned on the corner was just the piece to make Shodeen’s purchase and redevelopment plans complete.

In 2016, Shodeen sought to buy the property.

Back then, Giannini was holding out, hoping to stay until he was 81 before the sale would go through.

“They need that corner,” Giannini said at the time. “It’s like a stone in their throat.”

Now they have that corner. And Giannini stayed until he was 84.

The Shodeen Group LLC – through another business entity it created, Wessel Court East LLC – bought 12 E. State St. from Giannini on April 8 for $1 million, property records show.

As to what will go into the area where the cycle and resale shops were, Patzelt couldn’t say in 2016 and can’t say now.

“At this point, nothing until there is a resolution on the stone remnant structure,” Patzelt said.

The “remnant structure” is a circa 1843 former blacksmith shop at 4 E. State St. that has historic landmark status.

Shodeen sought permission to demolish it – which is allowed as a last resort – but the Historic Preservation Commission and the City Council denied it.

The shop has been at the center of a series of public hearings in which the owners asserted it would be too expensive to repurpose it.

Preservationists allege the owners were not willing to try.

The city recently cited the owners for failing to maintain the exterior of the former blacksmith shop.

A hearing officer ordered the “building shall be made weather tight prior to next date” of Oct. 17, records show.