Council Approves Freight House's Request to Expand Caboose Bar and Kitchen

The Freight House Restaurant’s Caboose bar and kitchen will undergo an expansion this spring.

The Stillwater City Council last month unanimously approved a special use permit for the Freight House to expand its existing Caboose bar and patio food service areas.

The expansion will include a new roof over the bar area on the south side of the Caboose, which will have a pitch similar to the existing Freight House building. A second, smaller roof addition will be expanded over a food-ordering counter.

The expansion will be built to include a metal standing-seam roof, exposed-wood beams and corrugated-metal skirting around the bar.

Lighting changes will be a part of the roof elements over the bar and food counter with light fixtures in the roof structure projecting down on the bar for direct light or up off the ceiling for indirect lighting.

The general lighting and sound system configurations will remain the same.

In 1987, a special use permit was issued for a new deck and Caboose patio allowing for 80 tables and 320 seats. In 1996, the city issued a special use permit for the construction of a small kitchen addition on the Caboose bar.

The Caboose patio currently has 20 tables that seat about 70 people. With the new expansion, the Caboose patio will actually lose 10 seats on the patio.

There will be 18 two-top tables, two four-top tables and 15 seats around the bar.

The Freight House building, constructed in 1882 originally as the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul passenger and freight depot, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Both the Heritage Preservation Committee and Planning Commission recommended that the council approve the proposal.