Chicago Pizza re-opened its restaurant at The Landing on Oct. 5 after being closed for more than a month following the mass shooting that left three people dead, including the alleged gunman.

Traian Marginean was one of the first customers to walk inside Chicago Pizza after their doors opened.

“Jacksonville has been getting a bad rap from all the crime that has been going on, and the shooting was definitely not a good step in the right direction,” Marginean said. “The re-opening will help the community from a business standpoint and Jacksonville as a whole.”

Chicago Pizza is just not an ordinary place to grab a pizza pie. The restaurant is a unique place where customers can go to enjoy pizza and video gaming.

Good Luck, Have Fun or (GLHF) is a popular term in the gaming industry and is also the name given to Jacksonville’s first game bar. Chicago Pizza and the GLHF Game Bar are co-joined. GLHF offers its customers PC and console games, televisions to streamline events and food, and alcohol choices.

“The concept was computers, consoles and a place to sit down and also eat pizza,” Marginean explained. “People would stay there for hours and I thought it was a very interesting concept.”

Marginean, who has been a customer at the gaming bar since January 2017, remembers vividly how he and some friends were at the bar only one week before the shooting. They learned that gaming officials were recruiting for commentators for the Madden tournament that was to be held the following week.

As chance would have it, he was already obligated to work that weekend as a referee elsewhere. On Sunday, Aug. 26, he finished work refereeing and started back toward Osprey Cove. As he was driving, he received a call from a friend who informed him of the shooting.

“I thought this would be the very last place that something like this would happen,” Marginean said. “I mean, what business does anyone have bringing a gun to a video game tournament?”

After the shooting, Marginean was determined to return to Chicago Pizza as a gamer and representative of the Jacksonville community. On the day of the re-opening, he headed to The Landing. The doors were not yet open at first, but he could see workers and some of the changes by peering through a window.

“There are few businesses I support, so I decided to go back there in support of those lost in support of our community,” Marginean affirmed.

Marginean said that, although this was not a life-altering event for him personally, he is more conscious and appreciative of the life he lives and of the great people he calls family and friends as a result.

—

For more information or news tips, or if you see an error in this story or have any compliments or concerns, contact editor@unfspinnaker.com.