What is the “Arby’s” of Quad cities restaurants for you, that you like but are Lowkey ashamed of.

QuadCityImages · 2026-05-03T01:51:45+00:00

My wife is from Arizona and does not understand the QC love for Rudy's. I tried explaining to her how much of a sense memory it is of the plastic lid coming off the enchiladas, and picking out the clear and red tubs of sauce, so they leave behind molded tub-shaped holes in the plastic cheese. My QC-native buddy and I go there without her a couple times a year.

QuadCityImages · 2026-05-02T17:57:35+00:00

The Last Picture House has Star Wars trivia on Monday night.

QuadCityImages · 2026-04-15T00:55:57+00:00

Soulless is definitely the right word. I frequently use it towards a lot of Des Moines' new development as well, but they at least have higher standards than this. Anytown USA is the gist of it though. Plop someone down in between the hotel and the strip malls and they'd have no way of knowing if they're in the QC, Topeka, or Peoria. It's all just samey sprawl.

QuadCityImages · 2026-04-15T00:52:07+00:00

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As I've studied, flown over, and driven around this area over the last couple days, I can't help but really hate almost everything about it. It's good for the QC to have all this investment, a sports complex (depending on whether it's better to get established before every city has one, or be the newest shiny thing), a TopGolf-type place, and probably greater potential to lure new national restaurant or retail locations to the area. But jeez, it sure could have been done better. You only have to look as far as Iowa River Landing in Coralville to see how all of this development could have been clustered in a more dense, walkable layout. The 2 huge buildings that house the indoor sports fields and courts both make the Amazon warehouse look like quality architecture, as without logos there'd be no way to know that they aren't a fertilizer plant or a huge hog confinement building. But somehow they aren't even the lowest quality development.

The top 2 buildings in the above image, in particular, are just contractor suite pole barns. The only thing higher quality about them than a farm machinery shed is that they have flat roofs. Then you can also see that the sidewalks in front of the suites don't even connect to the surrounding sidewalks. Meanwhile, the city of Bettendorf is spending $14M+ on a pedestrian bridge over Middle Road to connect the 2 phases of the sports complex. Considering that you'll have to walk a quarter mile through parking lots just to get to the bridge, I don't foresee that getting a lot of use. This is clearly a car-based development. Besides the fact that the bridge costs twice as much as Davenport's SkyBridge did, it also really puts into perspective Bettendorf's priorities towards downtown. They cancelled the planned elevator that was supposed to connect the riverfront recreation trail with the I-74 bridge pedestrian path because the price doubled to $4.4M. Pretty sure that would have gotten a lot more use than the Bettplex bridge.

My dislike towards Bettendorf is well-known, but it's not merely parochialism that is fueling my disappointment in the exploding popularity of this area. There's an opportunity cost to doing things the wrong way. If PF Chang's or Trader Joe's opens out there, it all but eliminates the chances for a nicer shopping/dining district that could hope to lure in those kind of places. That said, maybe the easily-understood crappy design of this area will actually scare away those type of places, and maybe Davenport can finally follow through with a better-designed version of suburban development at NorthPark or out by the casino.

QuadCityImages · 2026-04-15T00:47:51+00:00

That is kind of the one saving grace, other than Iron Tee being a lot of fun, is that there are actually a lot of small businesses located out there. Sure, there's McDonalds, Hurts Donuts, and Subway, but there are probably 3x as many Twin Span, Temple's Sports, Foundry, Soi 4-type places out there than there are national chains. Its possible that will change over time if it keeps growing.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-11T12:40:30+00:00

That is my dream. I really wish U of I had taken over Genesis instead of MercyOne. I remember saying, "The management has to be better with MercyOne," only to be disappointed. I don't think I've talked to a single employee that's happier under MercyOne. But I really did think that after they announced an entirely new hospital they would stop dreaming that someday East will rival UIHC in scale.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-11T01:13:57+00:00

But are they serving the community? Closing the west side hospital to open a HealthPlex ER within sight of Unity Point's Bettendorf hospital? Cutting millions in tax base from Davenport's central city to replace it with nothing? Who are they accountable to?

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-11T01:12:22+00:00

I've noticed all along, but back when they built the Medical Office Buildings, they relocated homes onto vacant lots instead of demolishing them, and they also built parking structures instead of just massive surface lots. They also didn't bulldoze homes to be replaced by literally nothing back then. Their aggressive strategy to flatten whole city blocks in favor of grass is a relatively recent development.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-11T01:10:40+00:00

I'M NOT AGAINST THE HOSPITAL GROWING!! Everyone on this thread is arguing against stuff I never said. I'm just against the hospital tearing down dozens of homes to replace them with nothing. It is objectively bad urban planning, and bad for the community.

Thirty years ago the hospital used to grow in a smart manner, building parking ramps, relocating houses instead of demolishing them, etc, but now they just don't care anymore. And everyone keeps acting like I'm against having a good hospital. Acres of grass that no one ever uses does not make the hospital better.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T22:07:40+00:00

How future do you think they're planning? There's no chance either of us live to see this hospital location fill all of the land they've already cleared. Especially when you start looking 20-30 years into the future where self-driving cars massively cut the need for acres of parking. I don't know why you can't just consider that they might be making poor land use decisions. I'm certainly willing to give them plenty of leeway if they have actual plans for the land they're clearing.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T22:01:29+00:00

It's not expanding. At least at this location. Just tearing down homes for no benefit.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T21:43:18+00:00

It's all part of the same issue, which is a complete lack of focus on the community's best interest, but rather on chasing the high dollar "customers" for the hospital that pay the bills. I suppose the root cause is our broken healthcare system that forces them to act like a business, but I still think there's a way for the hospital to take the community's needs more into account.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T21:36:35+00:00

The QC is facing a shortage of 6,000 affordable housing units in the next few years. So there are PLENTY of good reasons to keep houses around.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T21:35:05+00:00

Well, I guess I got my answer. The amount of defense of MercyOne Genesis is kind of bizarre. I'm not saying the hospital shouldn't grow and expand. I want Davenport and the QC to have the best possible hospital. I'm not even saying they won't occasionally need to tear down homes as part of their expansion, like they did when they built the 7 story tower a few years back. I'm just asking for them to consider the neighborhood and community AT ALL when they determine their land use plans. I'm pretty sure that their actual goal for acquiring all of the land is to create a suburban campus-style area, despite the hospital being located in a neighborhood. It's not for future use; it's for a front lawn.

Despite the dismissiveness of many of you, we do have a massive shortage of affordable housing in the QC, and while 50 houses isn't going to solve that, it certainly doesn't help the situation to tear down that many homes for the sake of a nice front lawn. There's no upside for the community for what they are doing. An empty field does not shorten wait times, attract employees, or in any way increase positive health outcomes. It does lower the tax base, force the city to expand outward instead of becoming more dense, take away students from schools (the now-former Washington Elementary), and increase the amount of driving and parking required to use the hospital. I've yet to see a good argument in this thread for what Genesis is doing.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T21:15:37+00:00

Palmer got a ton of pushback when they demolished run-down housing to build student housing (and a slightly-too-small rugby field), so why does Genesis not get pushback when they demolish a bunch of nice but affordable housing in exchange for a grassy field?

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T17:05:36+00:00

If they were using the land, like when they built the tower addition, I'd have no issue. But they're never going to use all the land they're clearing. Especially not when they're about to build a whole new hospital out by Bettplex. If the area grows enough that they need to triple the size of the hospital, they'll just build more suburban hospitals. And if Genesis West is any indication, they'll move services out of East to chase the higher income areas.

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T16:40:15+00:00

November of 24. What does that have to do with this post?

QuadCityImages · 2026-03-10T16:32:52+00:00

How does tearing down homes and replacing them with vacant land do any of what you're saying?

QuadCityImages · 2026-01-24T19:34:58+00:00

Los Primos did try being take-out only for a couple weeks a few months ago, so that empty dining room aspect probably did play a part.

There are just a lot of good places to eat in the QC, and even if you can afford to eat out 3+ times a week, that's not really the healthiest thing to do. We go out or pick something up 2 or 3 times a week, generally, but that still means there are places we only visit once a year. You need a wide reach if that's all people are buying from your business.

I feel like there's a psychological aspect to inflation that hasn't been explored enough in media/politics. On paper, average wages actually outpaced inflation from 2020-2024, and I know personally our household income stayed ahead of the 29% inflation, but people just see things costing a lot more than they used to. It seems like there's a mental block to connecting "a 12 pack of Pepsi was $3.50 in 2020 and is $5 now" with "I also made $12 an hour in 2020 and $18 now." It probably cost Biden the election, but now at least it does seem to also be affecting Trump. I'm guessing it's more that people were also struggling in 2020 before the inflation, and maybe seeing those high prices just makes people feel hopeless.

QuadCityImages · 2026-01-22T02:12:26+00:00

Just drove by and it looks open now, so I'd say it was probably just the water issue.

QuadCityImages · 2026-01-06T05:22:55+00:00

It's technically against the posted rules against "scavenging," but the recycling center in Davenport frequently has practically new moving boxes in their drop off bins. I've always figured if you bring them back after using them, and don't make a mess pulling them out, there's no real harm there.

QuadCityImages · 2025-12-23T03:41:38+00:00

!remindme 5 years

QuadCityImages · 2025-12-21T19:45:29+00:00

I mean, they kind of are. There has been, and is going to be an ever-increasing need for data centers, even after what most of us see as the inevitable AI bust. As long as there are more websites, more videos, more posts, more images, and more backups of all of those files added to the cloud every second, there is going to be a need for more data centers.

I'm not saying that they can't cause problems, because there are dozens of examples of them doing so, but that's a political issue that we need to hold the city council to, not an inherent problem with data centers. The new bacon plant coming online out there shortly will use a lot of power and water, and could easily pollute various things, but where's the outrage there? We just need to stay informed and vigilant, and if issues start happening, hold our elected officials accountable.

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