Muncie bars near BSU: One closing, one uncertain

The owners of the Locker Room and Dill Street Bar & Grill, both located along University Avenue, did not return messages left this week by The Star Press. Dill Street was closed and dark Monday and Tuesday evenings. And the staff at the Locker Room confirmed that New Year’s Eve was the bar’s last night, as did a sign inside the bar.

It can be hard to gauge the status of Village businesses during Christmas break, when bars are not filled with Ball State students. But rumors about the bars had circulated on social media in recent days.

Dill Street owner Phil Wills — who in 2013 relocated his longtime bar a block west after its old location was set to be razed for construction of the new Village Promenade apartments-and-commercial complex — did not return a call seeking comment from The Star Press this week. Dill Street’s phone number was disconnected.

Erica Wrightsman, identified by Locker Room employees as the bar’s owner, did not return a call seeking comment left at her workplace on Wednesday.

Tuesday night at the Locker Room, employees served a handful of customers and said they were told about the closing just last Friday.

The employees attributed the closing to lack of customers.