Five Guys used to be in the storefront that now holds framed artwork. The same goes for the windows where Chakaa Tea Shoppe and Bath & Body Works once were. You'll see them on the walk from the Cinemark Century to Yard House, and that walk is now the main reason people come to The River at 71800 Highway 111.
The center opened in 2001, so it turns 25 this year. In October, the Coachella Valley Independent counted 19 empty spaces on the first floor and only four retail businesses. Everything else open was a restaurant or a place that sells an experience. The River has turned into a place for dining and entertainment, and the city's new plan for Highway 111 now describes it that way.
Twenty-Five Years, Sorted by Who Stayed
The River's history is easier to follow when you sort tenants by type. The shops left first. The places people visit for a night out mostly stayed, or were replaced by another one.
| Tenant | What happened | Category |
|---|---|---|
| Borders | Closed around 2011 | Retail |
| Acqua California Bistro | Closed 2014, returned 2017, closed again 2022 | Dining |
| Fleming's Prime Steakhouse | Closed 2020 after two decades; building still empty | Dining |
| Dave & Buster's | Took over the former Acqua space in 2023 | Entertainment |
| Babe's Bar-B-Que & Brewery | Moved to Indio about a year later, after 22 years; space still empty | Dining |
| Five Guys, Chakaa Tea Shoppe, Bath & Body Works | Gone; storefronts now show art | Quick service and retail |
| Cinemark Century | Still the core anchor | Entertainment |
| P.F. Chang's, Yard House, Ben & Jerry's, The Cheesecake Factory | Still open | Dining |
| Escape Games at the River | Open for a decade on the second floor | Entertainment |
The Independent reports that the property sold in 2014 to the company now known as Cheer Land The River. The owner has been looking for tenants ever since and at one point proposed adding a hotel to the site. The table shows the pattern. The restaurant losses hurt, but they happened one at a time, and the Acqua space is the clearest case of an entertainment tenant taking over where a restaurant left. Retail is the category that kept shrinking.
There have been newer arrivals too. NBC Palm Springs reported in November 2025 that Cheers Coffee had been open at The River since August 1. The center's own store directory lists Mirage Cigar Lounge, COCO LULU and Hats Unlimited, plus a Tesla Supercharge Station that turns a charging stop into time for a meal.
Why the Anchors Hold
You can see why when you look at what these tenants sell. A movie in a cool theater followed by dinner is something you can't do online, and it's a plan you make with friends. The Independent spoke with patrons in October. One called The Cheesecake Factory "kind of like the main spot right here." Another put it more directly: "The big anchor stores are just fine. It's just, like, the smaller businesses are kind of struggling."
The business with the best view of this is upstairs. The River's second floor is easy to miss, and Escape Games at the River has been there for ten years. Its rooms are set in a medieval dungeon, an ancient Egyptian tomb and the 1980s. It has done well enough to open a second location in La Quinta. Owner Charlie Sundahl told the Independent:
"The foot traffic is good at The River. The shops have dwindled in the last five years. There have been some businesses that come and have not stayed for very long. The movie theater and the big staple restaurants have been good for us. I would like the shops to fill back up, but it has not had an effect on our business."
Shop vacancies haven't cut into the experience businesses because people come for the movie and the meal, not for browsing. The anchors bring in the crowds, and businesses that depend on planned outings do well alongside them.
The Empty Windows Have a History
The art in those vacant storefronts isn't a recent stopgap. The Window Walk Gallery launched in September 2020 as a partnership between The River and the Riverside County Desert Behavioral Health Advisory Board, according to Coachella Valley Weekly. The center calls it "a semi-permanent pop-up installation." The current work comes from artists with mental-health diagnoses or artists who support mental-health awareness.
That gives the gallery six years of continuity, longer than some of the tenants that held those spaces. On a walk from the theater to dinner, it's a reason to slow down. It also fits the larger pattern at The River, where the empty spaces have been filled with something to experience instead of something to buy.
What the City's Highway 111 Plan Says About The River
This fall, Rancho Mirage moved on the most significant land-use update for its main road in decades. The proposed Highway 111 Specific Plan would replace separate plans for the western and eastern parts of the corridor, adopted in 1989 and 1990. It treats the roughly three miles from Cathedral City to Palm Desert as one corridor with 12 planning areas covering about 552 parcels. GPS Business Insider reported that the Planning Commission approved it at its October 22 hearing. The posted agenda for that hearing asked the commission to recommend the plan to the City Council, which makes the final decision.
The plan doesn't treat The River as a retail problem to fix. It would reinforce the center as "a shopping, dining and entertainment destination," with an emphasis on reinvestment, pedestrian circulation and places for people to gather. In other words, the plan leads with the role the movie-and-dinner crowd already gives the center. Several provisions apply directly to a night at The River:
- Shade and landscaping. The plan's design guidance covers shade, landscaping and how buildings relate to the street. A reader responding to the Independent's October story pointed out that the center has almost no shaded place to sit and people-watch.
- Shared parking. Neighboring businesses with different peak hours could have their parking evaluated together instead of one lot at a time. A theater and a lunch spot fit that description.
- Connections between properties. Access drives, crosswalks and transit links are all addressed. As GPS Business Insider put it, these details decide "whether customers can comfortably move between destinations or must return to their cars for each stop."
- Night-sky lighting. Lighting rules aim to limit glare and protect the desert night sky. That matters on a corridor that's also home to the Rancho Mirage Library and Observatory, which gets its own "Library Commons" planning area.
Across the highway, Rancho Las Palmas Shopping Center would join the same framework for the first time as the Las Palmas planning area. Its goals are tenant mix, visibility, shade, landscaping and parking, while keeping its role as a neighborhood center. With both centers on Highway 111 under one set of rules, the corridor would be planned as one connected stretch.
Treat the big numbers with care. The plan estimates the corridor could hold 862 additional homes and about 895,000 square feet of additional commercial space, on top of today's estimated 430 homes and 1.82 million square feet. GPS Business Insider describes those figures as capacity under the plan, not approved projects or a forecast. Financing, demand and individual project reviews will decide what actually gets built.
Reinvestment Is Already Arriving on the Corridor
One project shows what the plan is meant to encourage. The Capital Grille is under construction at 71959 Highway 111, the former Roy's location, and was hiring managers and chefs this fall. A company spokesperson told GPS Business Insider in September that the restaurant should open by spring 2027. The project began before the plan, but the publication called it an example of the reinvestment in established properties that the city wants to see. A new steakhouse on Highway 111 also partly restores what the corridor lost when Fleming's closed at The River in 2020.
Spring 2027 is a busy target date for Rancho Mirage in general. Disney's current Cotino Bay page also projects a spring 2027 public opening for its waterfront town center. In October 2025, DapsMagic reported that the first phase was scheduled for fall 2026. Both projects add to the city's dining options in the same season, which is one more reason the plan's focus on making The River a place people want to stay a while makes sense.
This Season at The River
For now, the center works the way it has for years. Catch a film at the Cinemark Century, then eat at Yard House, The Cheesecake Factory or P.F. Chang's. Bring a group to Escape Games upstairs, or stop at Ben & Jerry's on the walk back to the car. The Window Walk Gallery is in the empty storefronts along the way. The River also hosts concerts, an annual Christmas tree lighting and a Chanukah celebration. This year's dates are best confirmed on the center's events page or its Facebook and Instagram accounts as December gets closer.
For Highway 111, the next step is the City Council's review of the Specific Plan.
The Highway 111 corridor shapes daily life in Rancho Mirage, from Friday movie nights to the restaurants coming in spring 2027. If you want to talk through what these changes mean for your part of town, Team Armstrong is glad to share what we're seeing up and down the valley. Contact us anytime.
