That area around 16th and J is great. Ton of places to walk to.
I walked by Parlare last weekend and took a peek inside, still a lot of work to do.
It says they are going to be open in Feb, but I highly doubt that. Slick looking place though. Right along the line like you said of The Park.
Even though it's a chain, I'm really looking foward to McCormick and Schmick's. The Elks is such a cool old building, nice to see some life get put back into that building. Now if they can just put the nightclub back on the top two floors, that would be awesome.
SactownRob might have a problem with that though
Also, I heard the MARRS project is going to have another bar/club in it as well. Adding Bedlands and the new place to that corner is going to make it even crazier. That'll be 6 bars/clubs on like 2 blocks.