At the heart of downtown Rowlett, a new brewpub combines food, history and local beer to bring you a taste of community pride that’s just a short walk away from DART’s Downtown Rowlett Station. You can experience more than a happy hour as you take the Blue Line to Bankhead Brewing Co., where salt and pepper calamari, brown sugar pizza, American Brown Ale and Munich Helles Lager entice visitors to stick around for a while. In September 2016, award-winning homebrewer, Ryan Pyle, and Zanata restaurant owner, Kevin Lefere, co-founded the brewery, which stands on Main Street in downtown Rowlett, the old route of the Bankhead highway. “We wanted to offer people a place where they can bring their friends and family and be proud,” Lefere said. “It’s kind of that cheers mentality. That sense of community is very important.” On a nice day, you can sit outside the restaurant’s patio, which offers seating for 150 people, and have a direct view of DART’s Downtown Rowlett Station. Having the restaurant located near DART rail “was certainly part of the business plan,” Pyle said. New developments near DART stations, such as Bankhead Brewing Co. in Rowlett, continue to add billions of dollars to North Texas’ economy and have put more than 43,000 people to work in the past two years. A recent study from the Economics Research Group at the University of North Texas reflects this data and had North Texas leaders, such as Rowlett Mayor Todd Gottel, praising DART’s economic impact. Locating the brewery next to DART’s rail station has opened doors for the brewpub. As some restaurants find the early evening window to be a hit or miss for bringing people in, the case is different at Bankhead Brewing Co., Lefere said. “We have noticed a huge influx of people from 4-6 p.m.,” he said. “We can look at the numbers and tell they’re directly from DART.”

At the heart of downtown Rowlett, a new brewpub combines food, history and local beer to bring you a taste of community pride that’s just a short walk away from DART’s Downtown Rowlett Station. You can experience more than a happy hour as you take the Blue Line to Bankhead Brewing Co., where salt and pepper calamari, brown sugar pizza, American Brown Ale and Munich Helles Lager entice visitors to stick around for a while. In September 2016, award-winning homebrewer, Ryan Pyle, and Zanata restaurant owner, Kevin Lefere, co-founded the brewery, which stands on Main Street in downtown Rowlett, the old route of the Bankhead highway. “We wanted to offer people a place where they can bring their friends and family and be proud,” Lefere said. “It’s kind of that cheers mentality. That sense of community is very important.” On a nice day, you can sit outside the restaurant’s patio, which offers seating for 150 people, and have a direct view of DART’s Downtown Rowlett Station. Having the restaurant located near DART rail “was certainly part of the business plan,” Pyle said. New developments near DART stations, such as Bankhead Brewing Co. in Rowlett, continue to add billions of dollars to North Texas’ economy and have put more than 43,000 people to work in the past two years. A recent study from the Economics Research Group at the University of North Texas reflects this data and had North Texas leaders, such as Rowlett Mayor Todd Gottel, praising DART’s economic impact. Locating the brewery next to DART’s rail station has opened doors for the brewpub. As some restaurants find the early evening window to be a hit or miss for bringing people in, the case is different at Bankhead Brewing Co., Lefere said. “We have noticed a huge influx of people from 4-6 p.m.,” he said. “We can look at the numbers and tell they’re directly from DART.”

At the heart of downtown Rowlett, a new brewpub combines food, history and local beer to bring you a taste of community pride that’s just a short walk away from DART’s Downtown Rowlett Station. You can experience more than a happy hour as you take the Blue Line to Bankhead Brewing Co., where salt and pepper calamari, brown sugar pizza, American Brown Ale and Munich Helles Lager entice visitors to stick around for a while. In September 2016, award-winning homebrewer, Ryan Pyle, and Zanata restaurant owner, Kevin Lefere, co-founded the brewery, which stands on Main Street in downtown Rowlett, the old route of the Bankhead highway. “We wanted to offer people a place where they can bring their friends and family and be proud,” Lefere said. “It’s kind of that cheers mentality. That sense of community is very important.” On a nice day, you can sit outside the restaurant’s patio, which offers seating for 150 people, and have a direct view of DART’s Downtown Rowlett Station. Having the restaurant located near DART rail “was certainly part of the business plan,” Pyle said. New developments near DART stations, such as Bankhead Brewing Co. in Rowlett, continue to add billions of dollars to North Texas’ economy and have put more than 43,000 people to work in the past two years. A recent study from the Economics Research Group at the University of North Texas reflects this data and had North Texas leaders, such as Rowlett Mayor Todd Gottel, praising DART’s economic impact. Locating the brewery next to DART’s rail station has opened doors for the brewpub. As some restaurants find the early evening window to be a hit or miss for bringing people in, the case is different at Bankhead Brewing Co., Lefere said. “We have noticed a huge influx of people from 4-6 p.m.,” he said. “We can look at the numbers and tell they’re directly from DART.”