A train-themed cocktail bar named Boxcar is slated to open on Greenville Avenue near SMU Boulevard in Dallas.
Boxcar was already shaped like a train — it’s a long and skinny space, a scant 1,000 square feet from front to back. Co-owner Jordan Carson and two partners are designing it to look like customers are sitting inside a train car.
Carson explains: “The TVs are built out to be like windows, and there will be curtains on them,” he said. More fun, still, the chandeliers are going to move, to make it feel like the train is rocking.
Carson co-owns Christies, the longtime Dallas sports bar that moved from McKinney to Greenville avenues a few years ago. He opened a new bar called Dudley’s Sports Grill in Rockwall in May 2024. (Why? Carson’s great-grandfather moved to Rockwall in the 1930s, and he and Carson share the middle name Dudley.)
Carson co-owns Dudley’s and Boxcar with Patrick Gorman, past owner of Ill Minster Pub in Dallas.
At Boxcar, Carson brought on two bartenders as co-owners. Allen “Scotty” Scott and Carlos Angel have worked at Dallas bars Parliament, Standard Pour, Double D’s and Tiny Victories.
Boxcar will serve “wild” cocktails, Carson said. One of the drinks Scott and Angel are working on is a clarified piña colada.
“It looks like water,” Carson said, “but it tastes exactly like a piña colada.”
Clarified cocktails are a trend in Dallas. At Little Daisy in downtown Dallas, the Clearly Skinny is a clear margarita with no added sugar. At Bar Colette in West Village, barman Rubén Rolón has three clarified milk punches on the menu now.
Boxcar will feel mostly like a bar, but it will have a small food selection. The eight or so items haven’t been set yet.
Carson’s team is racing against the clock to convert the sliver of a space from a washateria into a bar. He hopes to open Boxcar in about two months.
Boxcar will be at 4509 Greenville Ave., Suite B, Dallas.
