Some thoughts on my new 'hood (Ericsson)... I live about halfway between two decent commercial nodes: 28th Av & 42nd St, and 34th Av & 50th St (boy it would be nice if those north-south arterials had names instead of numbers...) As the crow flies, I'm closer to 28th Av & 42nd, but I actually live on 34th Av and my commute takes me past 34th & 50th every day, so I patronize that area a lot more. (Also 34th & 50th is actually south of Ericsson, and is considered East Nokomis)
34th Av & 50th is already one of the most useful/practical nodes in the entire city: a nice grocery store (Oxendales), liquor store, ~4 restaurants (one of them being Town Hall Lanes), Post Office, 2 major bank branches, multiple barbers, shoe store, small hardware store (at 52nd), a gas station (SA), and too many car repair shops. The basics are all here. A couple more restaurant options would be nice, but between Al Vento, Sassy Spoon, Town Hall, and Dominguez, that's a pretty nice little variety. There's another mini-node at 54th St with a breakfast joint, used book store, corner store, and a tire shop (in a nice, newer building FWIW). There's not much you can't do on 34th Av between 50th and 54th. One obvious area for improvement would be a rebuilt street with boulevard trees. There's not a single tree for over a block & a half, between US Bank and about 51st Street.
28th Av & 42nd St is a much smaller node, but it has some good stuff too, including Busters, A Bakers Wife, Angry Catfish, Bill's Garden Chinese, a barber, and a gift shop. Stretching east on 42nd, there are two convenience stores (Dokken's and Flag), a pet clinic, and a nice big Hudson's True Value Hardware Store. They actually carry a pretty full line for a neighborhood hardware store, in contrast to some of the tiny old hardware stores you find around the city (Bryant Hardware, etc.) I'm going to be spending a lot of time & money at Hudson's Hardware. Further east at 31st Av, there's Chris & Rob's Chicago Taste Authority, which has (overpriced) hot dogs & (surprisingly) some decent tap beer. This is technically the closest place I could go eat...I just wish the Chicago dogs weren't damn near $5.
Oh, and I have to mention Sunrise Inn, which is just two blocks down 34th Ave from me. I haven't been in there, and don't know if I ever will. It looks pretty sketchy, but how sketchy can a place be that only sells 3.2 beer? Yes, that's right,
Sunrise Inn is a 3.2 bar. That's (still) a thing, apparently.
So what's missing? COFFEE!! There are zero proper coffee shops at either of these business nodes, or frankly anywhere else in the neighborhood (other than Nokomis Beach Cafe, but that's way over at 28th Av & 50th St, which is not near me or either of these nodes.) There's the two donut shops (Bakers Wife and Mel-O-Glaze), the latter of which has some seating if you wanted to hang, but the coffee menu is almost certainly limited and/or mediocre. There's Angry Catfish, which is primarily an upscale bicycle store that also sells coffee and co-brands itself as a cafe. But not many people are going to hang out there and drink coffee, especially if they're not into "bike culture". I'd go in and get a cup by myself, but I wouldn't feel comfortable doing homework or reading for 2 hours. And my gf probably wouldn't go there at all, because it's a damn bike store, not a proper coffee shop. It's pretty ridiculous there's no coffee shop anywhere on 34th Av, between 42nd and 50th Streets. 46th St Station would seem an obvious choice to serve commuters & nearby residents, but something on 34th would be better. A coffee shop next to (or in place of) Sunrise Inn would be pretty awesome.