It’s not only Irish eyes that are misty on Columbus Avenue, where the beloved Emerald Inn will close its doors next May after 66 years.
The landlord is more than doubling the rent to $350,000 a year for the cozy, 800-square- foot saloon at 205 Columbus near 69th Street – and owner Charlie Campbell, 48, says he can’t afford it. “I was very upset when I found out. Our customers are upset. We never missed our rent,” said Campbell.
His family has run the spot since Franklin D. Roosevelt was president. But he said he only got the bad news when he saw the location advertised for lease on the Web site of real estate brokerage CB Richard Ellis.
The Emerald Inn was launched by his grandfather in 1943. His father took over in the 1950s, and Charlie has been in charge for the past 10 years.
The cozy inn, with a few booths and faded pictures on the walls, was once well known as a “beer and a shot” joint.
In the mid-1980s, Columbus Avenue was a rough stretch of blue-collar taverns, bodegas and hardware stores, with few of today’s high-end boutiques and beaneries.
But the Upper West Side’s whirlwind gentrification changed everything, and the Emerald Inn today draws mostly upscale customers.
Among them yesterday was Michael Morfit, 46, a partner in Lighthouse Financial, who said he comes in twice a week.
“We used to have all these ma-and-pa shops,” Morfit lamented over a couple of Buds.
“Now all you have is big companies like Circuit City and Best Buy, because smaller companies can’t afford the rents.”
Landlord Gale Garlik referred The Post to the building’s managing agent, A.J. Clarke, where no one could be reached.
scuozzo@nypost.com