The big screen at the Cottage View, one of the metro's two remaining drive-in theaters, will show movies this summer despite earlier predictions that it would go dark.

"We never looked very far into the future because we know the time is coming sooner or later," landowner Gerry Herringer said of the Cottage View, which opened in Cottage Grove in 1966. "We keep patching it up and we'll try to get another year out of it."

The Cottage View's fate was uncertain last fall when a developer told city officials he wanted to build a 500,000-square-foot shopping district that would include Herringer's land. However, the developer, PariPassu Cos. of Minneapolis, has yet to submit a formal proposal, said Howard Blin, Cottage Grove's community development director.

Meanwhile, the Vali-Hi Drive-In in Lake Elmo along Interstate 94 reopened for the season last weekend and appears under no threat of redevelopment, said Manager Joe Murr. "If it had been on the Woodbury side [of the interstate] it might be eaten up," he said.

Woodbury has extensive retail development along I-94, while most of the Lake Elmo side remains rural. Murr said the Vali-Hi land isn't for sale.

Urban sprawl and low profits killed most of Minnesota's dozens of drive-in theaters in the 1970s. Only six remain statewide. One of them is the Sky Vu in the northwestern Minnesota town of Warren. "We're getting a big draw," said owner Leonard Novak, reflecting on his best season ever last summer. "The older people are showing their grandkids what they used to do," said Novak, whose customers come from a wide area.

Another remaining drive-in, the Long in Long Prairie, has stayed opened continuously since 1956, said Laurel Meier, who owns the theater with her husband Cliff. They've seen a resurgence of interest, she said, in "just that old-time atmosphere of outdoor movies."

Herringer has been trying for years to sell the 94-acre Cottage View, which Mann Theatres Inc. of Bloomington now leases.

"In other parts of the country, drive-ins are prospering," said Steve Mann of Mann Theatres. The showings at the Cottage View are profitable, he said, and the 850-car drive-in often fills up on Saturday nights in the summer. "It comes down to property values," he said, describing how the acreage needed for drive-in theaters becomes valuable to developers wanting to build retail stores and other projects.

Like the Vali-Hi, the Cottage View also opened last weekend. Both theaters debuted in 1966.

Herringer said the Cottage View was a "modestly effective location" in a once-rural location, but that fewer family-sized cars and daylight savings time, among other influences, made the drive-in theater less of a destination.

Cottage Grove city officials have been seeking more retail development to stem the loss of shopping dollars to nearby Woodbury but haven't taken a position on the PariPassu proposal. The 4,000-acre East Ravine district -- which includes the Cottage View land -- is the last significant parcel of commercial land available near Hwy. 61.

Blin said that city action on the PariPassu proposal could be a year or two away. "For a project of this size, [it will be] months in review," he said.

Meanwhile, business is good at the Vali-Hi, said Murr, who's worked there since 1978. "We do real well. We need good movies and good weather, that's the key to it right there."

Murr said the Vali-Hi appeals to teenagers, college students and families depending on the movie selection. The theater opened last weekend with three movies, all PG-13.

Kevin Giles • 651-298-1554