It has now been more than four months since the Victoria Street bridge over the Conestoga Parkway closed – and the project to demolish and rebuild the bridge isn’t quite at its halfway point.
The bridge closed in late January and was demolished at the end of February.
Work on the new bridge, which will be wider as part of the infrastructure for the new Highway 7 connecting Kitchener and Guelph, has been ongoing ever since. At last word, the new bridge was supposed to be open by the end of November.
Retailers and restaurant owners in the area immediately around the bridge say they had been bracing for big drops in their sales volume, and have largely received what they expected to.
K-W Surplus general manager Patrick Knechtel estimates that his sales are down by 25 per cent since the bridge closed. He was prepared for a slightly bigger drop.
“We’ve been lucky so far,” he says.
“We can’t really complain. We just hope that it’s done on time.”
Knechtel says his store has trimmed some of its hours, but hasn’t had to resort to any larger cutbacks. If nothing else, employees are kept busy answering the constant phone calls from people wondering how to get to the store, which sits within the closure zone.
Other customers – like Teresa Ziolkowski, who was visiting the store on Wednesday – say accessing businesses near the bridge becomes a simple enough task after a few visits.
“I don’t find it any big deal,” she says.
“You just gotta learn your way around.”
Across the street at Natural Sound, owner Paul Connolly reports a drop in sales of a little more than 15 per cent. It’s been worse in the last few weeks.
“It’s not catastrophic or anything,” he says.
Connolly says he’s been running more aggressive sales and promotions in an attempt to keep customers flowing. He’s not particularly angry about the losses, given he’s heard businesses on the other side of the bridge have it worse.
Mohammad Yanes says that’s been the case for his restaurant, Arabesque Café.
He says he had anticipated a drop in sales of 20 to 30 per cent, but is actually running about 40 per cent below his typical totals.
“We feel it every day,” he says.
“It’s too much for the business. Forty per cent means thousands of dollars.”
Yanes says smaller crowds are most noticeable at lunchtime – something he attributes to the closure of the nearby highway ramps making his less restaurant for people coming from other neighbourhoods.
The construction work is being carried out by the Ministry of Transportation of Ontario. The project cost has been pegged at $18.7 million.
With reporting by Natalie van Rooy
