Construction hurts stores

Several businesses in Bloomington have been hurt by recent road construction on West Kirkwood that has closed both lanes of traffic for the three blocks west of Rogers St. since the end of May. \nThe project is scheduled to be substantially completed by mid September, said Joyce Williams, a project manager for the Bloomington engineering department. \nIt is two weeks ahead of schedule, said David Tallent, owner of Restaurant Tallent, a business next to the construction. Workers have already replaced the old utilities. Next they will repave the road and make new sidewalks.\nThe goal of the project is to "try to improve the looks of the street," Williams said.\nThe businesses, meanwhile, have lost all drive by traffic. \n"The people that ... step in on whim, we've lost all of that," said Matt Murphy, owner of Four Square Antiques and Architectural Salvage.\nThe antique store can rely on their regular customers to find their store since they have been in business for six years, but even with those loyal customers, business is down.\n"You might say we have had a lot of bad days," said Margie VanAuken, an employee at Four Square Antiques.\nNewer businesses like Tim Terry's Jewelry and Fine Antiques have been hit harder because it hasn't built up as large of a loyal following in its one and a half years of business.\nThe business was building momentum before the construction started, said Ladi Terry, wife of Tim Terry. But, business has slowed down so much that next time they go away they are just going to close the store temporarily instead of hiring someone to work while they are gone.\nLadi Terry thinks that the city should help assist businesses more by making efforts like offering them newspaper advertising because businesses need to buy extra advertising to make up for lack of drive-by customers.\n"The city should help out," Ladi Terry said. "It shouldn't be up to each individual business."\nThe city put up street signs, but the only signs for businesses on the south side of the street are on Fourth St., which does not get much traffic.\nA large sign on the corner of Rogers and Kirkwood, a high traffic area, is only for the businesses on the north side of the street.\nLadi Terry has tried to get this fixed by calling a couple city officials, but nothing has been done to fix the problem.\nTo get to Four Square Antiques, a driver must go down Fourth St. turn into an apartment building parking lot and then go through a very narrow alley. \nNot all businesses have been negatively affected by the construction. Restaurant Tallent, which is on the north side of the street, lost some business in the first couple of weeks, but after people figured out how to get there business is back to normal, said David Tallent.\n"The construction hasn't been all that bad for us," he said.\nOverall he says it is a good thing. They are going to cut down two rotting trees in front of his restaurant and replace those with 20 trees in a three block span, he said.\nNoise has also been a problem for some residents and \nbusinesses.\nSleeping after 7 a.m. has been hard for Junior Tess Hannah since that is when the work begins every morning.\n"It shakes the whole house. Construction workers are yelling ... I've kinda got it used to it though," Hannah said.\nEven with all the trouble it has caused, the project was still needed, Gallagher said.\n"The infrastructure was falling apart. What they're doing had to be done," he said.\nEven some businesses losing some business right now think it could help them out in the \nfuture.\n"I think it will be beautiful when it is done," VanAuken said.