Posted on 12/10/2017 10:17:53 AM PST by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
GATE CITY — As construction on the Route 23 bridges in Weber City continues, one small business owner has voiced concerns about the effect it’s having on her profits.
Mary Murphy, owner of Gold & Guns in Weber City, told the Scott County Board of Supervisors on Wednesday that her business has declined noticeably over the past year or so.
Though she attributes some of that decline to the lingering effects of the last recession, she believes the construction — and its estimated completion time of summer 2019 — is the main problem.
“I do believe that summer of 2019 is quite ridiculous,” Murphy told the board. “There are a couple businesses that have already closed on that stretch of (Route) 23, and I am struggling. … Also, if I’m in trouble, there are other businesses that are in trouble.”
The problem
The construction project will replace the current Route 23 bridges over the North Fork of the Holston River, according to VDOT’s website. The bridges, one built in the 1940s and the other in the 1960s, “have reached their lifespan and are ready for replacement,” the website states.
Traffic has been reduced to one lane in each direction, and access to and from businesses on the side of the highway — including Murphy’s — has been made more difficult.
Murphy, who also lives in Weber City, said her business and the other small businesses in that area have a big impact on the county’s economy, and she asked board members to help her find a solution to the problem.
“My little business may not seem like much, but I believe that Scott County would feel my loss,” Murphy said. “I do 95 percent of my shopping in Scott County for my home and my farm. If I have to go to Kingsport to get a job, that will change, just because it will be easier and I will not fight the traffic on the bridge if I don’t have to.”
VDOT’s response
Allan Sumpter, a representative from VDOT’s Bristol district, was present at Wednesday’s BOS meeting and responded to Murphy’s concerns. Though he said he couldn’t do anything to speed up the construction himself, he promised to pass her concerns along to the district construction engineer, who helps administer the project.
“I do know from the engineering perspective of it, it is a very complicated project,” Sumpter said, “and when we have projects that are dealing with that much traffic, they’re a challenge to maintain the traffic. … It’s a very inconvenient spot for a bridge project, but it’s a necessity that it be done.”
The board’s response
Board members Jack Compton, Danny Mann and Chairman David Redwine agreed that the bridge construction has been frustrating, but said they had limited power to change the situation.
In the meantime, board members promised to help Murphy and the other small business owners explore other options to help them get through the construction process.
“We don’t expect you’re going to get wealthy between now and summer of ’19,” Redwine told Murphy, “but we’d like you to stay, and we’ll help you any way we can.”
Mind you, three years before, the project had released a timeline, they had plans, planning meetings, and offered to work with businesses to mitigate the problems that would come.
With traffic reduced to a single lane, cars were crawling by the store, and we took every advantage of that crawl to entice them to come visit. We had to have given away thousands of cups of coffee and tea, to give them a ‘break’ from their travel (and get them into our store.)
Those three months of heavy construction were our most profitable months. The hair salon next door which hardly was ever open walked away with a check for $5,000 for the ‘impact’ the construction had on their business, for simply filling out a form.
If you deducted the effort we put into it, and assigned a retail value to those coffees, probably would have been equally cost effective to just fill out a form and demand a check. Guess those are the two options in life; address and overcome adversity, or simply wait for the government to deliver you a check for nothing.
My father and uncle owned a gas station in the 1950s. While they owned it the city built a railroad under pass over the in the middle of the block on state highway which the gas station was sitting.
They went out of business because of the disrupted traffic flow.
I wouldn’t think that a gun store would be as much effected as a gas station and the traffic has not be totally detoured as it was with the underpass.
But never the less such projects have a big impact on the businesses located close by. A lot of people will not want to deal with the traffic or want to go very far out of their way and there is really not much the local government can do about it. The only way the project could be shortened is if the state is willing to foot the bill for round the clock work.
Usually the state will only pay for continuous work is for freeway construction that impact major cities.
She saw it coming down on her like an asphalt roller....geez
Along with the construction disruption comes the ‘non-construction’ disruption, streets blocked off needlessly for days and weeks while no one is working there.
Government holds the general public in contempt.
Too bad she isn’t an LGBT baker.
**I wouldn’t think that a gun store would be as much effected as a gas station***
I remember pre-1968 when you could buy guns and gas at the same place. Cash and carry.
I don’t see why you couldn’t today.
Except that most gas stations today sell booze. At least in my state they frown of that combination of booze and guns. You have to choose one or the other.
But in a town near me there was a grocery store that had a gun store that you accessed from inside the grocery store. Technically not the same establishment but owned by the same people.
I was sorry to hear this past year that the gun store that had been there for decades had closed.
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