Biz feels pinch of ramped-up construction season

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This article was published 01/08/2023 (767 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

One of Winnipeg’s many summer road projects has taken a huge bite out of business for a local restaurant.

“It’s just a necessary evil. Obviously, road construction’s always good. It will make the city nicer, for sure. There’s (just) a price to pay for that,” said Ravi Ramberran, owner of Four Crowns Restaurant and Hotel on McPhillips Street.

Ramberran said the $1-million project to rehabilitate McPhillips started about a week ago and now makes it much more challenging for patrons to reach his restaurant, which led business to drop by about 70 per cent.

“I’ve got three entrances to our parking lot and two of them are pretty much blocked. With that construction there, there’s lineups down McPhillips now. People are not going to be coming to our place unless they have that extra time… during the day at least,” he said.

The business owner stressed he’s glad to see the city update its infrastructure, though he wishes daily construction hours could be extended.

“I wish we had 24-hour construction in the city, where those jobs would literally get done twice as fast but, for some reason, our city can’t seem to wrap their head around that,” said Ramberran.

For now, he sympathizes with his servers, whose tips have notably declined since much of the breakfast and lunch crowd has stopped coming.

“Our restaurant usually slows down a little bit in the summertime. Now it’s really slow. That’s a hard hit,” said Ramberran.

This year’s construction season is especially busy. The city budgeted $159 million for road repairs, which adds to projects that were extended into this year due to excessive rain in 2022, said Coun. Janice Lukes, chairwoman of council’s public works committee.

Lukes said she sympathizes with the seasonal hit some businesses endure due to construction but stressed the work is needed to repair Winnipeg’s aging infrastructure.

“We’re very, very fortunate to have all this money to be putting into the roads… The alternative is no construction and no repair money, no upgrading money. This is something we just have to do. It’s just ongoing maintenance,” she said.

Lukes said she is concerned about delays caused by so many projects being on the go at once, since these can wreak havoc with public transit schedules, bike lanes and sidewalks.

“The whole transportation network is impacted but it’s going to be beautiful (once the projects are completed),” she said.

The city expects to complete more than 200 road construction projects this year.

“For motorists, it’s another busy construction season with record investments in infrastructure,” said city spokesman Ken Allen. “We have a finite time to get the work done, (so) there are a lot of projects going on at the city at the same time. So, motorists, for the duration of this construction season, should expect delays due to the lane closures.”

While the city has explored 24-hour construction to speed up road work in the past, it found that change could create new challenges, such as reducing safety for workers after dark, increasing noise complaints, requiring more staff per project and potentially increasing costs.

“Where there is a specific benefit to the city and public, the city does require/permit a contractor to run a construction operation through the night. These (extended hours) are usually for a task that needs to be done in succession, very rapidly, and for a short period (for example: one or two days at a high-traffic intersection). The benefit must outweigh the risks and costs,” the city’s website states.

The city does list Saturdays as a working day on high-priority contracts to help speed them up, the site notes.

joyanne.pursaga@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @joyanne_pursaga