Road construction in the city puts strain on business owners | News, Sports, Jobs

Peter Weinreich, franchisee of the 7-Eleven convenience store at 321 Hazeltine Avenue, is furious about the losses his business has suffered over the past two months due to road construction in front of his store. The road construction began on June 27 and is scheduled to be completed by the end of August.

“Since they (the city’s public works department) closed the road, our store sales have dropped by a little over $100,000,” he said. “They closed 66 percent of the streets leading to the stores, left the smallest street open and put up a road closure sign at the end. People have told me they thought all the stores were closed because of the signs.”

A June 25 Post-Journal article said the road project would create a T-shaped intersection instead of the familiar Y-shaped intersection near Persell Middle School.

“When you come into town from Baker Street and turn onto Hazeltine, there’s a big, wide-radius curve there,” said Mark Roetzer Jr., deputy director of the Jamestown Department of Public Works. “We’re making a curve in that street, narrowing the intersection and creating a T-intersection, so people turning onto Hazeltine from Baker Street have to slow down to make that curve.”

The city’s road construction has hindered and stunted the growth of the 7-Eleven franchise store at 321 Hazeltine Ave. Store owner Peter Weinreich blames the city for closing most of the roads leading to the store, claiming inadequate signage makes people think his store is closed. PJ photo by Christopher Blakeslee

The project was designed by engineers from the city’s Department of Public Works and is funded by Chautauqua County. DPW and city public works crews will perform utility work for about two weeks before Lakeshore Paving crews begin digging up the road. During construction, access to Bergman Park will be available via Cityview Avenue, something Mayor Kim Ecklund emphasized because the park hosts baseball games in the summer and the World Series of Wheels auto show, as well as the city’s annual Labor Day Festival at the end of the summer.

Weinreich emphasized, however, that his company has seen growth year after year – until now.

“I’ve been here almost five and a half years and my business is growing month after month and year after year,” he said. “In the first six days of this month we’ve already lost $19,000. If you look at February, March, April and May, we’re up on last year. It wasn’t until the road construction started that we went down.”

Weinreich explained that he has already had to reduce his employees’ working hours to make ends meet, and that even deeper cuts may be ahead.

“I don’t want to say we should lay off people, but I had to cut employees’ working hours,” he said.

At his 7-Eleven store at 321 Hazeltine Avenue, franchisee Peter Weinreich expressed his extreme displeasure at the amount of money the roadworks at Hazeltine Avenue and Baker Street are costing him. PJ photo by Christopher Blakeslee

Weinrich said his business did more than $3 million in sales last year and he had to add extra staff to every shift, but this year, more specifically, he’s had to reduce his employees’ hours since construction began.

“I don’t know if my business can survive this,” he said.

Michael Zabrodsky contributed to this report.