by Mary Rupert
Businesses on Leavenworth Road from 55th to 59th Street will be trying to let their customers know they are still in business when the road is closed for two weeks from April 2 to 17.
“I’m sure it’s going to affect us here, but hopefully our customers will have a detour and will find a way to get here, because we’ll have some great bargains,” said O.J. Shipman of Happy Foods North, 5420 Leavenworth Road.
The grocery store is on the northeast corner of 55th and Leavenworth Road, in an area that will be open to traffic from the east and south, and customers who are coming from the west will have to take a detour.
Storm sewer construction will take place during the two-week period, and Leavenworth Road from 59th to 55th will be closed to through traffic, according to the UG newsletter. There will be access for homes and for businesses, but through traffic should use the detour, according to the newsletter.
The detour diverts traffic to Parallel Parkway and then back to Leavenworth Road.
Shipman said they will try to post the Unified Government’s detour map online on their website, and also at the store. Probably not everyone will need a detour map, he agreed, with some customers taking Georgia Avenue instead.
“People that are local in the area know all the different back roads to cut through,” Shipman said.
“It’s been challenging already on Leavenworth Road, hopefully our customers will be patient with us and live through it,” Shipman said.
Access is important for retail businesses and restaurants. In a grocery store business like his, you can’t get by on five or 10 customers a day, he noted. They need lots of customers in order to make payments, wages and utilities.
According to Lou Braswell, executive director of the Leavenworth Road Association, merchants in the four-block area weren’t notified of the exact date of the two-week closure until this past Monday, and some thought they should have had more advance warning. Originally, they received a message that the road might be closed sometime in March, she said.
Electronic signs have been posted at 71st and 47th alerting motorists of the closure.
Some of the businesses between 55th and 59th are Sonic Drive-in restaurant at 5545 Leavenworth Road and Mama Lily’s at 5512 Leavenworth Road. Another restaurant, Church’s Chicken, 5501 Leavenworth Road, is on the southwest side of 55th and Leavenworth Road, and has access to 55th. There are also service stations in the five-block area.
Sunset Plaza is on the west side of the 59th Street closure, where Leavenworth Road will be open.
“I tell the merchants, just smile and put your stress smile on, and remember we’ve waited a long time for Leavenworth Road to be updated, like Parallel and State,” Braswell said. “You take the good with the bad and it’s going to get better.”
Most of the Leavenworth Road construction project should be completed by September 2019 or several months before then if there is good weather, according to the UG newsletter.
