'A big blessing': Some Calgary business owners happy to see customers come back

Water main work closes parking lot, river paths The city is closing a parking lot and the pathway system along the Bow River over the weekend as water main work continues.

On Wednesday evening, the barricades along 16 Avenue N.W. started coming down and, by Thursday morning, traffic had reopened between Home Road and 43 Street N.W.

At the eastern edge of Montgomery, construction crews were putting the finishing touches on the road before it's expected it will fully reopen.

In her morning address, Mayor Jyoti Gondek said that will happen by Friday.

"The repaving work is mostly done. It's missing about two inches off the top of the pavement, but it is in good enough shape to open 16 Avenue back up again," she said.

"That is great news for commuters and businesses alike."

Even Thursday's partial reopening has given increased road access to Montgomery businesses that were essentially cut off to traffic by the feeder main repairs.

Dilnaj Kullar told CTV News that while traffic was restricted, his business dropped by about 70 per cent.

Within minutes of the road reopening Thursday, his parking lot was full as customers streamed back.

"Thank God for the construction team and how hard they worked. It's such a big blessing and a relief for our team," Kullar said.

"We're all staffed up ready to go for our customers. My team's all called back into work.

"I'm super grateful for our customers and the loyalty that they have with us, and just being grateful for the opportunity to get back to where we need to be."

Calgary café owner upset over losses

While traffic and business gets back to normal along 16 Avenue, Calgary Emergency Management Agency Chief Sue Henry says city parking and pathways in Edworthy Park will close to accommodate flushing the feeder main, which is the second of four phases in fully recharging the critical piece of infrastructure.

"The north parking lot near Edworthy Park near Bowness Road will be closed this closure will remain in place until further notice," Henry said during Wednesday's afternoon briefing.

"Also starting Thursday night, some sections of the Bow River pathway near Edworthy Park will be closed including near Angel's Cafe."

Henry stressed that business will remain open, but the popular eatery's owner Cathy Jacobs says the closure will kill business on what should be the busiest weekend of her entire year.

"How? How are we open? How do we do this? You shut my pathway, you shut my roadway? The parking lot? How do we do this? Our traffic is on this side of the river, not the south side of the river," Jacobs said.

"All of our events have been cancelled again. We had open mic tonight (Thursday), but we have to cancel it. Friday night was our packed house for trivia. We have Sunday morning live music.

"Like these, all these things, drive businesses to us bring people to us."

Jacobs says since the feeder main burst, the water restrictions and traffic closures have cut her business revenue by between 40 to 60 per cent.

"You know, this is not a little hit. Every weekend is critical. And it's been three weekends in a row that we've taken some type of hit,” said Jacobs.

"Father's Day we lost when this first started. Father's Day is systematically one of our busiest days. Canada Day is another one of them. And we're losing both of them. So yeah, the losses are immeasurable."