A business about to be impacted by a prolonged closure of the Bay Street Bridge is scrambling to come up with a plan after learning through the media major remediation upgrades would get underway on May 13th.
Nick Crooks owns the Saltchuck Pie Company at 360 Bay Street -- within a block of the bridge.
He says the first he knew something was up was about 3 weeks ago when employees complained their bus route had changed. Investigation revealed BC Transit had posted notices on poles saying they were altering the route due to upcoming work on the bridge.
Then on Wednesday (May 1st) the city confirmed work would start on May 13th. Crooks says it would have been nice to have received some notice:
" Well, you know, you hear so much these days in local politics about the need for consultation. And I certainly wasn't, you know, they didn't seek my opinion, or even give me a heads up that this was going to be a significant closure."
Crook says a lot of his customers come from Dockside Green, Vic West, Esquimalt, the Railyards who come for lunch, or on the way home -- so learning the bridge was going to have single lane traffic only through October, right through his busy summer season, was "not great news."
Crook is trying to find a way to keep the business going over the 5 months the project is supposed to disrupt traffic, including using a pie truck to sell coffee and slices of pie.