8 THE QUEENS COURIER • MARCH 1, 2018 FOR BREAKING NEWS VISIT WWW.QNS.COM
Surviving and Thriving Road work kililng businesses
Photo by Ryan Kelley/QNS
Delayed bridge project is killing Middle Village businesses
BY RYAN KELLEY
rkelley@ridgewoodtimes.com
Twitter @R_Kelley6
People used to wait outside to get into
Tropical Restaurant in Middle Village on
Valentine’s Day, but this year, the holiday
brought owner Steven Vinas nothing but
heartbreak.
Sitting at a table in the completely empty
dining room on Feb. 23, he said this is what
it looked like on Valentine’s Day a week
prior, and just about every other day for the
past year. Th e restaurant has been serving
its popular Ecuadorian cuisine for 13 years
on Fresh Pond Road near Metropolitan
Avenue, but Vinas, 44, said business is
plummeting because of a botched construction
project outside his front door.
“I started seeing the business like a cancer,
killing you slowly,” Vinas said.
Th e reconstruction of the bridge deck
on Metropolitan Avenue has been a
source of local frustration for more than a
year. Originally scheduled to begin in July
2016, delays pushed the start of the construction
to January 2017 when the contractor,
Mugrose Construction Inc., had
trouble securing the permits for the job.
At that point, the projected timeline
for the fi rst phase of work to be completed
was January 2018. During the summer
of 2017, however, the project was delayed
again for two months because repair work
to the M train line forced the MTA to
send extra shuttle buses into the area.
By the end of 2017, very little progress
had been made at Metropolitan Avenue,
and the Department of Transportation
(DOT) confi rmed to QNS that it had
defaulted its contract with Mugrose
Construction. In the two months since
then, the project has been at a standstill.
Vinas took his concerns to
Assemblywoman Catherine Nolan, who
then wrote to DOT Commissioner Polly
Trottenberg expressing concern for the
status of the project. Trottenberg sent
a letter in response, which Vinas also
received a copy of, and it said the bonding
company for the project was expected
to have a new plan in place by Jan. 19.
As of Feb. 22, however, that plan was
still not in place, according to a DOT
spokesperson.
“Th e contractor’s bonding agency is in
the process of rebidding the project to
a contractor who will complete remaining
work,” the spokesperson said. “A new
schedule will be submitted aft er the new
fi rm is under contract.”
For Vinas, that means the temporary
concrete barrier that protrudes in front
of his restaurant could be there for at
least another year. It makes accessing the
restaurant more diffi cult, and the traffi
c it causes makes fewer people want to
stop. He was only prepared to ride out
the storm for the original one-year timeline
of the project, he said.
“Everybody has their own story behind
it, but I’m feeling it fi nancially, emotionally,
and feeling very bad about the whole
situation,” Vinas said. “I’m very disappointed
in how the city does business, and
it hurts the small business.”
What was once the most successful of
fi ve Tropical Restaurants owned by Vinas
and his brother, the Middle Village location
has declined 40 percent in sales over
the past year, he said. Th e owner of the
car wash next door told Vinas that he is
even worse off .
But the small businesses aren’t the only
ones feeling the weight of the stalled project.
Vinas said an employee from the CVS
across the street came into the restaurant
one day and suggested that the national
pharmacy chain was struggling as well.
A source familiar with the situation
told QNS that the CVS on Metropolitan
Avenue suff ered a 25 percent loss in sales
over the past year.
If something doesn’t change soon,
Vinas said Tropical won’t be around for
much longer. He already had the second
fl oor — which was used by the restaurant
for parties — converted into an
apartment to try to make up for the losses.
Now his lease is up and his landlord
has set new terms, including higher rent,
Vinas said.
Within the next 60 days, Vinas must
decide if he will keep trying to survive, or
close his doors for good.
“You might come back in 90 days and
I’ll be closed, only because of this, and it
breaks my heart,” Vinas said.
Tropical Restaurant and the car wash next door are obstructed by a temporary barrier from on long-delayed construction project.
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