Road to ruin for business - Local news - inMyCommunity - Perth, Western Australia

AS POSTED HERE ---.Road to ruin for business - Local news - inMyCommunity - Perth, Western Australia

COUNCIL road works are being blamed for a sharp downturn in business in the Amherst commercial centre and The Vale shopping centre.

The Warton Road entrances to both sets of shops have been closed by the City of Gosnells to allow for the road to be expanded into a dual carriageway.

Additional upgrades to the Holmes Street intersection were initially delayed until April 6 so business owners could continue trading through the busy Christmas period, but two weeks into the closure of Warton Road entrances, businesses were already losing money as customers avoided the area.

Manager of the two centres, Terry Hunt-Mills, said the road works had to happen but patrons needed to know the shops were still open even though the main entrances were closed.

He said the Amherst shops were the worst affected because Woolworths provided a big drawcard for The Vale.

Bikeforce Southern River owner Mel Fixter said business was “a lot slower” and the carpark was “dead a lot of the time” as potential customers from Huntingdale did not know they had to turn off early to gain access to the shops and were often sitting in banked-up traffic.

Baby Dreamland owner Joeline Biancuzzo said she was losing $2000 a week as sales had dropped to $300 and customers plummeted from 10 a day to two a week.

“We’ve only been here seven months and were going great guns,” she said.

Ms Biancuzzo said if the works continued until June and sales continued to slump, she could be forced to close.

Last week, the City of Gosnells launched a campaign to promote the changed access routes before the Holmes Street intersection closure from April 6.

Major drainage and construction work will continue until June 25.