It's that time of year again. The snow is melting, spring is almost here, and the construction equipment is rolling. In Ithaca, that means work is finally back underway on a long-delayed, much-anticipated project to renovate the Ithaca Commons. As Brent Fox reports, for businesses on the Commons, the end can't come soon enough.
ITHACA, N.Y. -- To many in the community, it's starting to seem like a never-ending project. Re-construction on the Ithaca Commons began back in 2013. It was supposed to wrap up last year, but for many reasons that didn't happen. And it has had a big impact on some local stores.
"Our sales have been down for the last year and a half, two years. You know first people were promised it was going to be done a year ago and I feel like the public has really given up hope and they're just saying no we're not going to come down here anymore until it is done," said Karen Sciarabba, owner of Trader K's.
Some of the delays in construction were caused by issues under the Commons.
"They found that it was much more complicated than originally anticipated and lots of different utilities on top of one another and by the time all that got sorted out much more time had gone on than was anticipated," said Gary Ferguson, Executive Director of the Downtown Ithaca Alliance.
But the end is on the horizon. Construction on the Ithaca Commons is expected to be completed by the end of July with a big opening celebration at the end of August.
"There will be lots of festivities, concerts, street festival and lots of different, a family fun day, and lots of other activities that are going to be going on," said Ferguson.
Business owners are hopeful they'll also be celebrating, with bigger crowds returning to the revamped Commons.
"We definitely have high hopes. I feel that if they really promote it and do some fun activities and the bands and bring a lot more festivals down here again, I think people will realize the Commons is alive again and they'll come down to visit us," said Sciarabba.
People may also notice construction on the east end of the Commons. That's actually for the new Marriott Hotel and won't affect the Commons project.