By GEORGIA WESTGARTH
SALES are plummeting and shop owners struggling to see the light at the end of Adams Lane in Berwick as the Coles Supermarket development continues to lag behind schedule.
This will be Berwick shop owners’ second consecutive Christmas living with the road block that is driving shoppers away and pushing sales down 30 to 50 per cent since January this year.
Owner of Berwick Curtain Nook Annette Aldersea says shop sales are declining as more car parks are taken away with temporary fencing.
“In passing, trade and sales in store were down 40 per cent and there’s no doubt its due to the lack of parking because of the construction site.
“We get customers coming in all the time, complaining that they can’t find a park and some say they just drive away- shop owners are parking a long way away from their businesses to lessen the impact,” Ms Aldersea said.
The Berwick IGA was closed down in November 2014 and Ms Aldersea said the site opposite her store had been blocked off ever since.
“In July we were told Coles wouldn’t be finished by the expected date this Christmas and now it’s expected to be ready in early March, which is very disappointing- we’ll miss out on good trade over another Christmas,” Ms Aldersea told Star News.
More than 150 car parks have been removed from public use and Ms Aldersea said extra car parks that were promised by the City of Casey in Langmore Lane had not been delivered.
“Since they’ve close the gravel car park in Langmore Lane which held 65 parks, we’ve lost a further 15 spaces last week because construction have moved the temporary fencing on the north west corner to put in a new substation for power,” she said.
Wayne Young from Berwick PaintRight said the last few weeks had been the worst for his business which had been in Berwick for 16 years and was down 80 per cent in sales on Monday 11 August.
“I lost trade on Monday from 7.30am to 2.30pm because a truck had blocked off Adams Lane completely.
“Our foot traffic has just died right off, fortunately my regulars are still coming but people walking by are just non-existent,” Mr Young explained.
Along with their parking concerns, Ms Aldersea said she was frustrated that the only entrance to Coles would be situated on the opposite side to the Berwick village shops- creating a disconnect between the two shopping centres.
“The council has totally ignored its own planning rule and it’s disappointing that Casey planning allowed this to occur, they said they had discussions but I’m not sure how good a discussion they had,” she said.
Ms Aldersea said Berwick shop owners are calling for monetary compensation or a cut in council rates until the works were finished.
“I think it would be fair that we should be given compensation for a loss in sales over this period, why should we pay full council rates when our public car parking has been taken away?” she said.
But the City of Casey told her compensation ‘wasn’t their problem’ because the site is under private enterprise- even though the council signed off on public parking being used during the construction period.
