Published: November 02, 2009 03:49 pm      

Business owners prepare for re-opening of S.R. 267

BROWNSBURG — While motorists who routinely travel State Road 267 through Brownsburg are no doubt anxious for the road to reopen free of encumbrances, it’s the business owners along that stretch of roadway who are most anticipating the project’s completion.

Indiana Department of Transportation officials now say the entire project will be fully complete within the next two weeks. And that’s welcome news to all concerned.

“I would not call it excitement,” Mark Cranfill, owner of the Green Street complex, said. “I will say that we’re optimistic. It was a long, drawn-out project. We were promised that it was supposed to end and people were expecting it to end earlier.”

With an economic crisis prevalent throughout the nation, the extended road work could not have come at a worse time for local business owners.

“The road opening can only help,” Cranfill said. “It has hurt business quite a bit. Any time there’s a road project that closes the crossroads where you’re located, it’s hard. It’s hard to keep the doors open when you rely on traffic flow.”

Cranfill said he’s lost five tenants in the complex since the project began.

Les Mongell, president of the State Bank of Lizton, takes a different approach.

“Thank God that we opened another location in Brownsburg in 2008,” Mongell said. “If we had not done that to accommodate our customers, it would have been devastating.”

Bo Railey, owner of Exercise Inc., found the entrance to his location blocked throughout the project.

“(This project) has been a horrible nightmare,” Railey said. “The entrance and exit has been so torn up that cars are dragging the pavement. It’s cost tens of thousands in lost business.”

On some days, Railey said, INDOT workers would turn off his phone, power, and water without so much as a heads up. He said he had to send his customers to the nearby Dunkin Donuts just to use the restroom.

Railey said he lives just two miles from his business, but the commute takes him about 45 minutes.

“I’m not optimistic that they are going to get it done,” he said. “They still don’t have the entrance to my business open. It’s still a mess.

“I hope they don’t do the rest of (S.R.) 267 because I live there on 267. It would be a nightmare if what was in front of my business was in front of my house.”



ryan.palencer@flyergroup.com