With six months of construction along Interstate 96 ahead of him, Looney Baker owner Greg Dean is taking a philosophical approach: Hope for the best; prepare for the worst.

The Livonia-based bakery plans on adjusting the quantities of its baked goods to meet a possible drop in demand as commuters find other routes to work. But Dean also said he is going to take generous samples of donuts, muffins, bagels and Looney bread to the construction workers, hoping to get in good with the crew.

If thats going to be the only guys on the highway, I need to get their business, Dean said. Maybe I can get them hooked.

For Looney Baker, being open 24 hours, seven days a week will ease some of the pain when a section of the freeway closes from March 24 through October. The six-month shutdown along the seven-mile route from Newburgh to Telegraph roads is a $148 million very aggressive rebuild on the 40-year-old freeway and 37 bridges, the Michigan Department of Transportation said. Bridges will be closed at various times, with motorists given advance notice.

Businesses along this busy thoroughfare generally say they prefer the shorter closure to an alternative three-year fix that would have shut down one lane. And theyre appreciative of MDOTs high level of communication through the two years of preparation to launch this massive project.

Still, any road construction hurts. Each company along that stretch has come up with ideas of how to offset the impact, whether its developing new delivery routes, leaning more heavily on commercial clients instead of walk-in customers, providing deals or bombarding social media with messages about their availability in the months to come.

Destination spots may be avoided because people are taking different routes than their typical patterns. This will be the challenge for everybody, said Dan West, president of the Livonia Chamber of Commerce, which has been posting updates on its website for members.

Businesses have handled similar construction projects in different ways. During a recent project on Telegraph in Southfield, Burger King used the traffic hassles as an opportunity to demolish its old facility and build anew.

But the 2008 construction on Silver Lake Road, a main east-west route in Fenton, remains a bad memory for Mike Conway, who has owned Mr. Cs Barber Styling for more than 40 years. He believes that service industry businesses are the hardest hit in a construction project.

It probably cost me $100,000 over the past few years, Conway said. Business went down the tubes to a degree. People got used to going somewhere else to avoid the construction, and the new place became part of their comfort zone. They never came back.

MDOT has held four meetings to engage the public, residents and business owners. It also set up dedicated pages on Facebook and Twitter for the I-96 freeway closure, in addition to a construction project website. MDOT also has a mobility engineer and an ombudsman dedicated to the project, said Jeff Horne, MDOT project engineer and communications representative.

The full freeway closure would last one construction season and cost $20 million cheaper than maintaining lanes through the work zone, which wouldve lasted three construction seasons, Horne said.

Businesses along surface streets in Livonia and Redford should look at the positives of having I-96 closed. Those businesses will have an increase in traffic passing their businesses on a daily basis.

Another example is UPS on Schoolcraft Road in Livonia, which will modify its employee work schedules and adjust truck routes to meet its customer needs, company spokesman Dan McMackin said. JonBoy Landscaping, on Five Mile in Redford Township, said it is excited to have an increase in traffic pass its store.

The staff of Livonias Laurel Manor Banquet and Conference Center has been attending MDOT meetings regularly to stay on top of the project, said Deirdre Stemmelen, general sales manager.

It has added a note to its website and may add similar language to its outdoor signs, informing brides-to-be and conference planners that its Laurel Manor exit or the Newburgh exit (accessible for travelers coming from the west; the highway will be closed after that point) and entrances will remain open during the I-96 project.

MDOT met with them over a year ago about this … and we felt a big relief to hear our exit would stay open, Stemmelen said. We put it on (our website) to reassure people. Its the same reason we have a live operator on our phones to answer questions. Were in the customer service industry, so its really important for us to be accessible and helpful.

Some store owners are expecting increased traffic on the main thoroughfares crossing the closed section of I-96, with commuters finding other routes to and from work.

Clifton Denha, co-owner of the Wine Palace on Middle Belt, north of I-96, said hes trying to keep a positive attitude.

As a businessman, Im going to be concerned, but theres going to be increased traffic on Middle Belt, he said. Thats what were holding on to.

Denha said hell start delivering wine to customers who dont want to deal with the traffic and will plan aggressive sales to lure customers during the freeway closure.

Beirut Bakery owner Mark Hallis is one of the worriers. He says the scope of the I-96 project is a little overwhelming.

Our biggest concern is just how big the mess is going to be, Hallis said.

Were not going away (and) well probably sell up to local businesses. But that stretch of highway is huge for a lot of people. To be honest, we dont know how we are going to handle it until it happens.

EDMONTON – At the public launch of Make Something Edmonton, ATB president and Light the Bridge project leader Dave Mowat enthusiastically led us into his Technicolor dream.

He grounded his pitch on mega-decoration and art installations elsewhere — from where all Edmonton ideas must apparently come.

Shown to tempt: the now pastel Empire State Building, a blinking Eiffel Tower and the San-Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge. The California span’s triangular peaks flickered with birds and water ripples, accompanied by Eastern-influenced adult contemporary music. But artist Leo Villareal’s mammoth screen saver was a temporary art project.

It also looked nothing like the rather inexplicable act of digital manipulation that’s been Light the Bridge’s visual carrot — doctored scenes of the High Level mystically aglow with purple and green, seemingly painted by the rears of a trillion cosmic fireflies.

It’s hard to imagine anything could or should physically resemble these pictures, but used they were to successfully hawk crowd- and corporate-team-funding in a gesture of public art, made possible by us.

The thing is, Light the Bridge isn’t even public art.

Hilariously enough, in a city where people spray coffee out their mouths if asked to consider street art as “art,� Light the Bridge is closer to a behemoth act of indelible, enforced graffiti.

Consider: it is brightly coloured and participatory with a sense of “I did this.� It visually claims public territory, with a web page stressing, “That light is mine.�

And anyone who doesn’t like it has absolutely no recourse. That last part’s the kicker.

Semantics, sure — but it’s actually just decoration. Fireworks, if duller, that won’t go away or even be special, running night after year. And a quick question: what groundbreaking hue do you imagine we’ll see on St. Patrick’s Day? Halloween night? Repeat for all holidays with a yawn. Then there are promises for game night. Art, not so much.

The High Level Bridge is Edmonton’s most iconic structure, a masterpiece.

In 1967, sober civic minds stopped it from being painted gold for Canada’s centennial. Peter Lewis’s Great Divide waterfall — at least a conceptual wink at our topography used rarely — was shut down in 2009 because of its chlorine’s possible effect on Mother Nature.

In our rush to hustle this version of the vestigial Simpsons Monorail, what consideration has been given to dropping a shifting Lite Brite across the path of our deservedly hyped, uninterrupted valley ecosystem? Whether it will still count as uninterrupted at night is an interesting question.

Some argue, numbly and insultingly, that it might lower the suicide rate, as if clinical depression was a matter of brief exposure to the Incredible Hulk’s or the Eskimos’ colour palettes.

Oh, and despite Light the Bridge’s propaganda, one can easily photograph the bridge at night because it’s already beautiful. Anyone who doesn’t know this hasn’t tried.

One of the most disappointing flavours of this done deal is it falls in line with the very compromised idea that the river valley is a thing that needs to be “fixed.�

OUR HALL: Jenny Sands stands with supporters seeking the retention of two heritage halls in Lower Hutt.

A group of Lower Hutt residents are planning to fight moves to demolish two heritage halls to make way for a convention centre.

The Heart of the Hutt is proposing a different approach, which would have Lower Hutt’s Town Hall and Horticultural Hall retained and the new convention centre built nearby.

Laings Rd would become car-free and the Civic precinct linked with extensive landscaping.

“We are saying stop and let’s have a proper conversation,” Heart of the Hutt spokeswoman Jenny Sands said.

“It’s a master plan to try and integrate the area, and it doesn’t cost the earth.”

In November, the Hutt City Council voted to knock down the earthquake-prone town hall and horticultural hall, which are part of the Lower Hutt Civic Centre, a registered historic area.

The council wants to build a $10.5 million conference centre in place of the halls.

An economic impact report said the proposed centre could bring in between $55m and $75m over the next 20 years.

But Charles Sands, a retired architect, said there had not been enough public consultation. He has drawn up alternative plans for the precinct, with a new conference centre near the Dowse Art Museum, for about $7m, and a Maori cultural centre.

A further $2m to $3m could go towards strengthening the Town Hall, while the Horticultural Hall would be used as studio space, for indoor markets, and sport events. A section of Laings Rd would become car-free, while extensive landscaping would link other elements of the historic area.

Lower Hutt Mayor Ray Wallace said a working group spent two years working on the conference centre proposal.

“We believe they have come up with the best possible option, and the council has agreed to it.”

Mr Wallace said he would be happy to meet with the group and discuss their proposal.

“I’ll be interested to see what they have come up with.”

A public meeting is planned for February 4, from 7pm in the Little Theatre, where the group’s ideas will be presented.

– © Fairfax NZ News

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