Sunday, September 27, 2009
Editorial: Market commodity: solid information
Three major projects on the City Market will disrupt business. Great care must be taken.
From the RoundTable blog
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Three major projects are planned in the coming year for Roanoke's Market Square, any one of which would be disruptive on its own. Combined, they could prove chaotic and rekindle hostility among the people who share the market.
There's one good way to stop that from happening: with coordination and communication -- and soon. City leaders need to step up now to organize the projects so as to minimize, as best they can, the hardship businesses and farmers will face. And, they must explain the plans and welcome suggestions.
All three projects -- renovations to the city-owned Market Building, Center in the Square's major expansion project, and Downtown Roanoke Inc.'s extensive makeover of City Market vendors' spaces -- will benefit all once complete. It's getting there that might prove difficult and damaging for some.
It's only natural that those who earn their livelihood on the market, whether from a pickup backed up to a stall or in one of the posh restaurants that line the streets, will feel pinched.
This is a time when leadership is most needed. Unfortunately, DRI is still without a permanent director. (It's getting close, we are told.) And Roanoke is searching for a new city manager who won't come on the job until spring.
Still, the coming winter months would best be spent sifting through alternatives to allow each of the projects to proceed while causing the least amount of disruption.
Two years ago, when competing interests on the market caused tempers to flare, the city hired for $6,300 a mediator to bring the parties together.
A calm, of sorts, followed, but that could be attributed more to a delay in Center's and the Market Building projects than to any broad consensus.
Still, talking did help. Center's plans were redrawn to lessen its encroachment on the market. That appeased the farmers. And the city has tried to include Market Building vendors in the conversation about renovations.
The tentative truce could shatter if communication shuts down. Vendors already worry that their spaces will be used as a construction lay-down zone. They need good information, not more rumors to peddle.
City leaders would be wise to start talking now. It's cheaper than hiring a mediator later.
