RALEIGH COUNTY, WV (WOAY) – Route 19 traffic in the Shady Spring-Daniels area has been bad for some time.
Since late August, you definitely can’t miss all the road cones and construction signs along that busy stretch of highway.
One local business says the construction has affected them quite a bit.
“We had just taken over the business not long before and had built a lot of stuff up trying to get it built back, to get people back in the door, when the destruction hit,” said Zappers Pizza Co-Owner Terry Farmer. “People are going around a lot instead of coming through here because of the time of traffic. It takes too long to get home. If they can, they’re trying to avoid it.”
According to Farmer, most of their customers are pretty understanding, while others wonder why it’s taking so long to get their food.
“It’s still a lot of congestion,” she said. “Our drivers have a hard time getting our deliveries out because of sitting in traffic for 15 to 20 minutes before they can get through the road work.”
Farmer says she would have broken up the job into sections.
“Instead of tearing the whole road up all the way down through here and having traffic stopped in five or six different places, it takes even more time,” she said.
They are doing a lot of work on the sides of the road, which is blocking traffic, too, according to Farmer.
“Our parking lot, they tore it up, put gravel in it a few times,” she said. “Slinging gravel over big vehicles because they haven’t come back in and paved it, and it’s been broken up for quite some time. It’s a mess.”
The Zappers co-owner said they have customers trying to hurry and get out of there because it’s now so difficult.
“I just wish they had taken a little more time, consideration, and tried to think of a better way to do this,” said Farmer.
