S. Hollywood braces for improvement

After being in the works for more than two decades, the widening of South Hollywood Road is finally underway, and many who own businesses along the thoroughfare share excitement yet apprehension regarding the possible financial effects during and after construction.

The project, which is contracted to last a maximum of 490 days, will widen the road from two to four lanes between Martin Luther King Boulevard and La. Highway 311.

Officials say one lane in each direction will always be open during construction – except in very rare occurrences – and access to all businesses will always be possible.

Although it’s reassuring to many business owners, trepidation for the future abounds.

Eve Melancon, one of the owners of OMG! Cupcake Factory, said the upcoming construction is scary from a business point of view.

“We’ve already seen the effects and impacts just these last couple of days. Personally, from our standpoint, I feel that it’s really going to disrupt our store,” she said.

Owning two locations on each side of town, one on South Hollywood Road and the other on East Main Street, although she said you can’t stop progress, Melancon has already seen west side customers at the east side location, “because they don’t want to put up with all the turmoil that’s going on over there.”

“As a customer, and you have to be honest,” she said, “Are you going to go out your way to go to a store right there and you have to put up with all that traffic when you can go find something on the other side of town?”

She added that the OMG! Cupcake Factory will make an effort to do as many deliveries as possible to keep business up.

“Our store is willing to go out of our way and do what we can do to satisfy their wants for our cupcakes,” Melancon said.

Down the road a little, Four Seasons Spa doesn’t have the benefit of a second location, but owner Jenny Do hopes her loyal clientele will keep her business alive.

“My customers say it’s going to be bad, but they’re loyal,” Do said. “They’ve been coming here forever, so that’s good feedback. But in my position as the owner, I’m always going to be worried that it’s going to slow down by clientele.”

The construction doesn’t catch Do and others by surprise. She knew it would be happening eventually when she signed the lease 10 years ago, and she added she’s looking forward to seeing how pretty the roadway will be upon completion.

“What’s happening is happening, I guess. I can’t do anything,” Do said. “ … It’s going to be a tough time, but if our customers want Four Seasons still in business, come and support us. Right now is the time that we need them to help us get through this time.”

At Richard’s Restaurant Supply, owner Henry Richard said the construction is a necessary thing.

“Surely it’s going to impact us, but that’s the cost of progress. Hopefully, we’ll be here when it opens to reap the benefits,” he said. “… The contractor and the parish, their goal is to keep everybody in business so that they can keep paying taxes. It would be counterproductive to put people out of business. I’ve had conversations with both, and I really think they’re going to strive to do that and make it as painless as possible.”

A benefit Richard has that many of his counterparts along Hollywood don’t have is a direct outlet to Corporate Drive. Houma’s largest private school is also getting set for the impact of construction, and like Richard’s Restaurant Supply down the road, Vandebilt Catholic High School will take full advantage of its alternate outlet – Tunnel Boulevard.

Vandebilt Director of Public Relations and Advancement Lisa Vegas said the school began implementing a new drop-off and pickup traffic-flow method last week as a direct response to the construction.

“We had engineers and people from the diocese with construction come to take a look at the campus and come up with a good plan that our parents and students could use, because we figured that would be the biggest potential issue that we would have is with the traffic at dismissal and in the morning with drop off,” Vegas said.

Vandebilt has added a lane to enter the school from Tunnel, and no one can enter from Hollywood. There will be two Tunnel entrances and one exit to each Tunnel and Hollywood.

Vegas added that no parking or events will be affected by the construction.

She encourages parents and students to visit VandebiltCatholic.org and click on EDLINE followed by NEW TRAFFIC FLOW & EXPLINATION for a traffic flow map.

Although the project is allotted for 490 days, many are confident the contractor – Conti Enterprises, who was awarded the bid for about $11 million – will get the job done in a shorter period of time.

Terrebonne Parish Consolidated Government Parish Manager Al Levron said after adding in design fees, survey fees, land acquisition fees, construction administration costs and utility relocations costs, the project costs about $20 million in total with 80 percent of the funding coming from the federal government and the other 20 percent coming from Terrebonne Parish.

“The usage of the roadway exceeded the capacity of the roadway to move traffic,” he said. “ … This is a main thoroughfare, and apart from the headaches of construction, the long-term benefits are going to be significant.”

The project had originally been approved along with three others in the early 1990s.

The widening of St. Charles Street and the extension of Westside Boulevard have already been completed. Widening Hollywood is next, and the fourth and final project will be widening Country Drive, according to Levron.

After holding public hearings on the project and waiting for federal funds to become available as well as a local utility company to move its lines out of the way, ground has finally been broken on South Hollywood Road.

“It’s long, long, long overdue, and we just hope that the public exercises patience with the project with the required construction and disruption but it’ll be worth the disruption,” Levron said.

Work on South Hollywood Road is expected to be complete in 16 months.

RICHARD FISCHER | TRI-PARISH TIMES