Travelers to and from downtown Roanoke will soon have to find a different route than the Wasena Bridge.
After years of planning, the city is set to break ground Wednesday on the replacement to the 85-year-old bridge that carries Main Street across the Roanoke River, a project that’s expected to last two years and cost the city more than $50 million.
Wednesday’s event, featuring Roanoke Mayor Sherman Lea, Archer Western Construction officials and other dignitaries, will largely be ceremonial. Demolition is expected to begin in early April with construction on the new structure, which will include two lanes of traffic as well as room for pedestrians and bicycles, starting not long after.
Along with those who live in the Wasena and Old Southwest neighborhoods, businesses in the river plain along the corridor are bracing for the impact of the project. But several said they don’t expect an apocalypse.
“I’m not super concerned,” said Ted Snyder, who owns the Wasena City Tap Room and Grill, a restaurant a block east of the southern foot of the bridge.
The city said in a January news release that part of its strategy is to implement a “Ways to Wasena” campaign to help business in the neighborhood. The city has not yet provided any details on what that marketing effort might look like, however.
“What that entails, I have no idea,” said Jared Rigby, general manager of River Rock Climbing on Wasena Avenue.
“I think ultimately it will be a benefit to the whole area,” Snyder added. “We’ve known it was coming for the last four years. … It seems like they’re doing the best they can to kind of help keep people in the loop.”
For Snyder, who has spent 12 years at his restaurant, first as the kitchen manager and now as its owner, the growth he’s seen for business in the area over the years gives him optimism about the ones to come. When the restaurant opened, he said, it was one of few businesses in the neighborhood. Since then, several other restaurants and shops have opened in the area. With that commercial growth and the popular Roanoke River Greenway running nearby, it’s become a destination of its own.
Snyder said he’s “cautiously optimistic” about withstanding the challenges of construction not far away.
“I think there’s still enough of an attraction to the area combined with the city’s sort of marketing campaign to remind people about the area that, you know, I think we’re all going to pull through it,” said Snyder, noting that his restaurant is much more crowded on days with nice weather when people come to the area for the greenway or to visit nearby Wasena Park. “The real test for us will be when winter comes along and there’s not as much outdoor things going on.”
The replacement bridge has been in the works since the late 2010s, so area businesses have had years to get ready for the impending construction and the logistical challenges it may pose for patrons and employees alike.
“I don’t think it’s going to be a direct impact [on business],” Rigby said, noting that most of the climbing gym and yoga studio’s business comes from the southwest part of the city, where the construction won’t cause patrons to have to detour to reach them.
“I know we’re working together with [the city] and the neighborhood committee and parks and rec,” Snyder said.
One of the efforts will be a city-organized party in Wasena Park before construction begins in earnest this spring. Another positive effect of the construction, Snyder posited, would be that the planned greenway detour around the project will actually bring traffic closer to most of the area businesses.
The greenway will detour around its normal route through Wasena Park on Winchester Avenue, Main Street, Winona Avenue and Wiley Drive before rejoining its route, and most of the park will remain open throughout the project. The skate park, currently located under the bridge structure, will be rebuilt at another site in the park. Construction on a planned in-river park for water recreation will continue as scheduled. (It will begin in 2025.) Details about other facets of the project, such as public transportation and waste removal routes, are still forthcoming.
The city has created a webpage dedicated to the project that will be continually updated.
“Come what may, we’re going to be here,” said Snyder, “and we’re going to keep doing what we do and hoping for the best.”
