Winds of protest are blowing from the shops in Via Gorizia, ten days after the start of Hera’s works for the installation and redevelopment of the water and gas networks. The construction site has been set up at the roundabout in via Monte San Michele and will move one hundred meters at a time up to via Lughese, with completion of the works expected by the end of the summer. This is a major work, which will lead to the renewal of approximately 800 meters of pipelines and the replacement of over 45 user connections.
These prospects for the immediate future, however, have to deal with a present already full of inconveniences to traffic, which has suffered significant diversions onto alternative and secondary roads, and consequently also economic damage for commercial and entrepreneurial activities. They have not been easy years for businesses in the area, hit first by Covid, then by the flood and now by this road closure, against which local businesses had already collected around 300 signatures a few weeks ago.
Yesterday a meeting on the topic took place, attended by Donatella Bardi from the ‘Loretta e Donatella’ hairdressing salon, Marika Sampaoli from the newsstand of the same name, Urai Nongsoongnoen from ‘Uri Fiori e Piante’ Daniela Zagnoli from the fruit shop and vegetables ‘Le 4 Stagioni’, Daniele Benzoardi of ‘Officina Benzoardi’, Marco Rossi of the tobacco bar ‘Vitamina’s’, Ciprian Dronca of ‘Massimo Pulito’, Francesca Silimbani of the veterinary clinic, Loretta Poggi (former coordinator of the neighborhood committee and newly elected councilor on the PD list), Elisa De Filippo of Cna and Elisa Zanetti (deputy coordinator of the neighborhood committee).
The feeling shared by the participants is that of a concrete economic damage already evident in these first days and destined to worsen when the construction site moves towards the area with the highest number of businesses: “Many no longer pass through here, the drop in customers has already been remarkable despite the fact that the works have not yet arrived in this area – declares Sampaoli –. When it happens I will have cracks in the space in front of the business. They told me they will try to build a walkway, but they are not sure they will succeed.” Marco Rossi is on the same wavelength: “Last year we were flooded and we have still received almost nothing in terms of reimbursements. First there was Covid and this summer we will have to work at half the speed again”.
What arouses criticism from the operators is not so much the work itself, which is considered necessary by all, but rather the poor communication that preceded it and its methods. Donatella Bardi says: “The manager spoke only with the owners, leaving out us tenants who only found out everything through flyers a few days before”.
In particular, the failure to disseminate a timetable to traders is contested, which, although not eliminating the inconveniences, would have allowed the adoption of countermeasures. Elisa De Filippo of Cna explains it with a note of bitterness: “Given the delicate moment for businesses – she underlines –, we would have liked there to be not just a simple leaflet, but a sharing of the project by the administration. If the Had traders been informed earlier, they would have been able to organize themselves better, even with holidays, and reduce the damage.”
