After Southtown businesses voiced concerns about construction cutting into their bottom lines, the intersection of South Alamo Street and East Cesar E. Chavez Boulevard reopened around noon Tuesday, allowing two-way traffic in all four directions, according to city officials.
This reopening of the busy south-of-downtown interchange arrived earlier than expected. Originally, it the closure was expected to last until mid-November, city officials noted.
Earlier this week, construction choked off access to the area, prompting Southtown business owners to sound off on social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter.
“In case there was any remaining doubt: @Ron_Nirenberg & @ejwskk don’t care about the impact on small businesses,” restaurateur Chad Carey tweeted. “They are responsible for an incompetent & dysfunctional @COSAGOV Support the S. Alamo businesses as best you can.”
Businesses on South Alamo said they were only given a week’s notice about the closure, according to a Sunday KSAT News report.
Miles Donnelly of La Frite Belgian Bistro, 728 S. Alamo St., told the TV station that city officials didn’t reveal the true impact of the construction until five or six days prior to its start.
The reopening of the intersection follows underground utility work shifting from the southern part of the intersection to the northeast quadrant, San Antonio officials said. They didn’t provide a reason for the earlier-than-expected reopening.
“I’m very pleased that the partial intersection closure at South Alamo is reopening sooner than expected,” District 1 Councilwoman Sukh Kaur said in a media statement.
The work is part of the 2017-2022 Bond Project to reconstruct South Alamo from Market Street to East Cesar E. Chavez. The entire project is expected to conclude in early 2025.
Subscribe to SA Current newsletters.
Follow us: Apple News | Google News | NewsBreak | Reddit | Instagram | Facebook | Twitter| Or sign up for our RSS Feed
This article appears in Oct 4-17, 2023.