NEWS
The biggest retail centre in inner Fortitude Valley – the McWhirters building – faces an exodus of traders who are being sent to the wall by the closed Walton’s walkway.
It’s now eight weeks since the 20m section was closed off for maintenance that has never taken place. And a survey of McWhirters traders shows many are expect to close their doors sooner than later after seeing their passing potential customer trade cut dramatically from about 3000 a day to just hundreds after the walkway was barricaded shut on the night of Sunday 11 December. Florist Nancy Zhang (pictured above) will close the doors on her first-time business, Bewitching Blooms, in late February when her lease runs out. With her first child due mid year, Nancy said she had hoped to have been able to afford to hire someone to run the business while she was away but that was simply not possible now.
"You can imagine how terrible it’s been. Every week my sales have been around $500. I'm losing money every day and I’ve still got to pay rent, electricity and buy flowers.
"Before the [walkway] closed I really enjoyed working here. I just want to put it behind me now."
Several shops closer to the barricaded firewalls at the Walton’s section, Corey Hamilton has been running down stock at his Autographed Memorabilia shop in readiness for closing down. "If the doors opened today, I'll still leave. The worse case is that I’m here until July when my lease expires.
"Last week I didn’t do enough in sales just to cover the rent."
His neighbour Pat Hutchison runs pop art collectables shop OOO Look Shiny with his wife Maryanne.
"It’s just killed me,"” Pat said. "There's no sense throwing money at a business for no reason. Once again, big business is forcing little business out."
And if the doors opened tomorrow? "I'd have to reconsider it," Pat said. "I really don’t want to close the doors. This is a breeze for me. I love doing it and interesting people come through the doors."
Me Ming Wong has run his popular food outlet Fresh to Go in the Valley for 15 years but will consider closing his outlet if the walkway is not opened soon. His trade is down about 30 per cent with early morning and afternoon business affected the most. Like other nearby traders, he is seeking some rent relief to compensate for his losses. If that is not forthcoming and the doors remain closed, he will consider leaving when his current lease ends.
Mr Wong laid most of the blame at the feet of governments at both local and state level. "The people’s governments are supposedly there to help us but they have let us down. It’s very sad."
Jenny and Graham Blowers have put almost a decade into their Bakers Crust outlet in McWhirters. And with their current lease ending soon, Jenny says: "We will have to look seriously at what our future will be. Even if [the walkway] opened tomorrow, there is no way we can recoup our losses."
Jenny said the shop had dropped about 40 per cent in sales and "you just can't survive with the sort of volume"”.
Jenny voiced a concern shared by other McWhirters traders: even if the walkway reopened immediately, had pedestrian traffic habits changed forever? Will the centre see a return to the same level of passing potential customer trade it had enjoyed before the closure?
