Ugly Columbia street getting makeover. How are businesses surviving 2 years of work?
Nearly two years ago, more than half a dozen state and local luminaries stood with golden shovels over a mound of dirt on South Main Street.
They were celebrating the groundbreaking of a project five years in the making up to that point – the restoration of one of downtown Columbia’s ugliest corridors.
It’s no secret the stretch of road between Blossom and Pendleton streets south of the State House is a concrete-laden eye sore. Plans to overhaul the roadway by going from five lanes to two, install green space, widen sidewalks and add bike lanes have been in the works since at least 2017.
The effort has been plagued by false starts and rising construction costs, which delayed the project by years. But in February 2023, Gov. Henry McMaster, University of South Carolina President Michael Amiridis and others held out their golden shovels and broke ground.
But now that work has been ongoing for almost two years. When will the new South Main Street be revealed?
Disruption
Robbie Butt and his son Keaton opened their sandwich shop at the corner of Main and Pendleton streets to an ovation of orange cones and traffic barriers.
Their grand opening in February 2024 took place right in the middle of the South Main work. The expectation was that college students and faculty, lawmakers and lobbyists, and the myriad others who find themselves downtown for lunch would have another option in their outpost of the chain Sub Station II.
Butt knew that the construction would have an impact on the amount of foot traffic on his side of the street. But for most of the last semester, a construction barrier separated his restaurant from most of campus.
“The kids on the other side of all that construction had no idea we were there,” he said.
His first year of business has been a difficult one. He said he’s lucky he’s been able to rely on catering orders in the meantime to make up for some of the lost foot traffic, but because this is his first year he can’t say for sure how much business he’s lost out on in total.
But he also said he believes when the work is done, it’s going to be worth the headache.
“There are seven restaurants on our block alone and people have no idea,” Butt said.
The restaurant owners in the corridor have been discussing forming their own business group to better promote the area. But he thinks nicer streets, cross walks and shade trees will go a long way toward making it a more appealing place to be as well.
“When the construction gets done, I really kind of expect my business to double or triple,” Butt said. “When cars can use the street, there’s parking again, people can walk up and down the street and all of that, I know it’s going to get better.”
Future vision
Matt Kennell, CEO of the Main Street District, made a similar prediction for the area. The Main Street District covers the area between Gervais and Elmwood Avenue, so it does not extend to the area south of the State House.
“This part of Main Street was much like South Main Street is today,” Kennell said of the time period when “it was doing OK but not great.”
People didn’t like to walk around Main Street and it definitely would not have been suited to hosting something like the popular weekly Soda City Market, Kennell recalled.
In 2010, the city finished a streetscaping project on that side of Main Street that Kennell credits with much of the district’s modern success.
“I think everybody would agree that it created a much better environment, particularly for retail, restaurants and downtown living,” Kennell said.
But the process was still difficult, Kennell added. Several Main Street businesses closed during the time of the project.
Recently, Hunter-Gatherer announced it would be closing its Main Street tasting room, which is located south of the State House. The business’ other location, The Hangar at the Jim Hamilton airport, is remaining open.
Some on social media speculated that the construction impacted the business’ decision, but the business owners recently told a reporter with The State that the closure is because their lease had come up.
Kennell’s advice for South Main businesses eager for the construction to end: “They have much brighter days ahead,”
The work is expected to be finished by summer 2025. Earlier plans suggested the work could be completed by the end of 2024, but the summer 2025 completion date has been the S.C. Department of Transportation’s completion prediction since they broke ground in February 2023.
When complete, the work promises to better unite businesses on the strip with the University of South Carolina.
USC actually requested the initial Department of Transportation study on the street renovation more than five years ago and has been heavily involved in the design process because of how central South Main is to the university’s future growth.
The university’s frequent collaborator, design firm Sasaki, authored a 2017 plan for the corridor that included recommendations for pedestrian promenades and wide stretches of green space.
“That segment of Main Street has not seen the quality of development that you see on other urban streets,” USC architect Derek Gruner previously told The State.
This story was originally published December 12, 2024 at 9:30 AM.
