‘It’s going to kill all of us’: Lawrence business owners say construction on 9th Street poses devastating financial impacts

Business owners along Ninth Street near downtown Lawrence are concerned they could face devastating losses and possibly even closures as city construction work will soon close the arterial street that’s key to their livelihoods for several months.

Rob Coleman and Brad Walters are the ownership team at Fork & Tumbler, a small plates and cocktails restaurant at 616 W. Ninth St. 

Coleman and Walters, who also works as the restaurant’s executive chef, have collaborated in the Lawrence food industry for decades, from turning JB Stouts into Johnny’s West and establishing Basil Leaf Cafe downtown. 

They said they took on hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt to open Fork & Tumbler in June 2024. A few months later, well into their lease and buildout, they learned of the impacts the watershed project would have on their business plan and entire establishment.

In October 2024, Lawrence city commissioners voted in favor of a plan to reconfigure Ninth Street from four to three lanes between Illinois and Kentucky streets. The reconfiguration is slated to be part of the larger Jayhawk Watershed project, which will include new sanitary sewer and water mains in the area. The project will incorporate safety improvements to the street, including wider bike lanes and parking spaces, bringing the sidewalks into compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act and more.

At the time of the vote, Nick Hoyt, a city engineering program manager, told commissioners he anticipated that Ninth Street would be completely closed to traffic at certain points in the project.

Businesses along Ninth Street have now learned they’ll face several months of a complete street closure.

Michael Leos, a spokesperson for the city’s Municipal Services and Operations department, said via email that the project has grown in scope since its conception, and it remains necessary to prevent flooding.

“The existing stormwater system in the Jayhawk Watershed area is inadequate and includes an underground stone culvert made in 1911 that is undersized and can no longer support drainage needs,” he said. “… This much needed stormwater infrastructure upgrade will address this aging and undersized system that has caused localized flooding during intense rainfall, affecting homes and businesses within the watershed.”

City staff members met with concerned business owners on the street on Oct. 30, and Hoyt announced two proposals to complete the Ninth Street portion of the project.

Under Option 1, portions of Ninth Street would close once, for approximately eight months — from December 2025 through July 2026. 

Under Option 2, portions of the street would instead be closed for two five-month periods, from December 2025 through April 2026, and again from December 2026 through April 2027. 

City staff members sent surveys to business owners and employees to gauge which strategy they prefer. Staff will review the surveys, and Lawrence city commissioners will need to approve a change order, which will also include any potential phasing or schedule changes. Leos said the city anticipates that decision to occur before the end of the year. 

But regardless of the commission’s vote, Ninth Street between Louisiana Street and the alley west of Indiana Street will likely be shut down as early as December for the first phase of the closure. That closure will last until spring of 2026, Leos said. 

Work for the second phase, which will close Ninth Street from the alley west of Indiana Street to Illinois Street, could begin either immediately after the first phase or be postponed through the summer of 2026, Leos said. The commission’s vote on the change order will make that determination. 

Coleman and Walters have raised alarms across the city. They said that Hoyt informed them that all the city had to do was ensure that they could access their building during the construction. Asked about that statement, Leos confirmed the city will ensure access to businesses.

But the restaurateurs said the city’s plans don’t account for other essential business details, such as delivery access, trash pickup, employee parking, and more.

Additionally, Fork & Tumbler’s building is more than a century old. The city is not providing for a structural engineer to evaluate the impacts that construction right outside their front door will have on the foundation and on safety in the building.

“The project team will offer building owners pre-construction video inside buildings to document the condition of buildings before construction starts,” Leos said.

The folks at Fork & Tumbler asked the city to address their concerns directly. They said that satisfactory answers are still pending.

Instead, Coleman and Waters say they’ve been met with the refrain that this project is similar to the work done on 23rd Street and Sixth Street, and that businesses will pull through. 

However, work on those streets maintained open lanes throughout their respective projects, the businesses are set back further from the road, and they have parking lots. Some of the Ninth Street businesses have designated parking, but Fork & Tumbler relies on street parking. 

Leos said the project team had determined that even if one lane was open in each direction on Ninth Street, residents and patrons would still be unable to access the businesses in the area directly from Ninth. So they altered their phasing, looking to increase the speed of the project and minimize its overall length.

“The hard closure makes sense for them to get it done faster, but it’s going to kill all of us,” Coleman said. “And I think they’re just going to do what they want to do anyway, because that’s what the city does.”

Walters and Coleman both doubted that enough customers would be willing to walk and brave the construction to supply the necessary revenue needed to sustain operations.

Coleman said they also face power outages once a week as of now. Construction increases the risk of power outages, and even a few hours without power could destroy thousands of dollars of product in the walk-in freezer and set days of food prep behind schedule.

“We have two of those and we’re out of business, because that’s just such a huge cost,” Walters said.

Adding these issues to the pile alongside loss of holiday sales and construction dust and debris making it into the store and necessitating excessive cleaning, their concern is that the project will kill Fork & Tumbler, leaving them under a pile of debt with no city aid.

They’re also worried for their fellow neighborhood establishments. Among those nearby are 9th Street Mexican Tacos, Owens Flower Shop, Red Pepper and Great Harvest. 

“(P)eople tend to forget about us until they drive past, and by then it’s too late,” Great Harvest wrote in a widely shared social media post on Wednesday. “If you’re not driving by, will you remember us? We’ve been here thirty years, and I can tell you, most of you will not.

“So all we ask is that you do not forget us. Do not forget our bakery and cafe, or the restaurants, salons, florist, antique store, liquor stores, and other small businesses who will be suffering during construction,” the post continued.

The Fork & Tumbler owners said the city didn’t provide answers as to why there was a sudden push to start this portion of the project with such a short turnaround time for local businesses to plan. 

“(T)his project was developed before the changes in the KU Gateway project phasing and before the announcement of Lawrence potentially serving as a base camp for the 2026 World Cup,” Leos said. “As these new conflicts evolved, the project team continued to adapt the phasing and design for the Jayhawk Watershed to limit the impacts of construction as much as possible.”

Coleman said that “We don’t know what the rush is, but we know what the rush is. It’s the (KU football) stadium, if they want to get the stadium done so we can get all that connected.”

Walters said he would like to see greater transparency about the collaboration between KU and the city. He felt it was inevitable that the city would need to rush to reconfigure Ninth Street, considering the impacts of KU’s Gateway Project flowing directly down the hill.

The co-owners said they would like to see the city develop a compensation package for area businesses that could help them reduce their debt and keep their peers in business. 

“All the solutions the city has put forth make zero sense at this point,” Walters said. “The only thing that makes sense is compensation package … and that should be based on percentage of sales, loss of sales, salaries of employees, hourly wages, employees, rent, utilities.”

Asked if there is any feasible way the city could financially help businesses stay afloat if they’re facing closure, Leos said “There is no compensation provided for construction.”

Coleman, a lifelong Lawrence resident, expressed his disappointment with the city for these decisions.

“You feel like you do things in the community, and the community does things for you, and now it’s like — I feel like the city is just doing what they want to do, instead of trying to help people out, which is not the Lawrence I grew up in,” he said.

Wulfe Wulfemeyer (they/them), reporter and news editor, has worked with The Lawrence Times since May 2025. They can be reached at wulfe@lawrencekstimes.com.

Read their complete bio here. Read their work for the Times here.

— Reporter Mackenzie Clark contributed to this article.

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