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Jenny Ly’s hopes and dreams are all baked into her new steak and cheese pie, the latest attempt to resuscitate her business.
Ly says there has been a steep decline in customer numbers through her Blackheath Bakery and Patisserie since the Great Western Highway was closed at Victoria Pass on March 9 because the road was deemed unsafe.
“I’ve tried everything, and nothing works,” Ly says. “Business has been so down, so now we are trying new products to solve the problem.
“It feels like we barely recovered from COVID and now we’re back here. We work hours and hours and it isn’t enough.”
Ly and her neighbours now face the prospect of the closure stretching for another year. The state government said on Friday that it had a solution for the major east-west link, and that it was expected to reopen between April and June 2027. A bridge structure will be built over the existing Mitchell’s Causeway, supported by deep piles anchored into the stable bedrock below.
The closure was prompted by engineers who found serious cracking and ground movement in a stone causeway built by convicts nearly 200 years ago. The road defects and bulging of sandstone walls risked the causeway’s collapse.
Since then, motorists have had to take a detour that can add 30 to 45 minutes to any route between Katoomba and Hartley. As a result, the duration of everyday trips for groceries or school dropoffs have blown out, and trips between the affected suburbs require extensive planning.
Ly’s business at the head of Govetts Leap Road in Blackheath is at the heart of the area’s business strip and one of many deeply affected by the road closure. Fellow shop owner Con Kazantzidis said his daily commute has now more than doubled.
“What was once an 18-minute trip to work has now become a 47-minute drive,” he said.
“And traffic is never flowing smoothly. I’m finding that I’m getting to work a lot later than I used to, sometimes despite leaving adequate time. It’s still taking a lot of time.”
Kazantzidis owns The Stray Whisker, selling journals and stationery, and said the winding trips that replaced the almost straight line he would drive to and from work has taken a toll on his life.
“It’s been very frustrating. We can’t just pop in here on a day off for a delivery or some extra postage. We really have to think about it now, the extra fuel, the extra kilometres,” he said.
“It’s ridiculous because as the crow flies, it’s six minutes. But we’re not crows and we don’t fly.”
To support local communities struggling with the closure, a small business grant scheme has been expanded, with grants increasing to $25,000 from $10,000 for Mount Victoria, Hartley, Little Hartley and Hartley Vale.
The scheme has also been expanded to offer $10,000 to small businesses in Lithgow, Oberon and Blackheath.
To candle-shop owner Chimene Lambert, the grant could help alleviate the “5 to 10 per cent” drop in customer activity.
“There used to be a lot of people who would come up from those areas to shop here, and they literally cannot do that any more. It’s overall gotten a lot quieter around here.”
Lambert said the behaviour of tourists had also changed, with the added time needed to take routes further west meaning people were breaking up their road trips differently and, at times, driving past towns such as Blackheath.
“People going further west, they want to get straight there. If there’s another hour or so to their trip, they are less likely to stop here now. Everyone around here has noticed a drop in sales.”
Like many of the business owners in Blackheath, Lambert was sceptical that the road would reopen by next year, saying she thought a more realistic reopening window was towards the end of 2027.
Major construction is due to begin next month, with the government yet to reveal what the new crossing will cost taxpayers.
Jody Lee and Victoria Jefferys, who run the Gleebooks bookshop in Blackheath, said the closure had become a “communal nightmare”.
“It has split the community out here. We go west much less, and they come here much less. They space out when they come here now,” Jeffreys said.
“Little Hartley is a part of us, and we are a part of them. And because of what’s happened, feel like they’ve been forgotten.”
Mostafa Rachwani is a Parramatta reporter at The Sydney Morning Herald. He was previously the Community Affairs reporter at Guardian Australia.Connect via email.From our partners
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