Signs Add Chuckle to Traffic Mess

Johnnie Dodds Boulevard in Mount Pleasant looks more like a war zone than coastal suburbia.

Traffic barrels, cones and highway workers line the roadway as the city and county work through a year’s worth of traffic projects meant to ease congestion.

But for businesses that have had driveways, parking lots and signage obscured or cut off by the work, it’s a compounded nightmare.

That’s why the town has erected signs meant to encourage business and inject humor to traffic confusion.

“We’re trying to help the businesses that have been impacted by the construction,” said Quin Stinchfield, business development coordinator for the town. “For many of the businesses, their access points change and we want motorists to be aware.”

The town has erected 18 signs that note, with some humor, that customers are still welcomed and needed at the dozens businesses impacted by the roadwork.

One sign notes that, if customers want to come inside the shop, they just need to wait for the flagman to wave them through. Another jokes that customers are always welcome, with or without a hard hat.

The road construction has made a definite impact, said Yvonne McCollough, owner of the Bridal House of Charleston, which is located on Johnnie Dodds between Bowman Road and Anna Knapp Boulevard.

“Over the last three months, we’ve noticed a definite impact,” McCullough said. “We have a restaurant in our shopping center, and I’ve noticed a big impact in the lunch crowd there.”

Though many of McCullough’s customers seek out her shop, since wedding dresses aren’t impulse buys, but foot traffic is important, and that’s been decimated by the roadwork.

“You really just have to tough it out and know that this is a necessary evil,” McCullough said. “I think it’s going to be much better when the work is done, but right now it’s tough.”

Stinchfield said businesses have received the signs well.

“Most are just burying their heads through this process,” Stinchfield said. “In the end, it will be obvious that it was worth all the hassle.”