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Broken line puts a damper on Squirrel Hill businesses
Friday, August 04, 2000 By Molly Ball, Post-Gazette Staff Writer
Squirrel Hill was a dry, hungry place yesterday as the city Water and Sewer Authority scrambled to fix a broken water main in Oakland.
Inside The Coffee Roasters on Forbes Avenue, customers could get anything but coffee. Marc Viro, relaxing at a sidewalk table outside, was philosophical about the situation. The water outage, which also affected his home in Point Breeze, "really made me think about how dependent we all are on water pipes in an urban area," he said. "It's not like there's a creek nearby where you can fill up a bucket."
Restaurants, dentists, florists, hairdressers -- they all run on tap water. With no water coming out of the tap, some tried to make do, but most decided it wasn't worth the effort.
Between noon and 1 p.m., more than half the restaurants on Murray and Forbes avenues closed for the day.
On Shady Avenue, Mark Grant, owner of Suzie's, expressed frustration as he shut his restaurant down around 12:45 p.m. The supply of bottled water and soda pop had run out.
"We lose a whole day's worth of business. We can't serve lunch or dinner," he said.
Keeping a bakery going without water took extreme measures for Panera Bread on Murray. General Manager Barry Rosen said he drove to Kittanning for 250 gallon bottles of water and to the South Hills for 500 pounds of ice. With canned drinks, disposable plates and silverware, and catering equipment for brewing coffee, it was business as usual except for the restrooms, which were closed.
Rosen said he didn't think his restaurant was profiting from the closing of others. "Business is normal to slow," he said. "We just want to make sure the customer isn't inconvenienced."
Baskin-Robbins on Forbes also stayed open, but only scooped ice cream was available. The famous 31 flavors account for only 35 percent of the store's sales, Manager Darin Cooper said. Drinks, from soda to milkshakes, make up the rest.
Jude Oskin, manager of Shackleford's & Maxwell's Flowers on Murray, said the flowers and green plants in her shop would be all right without water for a day, but no longer.
The florist's building, along with many nearby establishments, had its basement flooded last week due to rainstorms. "It's all or nothing here in Squirrel Hill," said Brian Bennet, one of three owners of Kazansky's Delicatessen on Murray. Kazansky's made it through the morning but by noon had closed all but the shop's retail section.
"It's really bad," said Marlene Newman, a hairdresser at Personality Salon on Forbes, which was hanging up its "Closed" sign around 1:15. "This has cost us 75 to 80 percent of our appointments today."
Down the block, Gino Scamardi kept Gino's Hair Styling Salon open, but it was difficult. "I need water to work," he said. "I'm doing my best cutting hair dry." Some customers even brought in their own water.
"Someone came in here, wanted to use the bathroom," Scamardi added. "I said, 'Get outta here!' "
Toilets were the most pressing concern at the UPMC Rehabilitation Center on Shady. There, all but one bathroom was closed, and that one had to be flushed with buckets of water after each use.
For most, the water outage wasn't a massive inconvenience, but it made them worry. "How long could we go without running water?" wondered dentist James Wallace, shutting down his office on Beacon Street around noon after canceling the day's appointments. He'd had to tell one morning caller to take his dental emergency elsewhere -- a dentist can't work at all without water.
Wallace was upset that he couldn't reach the Water and Sewer Authority to find out what was going on. He spent 15 minutes on hold, only to be told no one had any information.
"The emergency number for the water department doesn't work during the emergency, because everyone's calling at once," he said. "I guess they expect emergencies to happen one at a time."
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