Free Valet et Parking-Eglintion Avenue this Saturday 29 November

The  Eglinton  Way  BIA  Offers  FREE  Valet  Parking  to  Shop  their  Neighbourhood!

Toronto,  ON:  As  participants  in  in  The  Yellow  Pages  “Shop  the  Neighbourhood"campaign,  The  Eglinton  Way  Business  Improvement  Area  (BIA)  is  offering Free Valet parking  to  its  customers  on  Saturday  November  29th,  from  10:30  a.m.  to  7:00  pm  

Shop The Neighbourhood is a free national initiative of Yellow Pages which supports small businesses and reminds Canadians how local shopping makes a difference in all our lives. The Yellow Pages team will be on The Eglinton Way handing out free balloons and bags to shoppers

 “Yellow  Pages  is  running  an  amazing  campaign  to  support  local

businesses  and  we  really  appreciate  their  efforts,”  said  Monique  Drepaul,  Executive Director,  The  Eglinton  Way  BIA.  

“With  over  50  of  our  merchants  participating  and providing  great  deals  for  shoppers,  it’s  a  great  way  to  help  us  inform  the  community  that

stores  on  The  Eglinton  Way  are  still  open  for  business  during  construction  of  the  LRT.”

Customers shopping at businesses along Eglinton Avenue W. between Chaplin

Crescent and Oriole Parkway may use the valet service free of charge. Valet services will be provided by Adagio Valet at three location

• The Healthy Butcher at 298 Eglinton Avenue W., 
• TNT Blu at 388 Eglinton Ave. W. and 
• One2One Studio at 506 Eglinton Avenue W

Isabel Mazzotta

For the children, the local CIBC branch is providing a complimentary photo with Santa and the BIA is also offering free face painting provided by local community artist, Isabel Mazzotta at three locations along The Eglinton Way:

•  Jumpin’ at 521 Eglinton Ave. W. (10:00 am – 11:45 am
•  Little Ones at 372 Eglinton Ave. W. (Noon – 1:45 pm) and
•  Artbarn School at 250 Eglinton Ave. W. (2:00 – 4:00 pm).

Shop the Neighbourhood deals are listed on www.yp.ca and can be downloaded via theYellow Pages mobile app. The Eglinton Way BIA will showcase their merchants` deals on the www.styleliveshere.com site. 

Also, starting at noon, there will be an hourly give-away at a random valet stations, where shoppers could win one of six $50 gift certificates towards any independent small business of their choice on The Eglinton Way.

About The Eglinton Way BIA: 

With over 200 businesses, located in Forest Hill, on Eglinton  Avenue  W.  between  Oriole  Parkway  and  Chaplin  Crescent,  The  Eglinton  Way has  everything  you  want  to  live,  shop,  eat  and  dine  in  style.

Monque Drepaul on Toronto LRT Construction--CBC Metro Morning

How Toronto main street is coping with LRT construction
Helping businesses affected by Eglinton Crosstown project site
Nov 07, 2014 7:58 AM ET
CBC News

It's important to preserve some sense of normalcy for retailers amid the upheaval caused by construction of the Eglinton Crosstown LRT, a neighbourhood business leader says.

Monique M. Drepaul

Monique Drepaul, head of the Eglinton Way Business Improvement Association, has been helping business owners cope, and she took part in a roundtable discussion hosted by the city Thursday to talk about the health of Toronto's main streets.

Construction of the Metrolinx light rail transit project began in earnest in June 2013. Expected to be in service by 2020, the entire Crosstown LRT line will span 19 kilometres along Eglinton Avenue with a little more than 10 kilometres underground. The line, which will include up to 25 stations, will link to 54 local bus routes, three TTC interchange subway stations and GO Transit.

Twenty businesses in Drepaul's neigbhbourhood have closed since the start of construction.

Monique Drepaul at Panel Discussion on this topic

"They just couldn't survive," she told CBC Radio's Metro Morning on Friday.

Some businesses left ahead of the construction, not knowing whether they would be able to pay the rent. In addition, foot traffic is down because, as Drepaul explains, "People don't like to see all these empty stores when they go by. They just feel that it brings the neighbourhood down."

Preliminary roadwork for the LRT was set to begin at Chaplain Crescent last December, but there have been a number of delays, which have kept local businesses guessing.

"Right now there's a lot of construction going on. We have two potential stations. One [site] is at Chaplain and one is at Avenue Road, and that is part of the problem. We're getting a double dose of the construction and this is only phase one of the project," she said.

"They're literally just setting up the headwalls for the station. They're not at the point where they're building the platforms yet."

The key to helping businesses cope, she says, is the sharing of information about the various stages of construction.

"I do know the city is issuing permits pretty much on a daily basis," not only to Metrolinx, but also utilities like Bell and Enbridge, Drepaul says.

She sat down Thursday with a city employee to explain that.

Drepaul says it would be helpful if local businesses knew, even on short-notice, when a store entrance will be blocked, instead of having merchants show up first thing in the morning "and discovering there's a giant truck in front of them."

She says her association has decided to make the best of a difficult situation, with a tongue-in-cheek set of ads called Style Under Construction and a website with the same name where business owners can see LRT updates.