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SCARSDALE, N.Y. - Gregory Kassimis is frustrated. The Metro Deli owner said Monday he has been trying to get the street in front of his Palmer Avenue restaurant at the Five Corners repaired for more than a year, with no results.
"I called the village and they sent a truck out," Kassimis said. "I ran out to move the cars and they said they'd just come back tomorrow. I never saw them again."
That was a year ago. A Scarsdale Highway Department spokesperson said last week that Palmer Avenue, also known as Route 125, is maintained by the state. Melissa Slater of the New York State Department of Transportation's highway maintenance department said Dec. 2 that a crew would be out to assess the situation Dec. 4. Kassimis said no one showed up. Last week, he said on Monday a truck came by and patched a four-foot by one-foot area in the northbound lane and left.
But that spot was the least of the problems, Kassimis said. The major problem is an area from the corner of Palmer and Heathcote north about halfway up the block, where the area close to the curb, where cars park, has eroded. There are holes and bumps, making footing treacherous under the best circumstances, he said.
"It floods when it rains. It ices when it's cold you can see it now," he said Monday afternoon, where the largest hole was still filled with iced-over water. "Someone is going to slip and fall. We have a lot of elderly customers who get dropped off, handicapped people, people who walk here. They have to walk out into the street and go around it."
He also said the problem is costing him and his neighbors business.
"Customers say they can't park out front," he said.
In the spring, he said, during the rainy season, the water comes up over the sidewalk and floods his basement.
"I have to go out in the pouring rain and push the leaves away from the drain," he said.
Monday, the DOT's Slater said she had no record of work done at the spot, but that someone had mentioned that there had been permits pulled by the gas or electric company that would require them to dig up the pavement. Highway crews don't typically repair roads that are slated to be ripped up soon, she said.
But Kassimis said the state could do a temporary patch now, then do a permanent fix when the other work is done.
"We've got to get this thing fixed," Kassimis said. "We've got to get results. Anybody who falls out there, they have a legit excuse" for a lawsuit, he said. "There's certainly enough lawyers in this town."
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