LEWES, Del. - The Best's Ace Hardware building standing now, won't be for much longer. A decades old family business will succumb to the wrecking ball as DelDOT announces its plans to make way for new road work. DelDOT tells me that by removing this building, they will be able to proceed with their plans to improve the intersection of Five Points.
"Again, we know this is an area that continues to, not just in the summer time, cause headaches but really throughout the year now with the level of traffic that we see. So it's going to be an important project that we're hopeful will address some of those long standing traffic issues." said C.R. McLeod with DelDOT.
Mike Wajda has been working at Best's Ace Hardware since April of last year, "It's an icon, it's been there for a long time and people have based their store off of that particular corner and it's going to be missed but it'll be turned around here with a new location."
At the buildings neighbor Surf Bagel, customers are not looking forward to the closing of the Route nine access point to the eatery.
"It certainly was a great access point to be able to pull in that way... now you have to go north on one and turn around to come south." said Frank Powers, who lives in Lewes.
Surf Bagel shared parking with the Ace and will now need to make upgrades to their own parking to accommodate the upcoming changes.
"We're working with DelDOT to improve the area behind the building soon to make that parking a little bit more efficient and obvious for the guests." said Vice President of Surf Bagel, Matt Patton.
Construction of the roundabout is expected to begin in the spring of next year,
but the project overall is estimated to be completed late in 2024.