Local businesses are contributing to the restoration of Pompey Square and mobile vendors will be permitted to set up shop once the development is complete.
This collaboration among members of the business community is being seen as crucial to creating downtown Nassau’s new heart.
More than $150,000 has been invested purely from contributions from local businesses, according to Frank Comito, a board member of the Downtown Nassau Partnership (DNP). Stakeholders are targeting a grand opening before the end of the summer.
Site preparation should be completed by the end of next month, he added, at which point full-scale construction can begin.
“We anticipate this phase to be completed by the end of March, at which point we will move into vertical construction of public features, restrooms and landscaping,” he told Guardian Business.
Site preparation work is being done by Gilley’s Trucking and Heavy Equipment. Caribbean Civil Engineering, Terran Design & Management and Jackson Burnside Limited have been contracted as well.
“We are very near receiving bids for hardscapes and landscaping,” Comito continued, “all of which will be signed off by the first week of March. It is hard to estimate the number of construction-related jobs at this time.”
Pompey Square, located on the site of the temporary straw market, has been envisioned as an area where social events will meet entrepreneurial pursuits.
A stage will be incorporated to facilitate concerts and other public presentations, Comito said.
