‘We can’t even afford the rent’: Shop owners fear closure as roadworks grind on

Saturday, 7 February 2026

Businesses in Lincoln’s town centre are struggling to stay afloat during intensive roadworks required to upgrade the main street.

Surekha Pudi has owned Cottage Café on Lincoln’s main street for about three years.

Since major roadworks began in the Canterbury town at the start of January, she says sales have halved and she’s “really thinking about closing down”.

“We have taken loans and we have taken money from our pockets. Now we have no money to take out of our pockets… we can’t even afford the rent.”

Surekha Pudi is considering closing her café because takings have halved since major roadworks started in Lincoln’s town centre.

Pudi said she had “no choice” but to let a staff member go. Her husband now worked in the café during the day and another job at night. She was at home with her newborn baby, who was born prematurely in November.

Pudi wanted more support from the council, such as relief packages and rent subsidies.

Barber AJ Vine says elderly people and young children are struggling with limited access to shops in the town.

“How long can we face this struggle?”

Selwyn District Council said the roadworks were part of a long-term plan to make the town centre safer and better able to cope with rapid growth. According to the latest census data, the area is the fastest-growing territorial authority in New Zealand.

Traffic can only turn left off Gerald St and on-street parking is no longer available.

The upgrade includes the development of a plaza-style area, wider footpaths and the replacement of sewer lines.

The current phase, affecting Gerald St, was expected to run until July, with the wider programme to continue in stages until 2030.

Rick Sun said he had been bleeding his savings dry to keep the lights on in his family’s shop, Lincoln Convenience Store.

Sun said sales were down about 60%.

“One day we will run out of our savings, and the business will shut down,” he said.

Sun had owned the dairy on Gerald St for five years and said business had “never been bad like this”.

Florists Suzanna Naylor and Annie Strong say all staff at Broadfield Flowers have cut their hours as roadworks drive away customers.

He said this time last year he would bring in about 300 transactions a day. Now it was only about 120.

When Stuff arrived at the town centre on Wednesday morning, about 15 cars were backed up at traffic lights waiting to get into the main stretch, a number of them giving up and pulling off to avoid the main street altogether.

“People just choose to not come here, to not go this way,” Sun said.

Florists Suzanna Naylor and Annie Strong said they and their colleagues at Broadfield Flowers had reduced their working hours to “accommodate the slower trade” as the roadworks drove customers away.

“I don’t think we’d survive without the online orders,” Naylor said. “It definitely affected our Christmas trade, our busy time of year. We had a lot of waste as well, because we have products that can’t last.”

Lincoln Family Barber owner Raeann McPherson says the work is devastating businesses.

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Others said the biggest issue was no longer just lost income, but how hard it had become for customers to access their shops.

Further down Gerald St, Raeann McPherson was trying to encourage clients at her barbershop, Lincoln Family Barber, to park around the back of the building and walk over a temporary footbridge.

Phase one of the works is set to be completed by July, weather permitting.

“I’ve never experienced anything like this,” she said.

Lincoln Fish Supply manager Lou Hardie says her customers are still visiting in the evening, but can no longer easily drop in during the day.

McPherson said walk-in custom had halved, and the business was relying on bookings.

She had started a petition, which had 384 signatures by Thursday morning, aiming to get permanent pedestrian access from the car park behind shops on the north side of the street.

For barber AJ Vine, the work had been a “diabolical mess,” particularly for elderly people and people with young children who struggled to navigate the works on foot.

The work is part of a major project to revamp the town centre of Lincoln in the country’s fastest-growing area.

“All these businesses are struggling, a couple of them are throwing around the ‘L’ word [liquidation] already,” he said.

Selwyn District Council executive director of infrastructure and property, Tim Mason, acknowledged that the town centre upgrade meant “disruption to businesses and residents”.

However, it was “exciting to see” people embrace opportunities such as Lincoln Village, a proposed hospitality precinct set to house 14 businesses.

Food outlets said the loss of short-term parking had been especially damaging.

Lincoln Fish Supply manager Lou Hardie said the store had suffered a “significant drop” in revenue.

Part of the town centre project included the addition of larger car parks off Gerald St, but Hardie said many existing businesses relied on on-street parking, as they were suited to people popping in and out.

Mason said the council’s contractor and staff were speaking with businesses daily and looking at adjustments to reduce the impact “wherever possible”.

Those had so far included providing additional parking, pedestrian access and signs promoting businesses.

“We will keep working with the businesses and looking at options for how we can reduce the disruption, including looking at options around the work programme and hours.”

But for most businesses, it’s still not enough.

“I don’t know how long I can survive,” Sun said. “And this is just the beginning.”

CORRECTION: The Lincoln Convenience Store has had a decline in transactions from 300 to 120 per day, not dollars as was initially reported.