Take a walk down Westchester Ave. and a person will come across two things. One is a mass of small businesses; all ranging from restaurants, pizza shops, Chinese restaurants to gift shops, dry cleaners, and small markets known to us locals as bodegas (say it with me, BO-DE-GA). The second thing one will notice is that scattered amongst all this booming business is the ever popular FOR SALE sign. About every five or so businesses there is the unpleasant sight of metal shutters closed. Westchester Avenue little by little seems to be disappearing.
Get off the six train at St. Lawrence Avenue and you will see a prime example of what I’m talking about. Eileen’s Gift Shop stands right off the corner of St. Lawrence and Westchester. It was once a place where one could find any little knick-knack; fire trucks, scooters, backpacks, minor stationary supplies, heck even a few stick bombs for the young practical joker. Now, the only thing that lets you know that a gift shop was there is the yellow awning displaying the store name, with a nice FOR SALE sign across the word Gift.
You don’t have to travel far too see the next tomb of a business. Walk to the end of the block, look to the right, down Beach Avenue and set your eyes on the former home of the D & K Hair Salon. Once a place for mothers to go and get done up, is now a green awning and handicapped access ramp taking up a corner. A resident of the area who did not want to give her name said, “This was the only salon to ever get my hair and nails perfect. I’ve had to try out a few different places since they (D&K) closed. Now I have the walk a few blocks toward Parkchester instead of just coming down the block”
In this recession going depression, the small business is a quick casualty.