Anyone who walks the 700 and 800 blocks of Granby Street this summer already knows the drill. Traffic narrows to a single lane. Orange fencing runs along trenches where crews are replacing pipes that have been in the ground for a century. Storefronts sit a few feet behind construction barriers instead of open sidewalks. That has been the daily reality in Norfolk's NEON District since summer 2025, and it is not close to over.
The obvious story here is that construction is bad for small business. That much is true, and it is also the version of this story you can read anywhere. What's more interesting is what Norfolk decided to do about it this year: the city didn't just extend the repair timeline. It started paying, in actual budget dollars, to manufacture the foot traffic the torn-up street can no longer generate on its own.
The Project Digging Up Granby Street Won't Be Done Until Winter 2028
The NEON District Streetscape Project is not a cosmetic upgrade. It's replacing water, sewer, and stormwater drainage systems along Granby Street between East Brambleton Avenue and East Virginia Beach Boulevard, then rebuilding the surface on top with new sidewalks, greenspace, seating areas, street lighting, and EV charging stations, according to the city's project page.
Construction began in summer 2025. At a recent Economic Development Authority meeting, business development manager Nikki Southall told officials the completion timeline had slipped from winter 2027 to winter 2028 because of utility work complications, Yahoo News reported. Phases 1 and 2, covering the east side of Granby between Brambleton and Olney, are finished. Crews are now working the west side and the Olney Road intersection, which means the lane shifts and detours that have defined this stretch aren't going away this year either.
Two Longtime Businesses Didn't Make It to the Other Side
Some tenants couldn't hold on long enough to see the finished sidewalks. Cardinal Skate Shop closed this spring after a decade on Granby Street. Owner Jason Hawkes told local media the construction disruption was a major reason he shut the doors, per WHRO. Virginia Furniture Company, a fixture on that block for 20 years, closed as well.
The city's response was direct. The Norfolk Economic Development Authority approved a grant program covering rent, mortgage, and utility costs for businesses in the 700 and 800 blocks, up to $10,000 per business from a $265,000 pool, tied to losses incurred between January and June 2026. Applicants have to show proof of revenue loss and an active lease or business license dated on or before January 1, 2026.
It's real money, but it's scoped narrowly. Michael Benton, who owns the menswear shop Stark and Legum on Granby, called the grant only a temporary fix. Standing in a nearly empty store during business hours makes it easy to see why six months of utility reimbursement doesn't solve a problem that runs another two years.
The Businesses Still Standing Have Stopped Waiting for Foot Traffic
Sonia Newell has run Granby St. Glow Juice Bar and More since December 2024, which means her entire time in business has overlapped with the construction. Rather than keep the doors open and wait, she's started locking up early some days to work vendor events at Nauticus instead, telling News 3 the juice bar just isn't the business it used to be with the street torn up outside.
That's a quiet but real shift in how retail works on this block. When the sidewalk can't reliably deliver walk-in customers, the businesses that adapt are the ones willing to go find their customers somewhere else, at least until the street can do its job again.
Which Is Why the City Just Started Budgeting for a Foot-Traffic Substitute
The same logic shows up at the neighborhood level, not just the individual business level. This spring, the district held its first-ever artisan market at The Plot, the open lot at Granby and Olney, drawing 20 vendors. The timing wasn't incidental: it landed exactly two weeks after Cardinal Skate Shop's closing, organized in part through d'Art Center as a deliberate push to bring people back to blocks that construction had made hard to walk.
That market is one piece of a larger calendar the district has assembled this year to stand in for the foot traffic Granby Street used to generate on its own:
- The district's first spring artisan market at The Plot, drawing 20 vendors
- Free art programming through d'Art Center, with a movie night and a scavenger hunt planned for later this year
- A Fiscal Year 2027 city budget vote that includes $60,000 earmarked specifically for NEON District programming
That last item is the one worth sitting with. A city budget line for neighborhood programming is a different thing than a nonprofit hosting a market because it seemed like a good idea. It means Norfolk has formally acknowledged that sidewalks alone don't create foot traffic here right now, so programming has to be funded on purpose rather than assembled informally.
The Anniversary Nobody's Talking About Anymore
There's a detail that makes this whole year land differently. Last fall, the NEON District marked ten years since its founding with a hardcover retrospective, "NEON at Ten: A History of Public Art in Norfolk's Arts District," documenting more than 200 works across the district's run. That milestone landed in the same year the streetscape project broke ground. The decade of momentum that book celebrates is the same momentum now being tested by two more years of construction before the sidewalks are whole again.
What This Looks Like If You Already Walk These Blocks
Plan on single-lane traffic and shifting detours around the Olney Road intersection continuing at least through 2028, since that's the city's current completion estimate for the full project. If you're timing a visit, checking which side of Granby is open that week saves a walk around the block.
The wider Norfolk food scene hasn't slowed down this year, even if some of the growth has landed outside NEON's disrupted stretch while construction runs its course. Momo Kitchen opened in the Railyard District off Hampton Boulevard. King's Philly opened on East Little Creek Road. Norfolk Candle relocated into Selden Market. La Brioche reopened on Colley Avenue in late June after a run of uncertainty about where it would land. Crave Bakery moved from its Edinburgh Lane spot into the former Chocollage space in the Historic Freemason District.
Inside NEON itself, the anchors that have carried the district through past changes are still doing exactly that. Zeke's NFK is still pouring coffee and building poke bowls. Ordinaire is still serving its coastal, Gullah-inspired menu in the old Brothers restaurant space on Plume Street. Soirée Bistro and Golden Fortune Restaurant, open since 1987, are both still there. Zinnia, the restaurant and events space inside the Chrysler Museum of Art, is still hosting evenings on its garden terrace.
None of that changes what the next two years of construction will look like. But it's a reminder that the calendar this year is fuller, not thinner, because the people who run this district decided a torn-up street wasn't a reason to go quiet. If you've been putting off a visit until the sidewalks look finished, this is the year to go anyway. That's the whole point of the market at The Plot and the movie nights d'Art Center has planned.
If you're the kind of Hampton Roads resident who tracks a neighborhood block by block, that's exactly the kind of read the Allison Alliance Home Team tries to bring to every part of southeastern Virginia and northeastern North Carolina. When you're ready to talk about what's happening in your corner of the map, real estate or otherwise, let's connect.
