ASHEVILLE, N.C. (828newsNOW) — Barricades made Haywood Street look more like a maze than a roadway as downtown Asheville prepared for former President Donald Trump’s arrival mid-week. The Republican presidential candidate’s speech was supposed to focus on the economy during his campaign stop. Meanwhile, several businesses in the surrounding area closed up shop for the day.
The Trump rally, held at Harrah’s Cherokee Center – Asheville, was announced on Saturday. A release from the Asheville Police Department, sent around 3 p.m. Monday to media outlets, said heavy law enforcement would be in the area leading up to and following the event. Without going into specifics, the release said officers would be “patrolling by vehicle, on foot, and on bicycles,” and encouraged people to “treat each other with respect.” Then, around 7 p.m. Monday, another release from the city of Asheville was sent via email to media outlets detailing road closures and other service interruptions that would begin Tuesday afternoon, more than 24 hours before Trump would take the stage.
The road closures meant any vehicles still parked on these particular streets by 9 a.m. Tuesday would be towed. Barriers on Haywood Street also blocked much of the area to any foot traffic outside of patrons being guided to and from Harrah’s.
Businesses in the area weren’t forced to close, but many chose to do so.
Alan Levy, owner of Gentlemen’s Gallery Inc. which is just across the street from Harrah’s, said although the closures were sudden, he thought everything was handled well.
“The streets were clean, peaceful,” he told 828newsNOW. “Couldn’t have asked for a better event.”
He, like many others, closed for the day, but he said he didn’t mind this too much because he considered all of the people pouring into downtown as a form of free exposure to his business.
“Sacrificed a day of business, but the exposure will pay off,” he said.
At the Fox and Beaux Boutique & Custom Jewelry Design Studio, retail manager Kay Seehaus and associate Cameron R said they essentially “had no choice but to close.” Both said it would have been nice to have a little more notice and communication ahead of the closures. Cameron said she found the map of closures online after being warned by an associate. She said customers were asking her why parking was being blocked off Tuesday morning, before she knew about the closures.
“I came into work and the lot we park in was blocked off because they were using that, but they said they were going to block it the next day not that day,” she recalled. “So then I just had to like pull in front of the store so I could run in and unlock and get everything ready and then the cops were knocking on the doors, saying ‘secret service is going to tow your car immediately.'”
Dealing with fine jewelry, Seehaus said they do shipments and deliveries daily, so that aspect of their business was heavily disrupted.
“If all of this was clear and communicated beforehand, that would solve a lot of issues,” Seehaus said.
Down at the Spice and Tea Exchange, employee Jenna Kemper called the whole ordeal a mess. She said cops came in on Monday to let them know what would be taking place that week. The business also received calls from the city with notifications about the closures.
Like other businesses, they were not forced to close, but staying open just didn’t make much sense. Kemper said she found irony in the whole situation.
“It’s ironic that the topic of his [Trump’s] speech was economics and that it shut down all of these stores,” she said.
Employees of Indigo Sun echoed that sentiment, saying the event did not particularly help the economy, at least in their immediate area, on Wednesday. However, associate Asia Guyer said they had great business the previous days, not sure whether to credit that to the rally or not. Other employees of previous businesses 828news spoke with said they also had good business on Monday.
Guyer said she would have appreciated it if the rally had been held somewhere like the WNC Ag Center where it would’ve had less impact on downtown businesses.
