Businesses in downtown Palm Springs impacted by storm

Storm clean up continues as roads continue to reopen in Palm Springs — some local businesses downtown say they’re feeling the hit after this week’s weather.

“This valley was not meant for rain…it was not meant for it…a lot of road closures,” said Edgar Suarez, an employee at “Eight4Nine” restaurant.

“I closed the store because there was nobody on the streets,” said Peter Daltorio, the owner at 5001 Home Collection.

Many describing the terrible traffic caused by road closures on Friday night: “It took me an hour to get home…and I only live two miles from here,” said Daltorio. “Gene Autry and Ramon was just a nightmare,” said Suarez.

Many of those businesses say they rely on heavy foot traffic in season. “With the water and the washouts of the roads…it’s been very difficult to get people into palm springs…so business was definitely impacted by the weather,” said Stephen Monkarsh, the owner of Just Fabulous.

And some local restaurants say they had several cancellations as people elected to stay in. However, with many of the roads reopening and good weather returning — they say holiday weekend business is looking up.

“Now that we’re entering a three day weekend and the weather is really pretty…getting the sunshine…it feels great and we’re really busy,” said Suarez.

“This weekend we can’t keep people out of the store,” said Monkarsh.

Traffic conditions have also improved downtown — and hundreds of visitors were out enjoying the holiday weekend. “People are happy…a lot of people from out of town…a lot of people from the east coast…lot of people from the northwest…people from Oregon are coming in…they’re very happy to know they’re going to have at least a sunny weekend,” said Suarez.

“Actually [people from] all over the world…a lot of people from England, Germany…Asian countries,” said Daltorio.

Some restaurants even said they’ve seen people out celebrating a belated valentines day now that the storm has passed. “A good 15% since Valentine’s night…have been couples trying to celebrate it because of the fact that we had really horrible weather,” said Suarez.