Highway 77 Construction Causing Real Problems

Construction work on US 77 in La Grange isn’t just causing traffic delays. This week it started affecting finances for La Grange Dairy Queen and its employees.

On Monday, July 6, the construction zone moved south and started blocking the main entrance to Dairy Queen on Jefferson St. Store manager Shaunda Aguilar said traffic dwindled immediately.

She didn’t know how long the entrance would be blocked.

“They can’t give a definite answer,” she said. “They originally told us that they weren’t going to affect us until after the summer, and of course that changed real quick.”

Aguilar said a few customers have been using the alley along the railroad tracks to get to the store. Others have been placing orders through Door Dash and Favor delivery services. For the most part, however, the construction zone has kept customers away. “We felt the effect to the point that right now, we’re running only three employees during the day,” Aguilar said. “And we may end up, unfortunately, going down to two. That’s how slow it is. It’s sad to say, but employees are losing wages.”

There will be more disruptions as construction moves south on US 77. The Record reached out to the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) this week for an update on the project. They had not gotten back to us in time for this publication. According to previous releases from Tx-DOT, the rehabilitation project will eventually proceed all the way to FM 155 at the top of the Bluff. The project started on June 8 and was expected to take five months.