Business View Magazine | April 2020

248 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE APRIL 2020 and other exterior renovations, and we’ll soon be seeing a major façade renovation. The City of Hazelwood has been working with the owners on a grant program to inspire entrepreneurs and activate the center with new local tenants. We’re helping small businesses with the start up capital to get their business up and running. Or, if they’re already established, we’re helping them grow their business and buildout out a new retail store at Village Square.” Fatefully, the Village Square’s decline in popularity happened at the hand of important infrastructural changes to a neighboring highway. “In 2000, the intersection of Lindbergh Blvd. and just north of the I-270 was nothing but a series of stoplights,” Zimmerman explains. “Everybody hated it, so they fixed it by building an overpass. The problem with the overpass is that it by-passed the shopping center. You had to really want to get to Village Square, and that’s why it died.” Fortunately, MoDOT, Missouri’s Department of City Manager, Matt Zimmerman