Carson City Curry Street area business deal with flooding

The water arrived with the new year and hasn’t left yet.

“Dec. 31 was the first evidence of flood. I haven’t seen the water stop coming down the road since,” said Robert Reynolds, nursery grounds manager, Greenhouse Garden Center.

For Greenhouse Garden, located at the corner of Curry and Rhodes streets, where the water keeps flowing down the hill, the first storm in early January was the worst.

That’s when water seeped in the nursery’s north entrance and a foot of mud filled its parking lot.

The business replaced the carpet in its 2,000 square-foot shop and with the help of Carson City workers removed the debris and sandbagged around the building.

“We’ve had immense help from Public Works,” said Reynolds. “We’re very pleased with what we’ve gotten from them.”

For the nursery, the bigger problem has been access.

“We’ve been working with the city to keep one entrance open. We blocked off the south entrance because we need to channel the water,” said Reynolds.

Still, he says the nursery had no entrance for about four days and business has dropped by about 50 percent.

“We have been able to maintain our Saturday classes and we had a great ladies event through all this,” said Reynolds.

Greenhouse Gardens’ neighbors suffered less but had similar experiences.

Vital Signs Graphics & Marketing on Curry Street had no damage but business did drop off.

“It’s hard to say how much business,” said Hannah McIntosh, sales and service.

McIntosh said when Curry Street was closed customers and residents were let through the barrier to the south, but some customers didn’t know they could get through.

Like Reynolds, McIntosh had nothing but good things to say about the city’s efforts to stem the tide.

“Public Works has been great. They’ve been working nonstop,” she said.

The WheelHouse, across Rhodes Street with access from Curry Street, didn’t have any flooding either, but did lose a few hours.

“It got a little crazy with all the big trucks so we would start later,” said Teak Dopf, manager.

Instead, the skateboard and bike shop helped out and took some sandbags to the Nevada State Railroad Museum, which has been closed due to flood damage, and businesses on the other side of Curry Street, said Matt Bartak, WheelHouse owner.

“It’s nice to see everyone come together and address the problem in the now,” said Dopf.

The businesses across Curry Street, too, felt the impact of the first storm in January, but nothing since the road was sandbagged.

“We flooded twice, we had two inches in here,” said Frank Dimartino, owner, Small Car Motors on Carson Street. “We had mud everywhere.”

America Rents had mud, too.

“In early January we had mud in the shop back there,” said Nate Liebespeck, sales. “The city was on it, got back there quick. Department of Forestry was there. Must have been 50 guys stacking sandbags.”

Those businesses all are primarily accessed from Carson Street so they didn’t see a drop in business.

Across Carson Street, it’s been the latest storms that caused the most trouble.

The parking lot at the Carson Mall filled up two weeks ago and storage rooms in the Sportsman’s Warehouse filled up, but the store never had to close.

“Water came in the southwest corner. We had six to eight inches in some areas,” said Jason Sease, manager. “But it receded really quickly.”