PennDOT Is Repaving New Tyburn Road in 2026 — Your Business Should Be Repaving Its Digital Presence Too

Written By Ritner Digital

Road construction is coming to Falls Township. Not as a rumor, not as a maybe — as a confirmed item on PennDOT's schedule, backed by a state senator road tour and official project updates.

PennDOT has confirmed that resurfacing of New Falls Road, Edgely Road, and Tyburn Road in Falls Township are all scheduled to begin in 2026. Senatorstevesantarsiero Work on the Bristol-Oxford Valley Road and North Oxford Valley Road intersection is expected to begin in July 2026. Falls Township These are not minor side streets. These are the commercial arteries that connect Levittown and Lower Bucks County businesses to the customers who drive to them every day.

If your business sits on or near any of these roads — or depends on customers traveling them to reach you — this is not abstract infrastructure news. This is a direct threat to your foot traffic, and the businesses that survive it will be the ones who built direct digital relationships with their customers before the orange cones appeared.

Here's what's coming, why it matters, and exactly what to do about it.

What PennDOT Has Planned for Lower Bucks County in 2026

A recent road tour by State Sen. Steve Santarsiero and PennDOT confirmed that the state is planning to improve the intersection of New Falls Road and Hood Boulevard in Falls Township, which has been deteriorating for years and is tentatively scheduled to be repaired and repaved. LevittownNow

In 2026, PennDOT has parts of New Tyburn Road in Falls Township, Radcliffe Street in Bristol Township, Woodbourne Road in Middletown Township, and others on its list. LevittownNow

A project to redesign and engineer the "hump" on Tyburn Road at New Falls Road to make it less severe has also been put into the queue. LevittownNow

Take a moment to think about the commercial density along these corridors. New Falls Road runs through the heart of Levittown's retail and service strip. Tyburn Road connects Falls Township's residential neighborhoods to its commercial areas. These are roads that carry customers to businesses all day, every day. When PennDOT moves in with equipment, lane closures, detours, and construction signage, that customer flow gets disrupted — sometimes for weeks, sometimes for months.

The repaving itself is a good thing. Better roads are better for everyone, including businesses, in the long run. But the construction period is a different story entirely.

How Road Construction Actually Affects Local Business Revenue

This isn't speculation. The research is clear and consistent: road construction near small businesses causes measurable revenue loss, and the effects can last longer than the construction itself.

One restaurant owner whose establishment sat on a construction-affected main street estimated her revenue declined by 20 to 30 percent during the construction period. Marketplace That's not a rounding error. For a small business operating on thin margins, a 20 to 30 percent revenue drop sustained over a construction season can be genuinely existential.

Research from the University of Minnesota found that when road projects rehabilitated existing infrastructure, small businesses took a disproportionate loss in sales and jobs — while larger chain businesses with multiple locations were largely unaffected and in some cases even opened new locations. Umn In other words, road construction hits the small, independent, single-location businesses hardest. The exact kind of businesses that line New Falls Road and Tyburn Road in Falls Township.

Research has also found that even after construction ends, some businesses continue to see lower revenue — because some customers identified new businesses to visit during the construction period and simply never came back. Marketplace

That last point is the one that should keep you up at night. It's not just the construction period you're managing. It's the customer habits that form during that period. If your regular customers detour around your business for two months and discover a competitor in the process, you may not get them back when the road reopens.

The businesses that hold onto their customers through a construction period are the ones who stayed in direct communication with them throughout. They sent emails. They posted updates. They made sure their Google Business Profile told the accurate story of what was happening and how to reach them. They didn't go dark and hope for the best.

The Digital Communications Playbook for Construction Season

If PennDOT is coming to your road this year, here is what you need to build or strengthen before the equipment arrives.

Step 1: Know Before They Come

PennDOT publishes project schedules, and local news outlets like LevittownNow.com cover road project updates consistently. Subscribe to those updates. Follow your township's official communications. The businesses that get blindsided by construction are the ones who weren't paying attention — and the ones who are prepared start communicating with customers before the first orange cone goes up, not after.

Getting ahead of the story is everything. An email to your list two weeks before construction begins — explaining what's happening, how to reach you, where to park, and what the access situation will look like — is worth more than a dozen posts made in a panic after traffic patterns have already shifted.

Step 2: Update Your Google Business Profile Immediately

The moment construction begins affecting access to your business, your Google Business Profile becomes your most important communication tool. Here's what to do:

Update your business hours if construction affects when you can operate normally. Add a post explaining the construction situation, how to reach you, and any alternate parking or access instructions. Use the "description" field to note that you remain open and accessible despite nearby road work. Upload photos that show customers how to find you, where to park, or what the current access situation looks like.

85% of users say contact information and operating hours are the most important details when researching a business ContentGrip — and nearly half plan their travel route immediately after looking up a business. If someone searches for you during construction and finds outdated hours, an incomplete address, or no information about the access situation, they will choose someone else. Not because they don't want to come to you — because they couldn't figure out how.

Your Google Business Profile is your digital storefront. During construction, when your physical storefront may be harder to reach, it becomes the primary thing standing between you and a lost customer.

Step 3: Use Your Email List to Stay in Front of Customers

This is where the rubber meets the road — or, more accurately, where the email meets the inbox while the road is torn up.

60% of consumers prefer to be contacted by brands through email. OptinMonster Email is the only channel through which you can reach your customers directly, without asking them to come to you, without relying on an algorithm to show them your post, and without hoping they happen to drive by and see your sign.

During a construction period, a well-maintained email list lets you do things no other channel can match:

  • Send a heads-up before construction begins, so customers know what to expect

  • Share alternate route or parking instructions with people who already want to hear from you

  • Offer a construction-period promotion to incentivize customers to make the extra effort

  • Send a "we're still here, and the road is open again" message the moment construction wraps up

That last email — the reopening message — is often the most valuable one you'll ever send. It brings back the customers who drifted during construction and re-establishes the habit before it's lost permanently.

Email marketing delivers an average ROI of $36 for every $1 spent Nutshell, and that number looks even better when you consider what it costs to lose a regular customer to a competitor discovered during a two-month road project.

If you don't have an email list yet, start building one now. The construction schedule is already set. You have a window to get ahead of it.

Step 4: Be Visible in Local Search When Physical Visibility Is Reduced

Road construction does something insidious to brick-and-mortar businesses: it reduces your physical visibility. Signage gets obscured by equipment and barriers. Traffic patterns shift, meaning fewer cars drive past your location. The casual, impulse-driven customer who would have pulled in on a normal day doesn't pull in because the construction makes it feel complicated.

The counter to reduced physical visibility is increased digital visibility. When your physical presence becomes harder to see and access, your Google Map Pack ranking, your review volume, and your local search optimization become more important — not less.

42% of searchers click on Google Map Pack results for local queries. BrightLocal During a construction period, the customers who are determined to find you will search. If you're ranking well, with a complete profile and strong reviews, they'll find you and make the effort. If you're not, they'll find your competitor instead.

This is the moment when all of the local SEO work you've done — or haven't done — becomes visible. Construction season is not when you want to discover that your Google Business Profile hasn't been updated in a year.

Step 5: Use Social Media to Tell the Access Story in Real Time

Social media plays a supporting role during construction — not the leading one, since you don't own the channel and can't control who sees what. But it is useful for real-time updates: a photo of the current access situation, a quick video showing customers how to navigate the construction zone, a post confirming you're open when rumors spread that you might not be.

The key is using social media as a supplement to your email list and Google Business Profile, not a replacement for them. Post updates, but make sure you're also capturing email addresses from the customers who engage with those posts, so you have a way to reach them directly next time.

What the Long Game Looks Like

The PennDOT projects scheduled for New Tyburn Road, New Falls Road, Edgely Road, and surrounding Lower Bucks County arteries in 2026 will end. The roads will be smoother. Traffic will return. Customers will come back.

But which customers come back, and to which businesses, will depend in large part on what those businesses did during the disruption. The ones that communicated — that stayed in their customers' inboxes and on their Google screens throughout the construction period — will recover faster and more completely. The ones that went dark, hoping their regulars would just figure it out, will find that some of those regulars figured out a different option instead.

Research is clear that small, single-location businesses are the most vulnerable to revenue loss during road construction — and that chain and multi-location businesses are far better positioned to weather the disruption. Umn The advantage the chains have isn't just budget. It's systems. It's email lists, managed Google profiles, active social accounts, and the infrastructure to communicate with customers when physical access gets complicated.

Independent Lower Bucks County businesses can build those same systems. The cost is modest. The time required is manageable. And the window — between now and when the equipment arrives on New Tyburn Road — is still open.

Use it.

The Construction Season Digital Readiness Checklist

Before PennDOT shows up on your road, run through this list:

Google Business Profile

  • Is your profile claimed, verified, and fully completed?

  • Are your hours, address, and phone number accurate right now?

  • Do you know how to add a post or update your hours from your phone?

  • Have you posted within the last 30 days?

Email List

  • Do you have an email list at all?

  • Can you reach your customers within an hour if access to your business changes suddenly?

  • Are you emailing your list at least once a month — so they recognize your name when you need to send something important?

Local Search Visibility

  • Are you appearing in the Google Map Pack for your primary search terms?

  • Are your citations — your business name, address, and phone number — consistent across Google, Yelp, Apple Maps, and other directories?

  • Do you have enough recent reviews to stand out from competitors who may have better physical access during construction?

Social Media

  • Do you have at least one active social account with a real following?

  • Is there someone who can post updates quickly when the access situation changes?

If you're missing pieces of this checklist, the time to fix them is now — not in July when the lane closures start.

The Bottom Line

PennDOT repaves roads. That's its job, and the Lower Bucks County road network is better for it in the long run. But the construction period is a real, documented threat to the revenue of the small, independent businesses that sit along these corridors — and the research is clear that the businesses most likely to lose customers permanently are the ones that failed to maintain direct communication throughout the disruption.

New Tyburn Road. New Falls Road. Edgely Road. These are your roads. Your customers drive them to reach you. When PennDOT changes how those roads work, your ability to keep those customers will depend almost entirely on whether you have the digital infrastructure to stay connected to them.

The orange cones are coming. The email list, the Google Business Profile, the local search ranking — build them now, while the roads are still clear.

Don't let a road closure close your business.

Ritner Digital builds the digital presence that keeps customers coming even when access is disrupted — from Google Business Profile management to email list strategy and local SEO. When PennDOT shows up on your road, your customers should still be able to find you.

Get ahead of construction season with Ritner Digital →

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Frequently Asked Questions

How much advance notice will I actually get before construction starts on my road?

It varies, and that's part of the problem. PennDOT publishes project schedules and updates them through its website and district communications, but the gap between "scheduled for 2026" and "crews show up Monday" can be surprisingly short. State legislators like Sen. Santarsiero and Rep. Prokopiak do a good job of sharing updates through their offices and local outlets like LevittownNow.com, so following those sources is your best early warning system. The practical answer is: don't wait for the notice. If your road is on PennDOT's 2026 list, treat the digital preparation work as urgent right now. The businesses that scramble after construction starts are always playing catch-up.

My customers have been coming to me for years. Won't they just figure out how to get here during construction?

Some will. Your most loyal regulars — the ones who genuinely love your business and have a strong habit — will make the effort. But research is consistent that construction-period disruptions cause a real, measurable percentage of customers to find alternatives, and that some of those customers simply never return once the habit is broken. You can't control whether your road gets torn up. You can control whether your customers hear from you directly — by email, through your Google Business Profile, on social media — with clear, practical information about how to reach you. The customers who hear from you directly are far more likely to make the effort than the ones who pull up and see orange cones and assume you're closed.

Is it worth investing in local SEO if my business already has a loyal regular customer base?

Yes — and road construction is exactly why. Your regulars already know you. But during a construction period, two things happen simultaneously: your existing customers are less likely to make their routine visit, and new potential customers searching for businesses like yours online are actively choosing between you and your competitors. A strong Google Business Profile with current information, recent photos, and a healthy review count is what wins that second group. Your loyal regulars are your floor. Local search visibility is your ceiling. Construction season is when the ceiling matters most, because the floor gets shakier.

What if the construction isn't directly in front of my business but nearby — does it still affect me?

Yes, often significantly. Construction on a major artery like New Tyburn Road or New Falls Road affects traffic patterns well beyond the immediate work zone. Customers who would normally take a particular route to reach you may detour entirely, bypassing your business without ever intending to. Reduced overall traffic volume on a corridor — even blocks from your location — translates to fewer impulse visits and less visibility for your signage. The digital communications playbook applies equally whether construction is at your front door or a quarter mile away on the road your customers use to get to you.

How do I actually build an email list if I've never done it before?

Start simpler than you think you need to. Pick a free or low-cost platform — Mailchimp, Constant Contact, and Klaviyo all have accessible entry-level options. Create a basic signup form and add it to your website. Then start asking every customer, at every transaction, if you can add them to your email list — explaining what they'll get and how often you'll contact them. For service businesses, the best moment to ask is right after you've completed a job well, when customer satisfaction is highest. For retail or restaurant businesses, a simple counter card or receipt prompt works. Set a goal of adding five new subscribers a week. In six months, you'll have a list of over a hundred opted-in customers — people who specifically said yes to hearing from you. That list is worth more in a construction-season crisis than any amount of social media following.

Once construction is over, do I still need to maintain all of this digital infrastructure?

Absolutely — and the answer isn't really about construction at all. Road work is just the most visible, most time-bounded version of the disruptions that local businesses face regularly. A bad winter. A parking lot repaving. A new competitor opening nearby. A key employee leaving. Any of these can affect your foot traffic and force you to rely on direct customer relationships to hold your business steady. The email list, the optimized Google Business Profile, the active local search presence — these aren't construction-season tools. They're the permanent connective tissue between your business and the community it serves. Construction just makes their absence obvious. Building them now means you're ready for whatever comes next, not just for the orange cones on New Tyburn Road.

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