Cap d'Agde: quays of Trinquette and Beaupré, these traders who want to be compensated

Some of the Capagathois traders who requested compensation from Sodéal, in vain. FREE MIDI – OLIVIER RAYNAUD

The winter construction site weighed on the cash flow of certain professionals, who turned to Sodéal to obtain compensation for the damage suffered. But the company managing the ports of Cap d'Agde doesn't hear it that way.

There are not many of them that remain open for part of the winter, or even at the very beginning of spring, but on the quays of Trinquette and Beaupré, at the Center Port du Cap d&rsquo ;Agde, traders are determined to make their voices heard.

Weeks of work and closure

On this gloomy Monday morning, they arranged to meet us at Marie-Clara Rahem's ready-to-wear boutique Lik’, which alone symbolizes the problems encountered by these professionals this winter, while the docks had a new look. Last December, she already regretted in our columns the fact of not having been informed until very late, in October, of the completion of this project. "With the work, it's difficult for customers to come while I have a store full of winter items", she worried, before having to close shop for two months, in January and February.

From Didier Chaze, who operates an optical store and the SaVana boutique, to Marco, manager of the restaurant La Table de la Mer, or Fabienne Varesano, the municipal councilor of the Rassemblement National, who operates a clothing store on the Quai de la Trinquette, seven of them contacted Sodéal, the company managing the ports of Cap d’Agde, which undertook this renovation work, to obtain compensation for their loss.

The traders asked for 10,000 € each

If their economic situation is otherwise less alarming than that of the traders on the Promenade and rue Jean-Jacques Rousseau, in the heart of the city, who have also obtained nothing of the City, they discussed with Sodéal compensation of 10,000 € by business and free terrace rights for this year. Complaints collected by President Stéphane Hugonnet, without however the applicants obtaining anything. "It’is a categorical no and a lack of consideration", believes Didier Chaze, very upset, like his peers.

Some, once Sodéal's refusal was made official, "a priori at the end of June" tells us – we do not refrain from taking the matter to court.

Stéphane Hugonnet, president of Sodéal, and its director David Masela could not be reached on Monday May 27. I subscribe to read more