Thousand Oaks Merchants, Shoppers Hope for Light at End of Tunnel : Renovation: Work on Janss Mall has created a mess for all. Thirty tenants are waiting out the construction, expected to end in October.

Amid the scaffolding, rebar and piled-up bricks are the clues that the Janss Mall is ready for shoppers despite the chaos.

“Open During Construction,” the signs read, peeking out from the awnings where workers are perched drilling, sawing and troweling mortar as part of the mall’s $60-million renovation.

Without those signs, shoppers might never know that eager merchants await behind the torn exterior.

Once inside, it’s not much easier to tell. Hard-core shoppers share space with tool-belted construction workers in hard hats.

Wood-paneled, lantern-lit tunnels transport both from storefront to storefront, the workers climbing ladders above the stores to continue their work, the shoppers heading inside to look for bargains.

Janss Mall shoppers scoff at those who complain about a renovation project like that in downtown Ventura, which causes such mere inconveniences as forcing passersby to walk on one side of the sidewalk while workers pave the other.

They joke that the mall should start an advertising campaign urging Janss shoppers to bring their hard hats as well as their wallets.

“I shop here because I like the stores, and a little construction is not going to stop me,” said Carolyn Schaefer of Moorpark, raising her voice above the din of a drill as sawdust landed in her hair. “Besides, it’s pretty . . . well, it was pretty.”

Merchants look forward to the end of construction even more than the shoppers.

“Business has dropped off substantially,” said Joe Ehret, who owns Nicki’s Coffee Espressions with his wife, Nicki.

“But anyone who tells you that they weren’t [told of] the project in the beginning isn’t being honest.”

Ehret thinks that business will pick up in October, when the 37-year-old mall might actually resemble a retail center again.

“It’s going to be very rewarding for those of us who stayed here,” Ehret likes to tell his workers and customers. “That’s when we’ll see the light at the end of the tunnel.”

Anna Mendelsa, manager of Bloom’s Flowers, said the construction has been hard on her business, especially in the beginning. “For the smaller stores, it’s a little tougher to hang in there. But we’re hanging in there.”

Other merchants have not been as patient. The mall has 30 tenants waiting out the construction, down from 40 before the work began.

Property manager Bill Mendelsohn said that’s the sacrifice the mall had to make to complete construction in a year rather than spreading it over several years. He hopes to recoup some lost leases when construction is finished.

“We figured we would inconvenience the stores and get this over with sooner rather than let the renovation drag on,” he said.

In addition to refurbishing storefronts, builders have torn up almost the entire mall and parking lot to make way for a new infrastructure, including new water and electrical lines, and storm drains.

Mendelsohn said the destruction is over, and workers will now build up new retail buildings, adorning them with aesthetic structures like fountains, sculptures and murals.

Mervyn’s, Linens ‘n Things and a nine-screen movie theater will be anchors once construction is completed.

Meanwhile, merchants will depend upon brave shoppers like Irene Ayalla and Vicki Wells, both workers at the nearby Oaks mall who stole away Tuesday afternoon for shopping and sushi.

“We get tired of our mall sometimes,” Wells said.