At Babe's Chicken, phones are ringing non-stop, which is always a good thing for a restaurant, except when the most prominent reason for the calls are questions along the lines of, "So, how do I get there?"

Even though Babe's is in a prime Division and Center streets location in downtown Arlington, construction along a 13-mile stretch of rail running parallel to Division Street caused closure of some railroad crossings and forced motorist to navigate a maze of detours over the weekend.

"So people called us wanting to know the easiest route to get to us," said Babe's Manager Howard Ball. "But at least they were calling."

Union Pacific Railroad crews went to work just before the MLK holiday weekend, renewing the railroad track by replacing the old wooden railroad ties with the newer and more modern concrete ones. According to Union Pacific, concrete ties enable trains to operate more smoothly, more efficiently and with less noise. That's good news in the long run for downtown businesses, but some were concerned about the disruption.

"The railroad construction project has certainly challenged our restaurants and other businesses, but they've all had a positive attitude and shown great resolve in overcoming this adversity," said Tony Rutigliano, President & CEO of the Downtown Arlington Management Corporation.

"We greatly appreciate the excellent way in which the City of Arlington communicated with us throughout this project. The detailed information helped us all be well prepared."

Ellie Hernandez, owner of Front and Center Cyclery, which has been selling, repairing and renting an eclectic array of bicycles since October, said she's all for City improvement, "but this has been tough."

Hernandez didn't get the loads of customers expected the first week of classes at UT Arlington.

"I have parents dropping off their kids and trying to get to us, and they can't. So they go to another bike shop - 12 miles away," Hernandez said. "They'd rather go 12 miles away than go through this traffic. Although it really depends on where you are. Some are doing fine."

Mellow Mushroom is one of them. General Manager Loni Neiswander said her pizza restaurant did well over the weekend because traffic trying to get under the rail bridge at West Street came right by her restaurant to do so.

Mellow Mushroom also went on the offensive, reaching out to customers via Facebook to give them an actual route to get to the restaurant.

Burger shop Grease Monkey let the railroad crews know that a $5.50 combo meal specially priced for police officers and fire fighters extended to them.

"The construction did hurt us a little through the weekend. We were down 10, maybe 20 percent," said Grease Monkey General Manager Paul Checkeye. "We have gotten some of the workers in here so that's been nice. But, quite frankly, we're just holding on until it's over."