Tucson survivors: Rocco’s Little Chicago endured two years of major road construction — and a pandemic

Anthony “Rocco” DiGrazia doesn’t remember how long the construction project on Broadway lasted. The street was being widened at the doorstep of his beloved, decades-old pizza establishment, Rocco’s Little Chicago.

“At that point we were literally so traumatized we were taking it moment to moment,” he said.

The expansion of Broadway had been approved by voters in 2011. For years leading up to the project, the city sought feedback from stakeholders and community members.

“I was on the committee as a representative of the north-side businesses for 150 hours worth of meetings,” Rocco said. “There was a lot of public input. There was a lot of RTA input and banter back and forth. The road that was designed was designed by the community, which is why everyone hates it ... it’s pissing everybody off equally.”

“Originally it was going to take every building on the north side of the street,” he said; his restaurant sits at 2707 E. Broadway. Instead, the meandering path the main street takes dodges historic buildings and preserves some of the commerce on the north side of the road. 

Rocco was expecting the construction to be disruptive — and it was. “I was planning on a 20% contraction of business,” he said. He posted photos on social media of maps for customers to navigate the dirt frontage road that bypassed the construction.

After a decade of deliberation, the expansion project put up the first traffic cones in February 2020. In just weeks, the businesses that had spent years anticipating a major change would be hit by another transformation — the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We didn’t do dine-in for six months, maybe longer, after the pandemic started — I don’t remember exactly how long, it’s all a blur,” Rocco said. “Initially, we pivoted the best we could to takeout only, we did contactless takeout on the patio ... When nobody could get toilet paper in commercial packs, we could still get big packs of it. So we had a list of groceries we could get, like eggs and flour and yeast and stuff (that civilians couldn’t). We did everything we could to have a positive cash flow.”

“The PPP loans kept me afloat,” Rocco said. “Rio Nuevo gave me some cash, the Sunshine Mile Project. All of this kept me afloat, but my workers kept coming to work and the customers kept coming for pizza. The customers helped us survive.”

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Not every business on Broadway was so lucky.

“Zemam’s had to (temporarily) close because their parking lot was denied by the road widening projects. But he still closed, but he has Zemam’s Too on Speedway that has kept his business alive,” Rocco said. “Everything in Solot Plaza directly to our west left. They didn’t have any parking after the road widening project. I guess there’s been a few businesses tucked back in the Continental Building I’m forgetting.

“But no free-standing structures had anybody open the whole time. Various places are closed. There was a radio station on Broadway, a Hispanic station ... It’s hard to tell what was due to the road widening and what was due to the pandemic,” Rocco said.

Over the quarter century Rocco’s has been in Tucson, the business has endured other challenges, but none as threatening as the combination of the construction and the pandemic.

“[When I started,] I didn’t know how to run a business. I learned as it went on,” Rocco said. “We survived the last recession, too. That one was a little easier because the sorts of restaurants that took a hit then were the less affordable ones. We were positioned as a quality comfort food that people could still afford.”

When COVID fractured us into our germ pods and home offices, Rocco’s persisted as a connecting point, remembering its regulars of the community they love.

“I’ve always felt lucky. I try to treat my employees right and they do well by me. In addition to me having loyal customers, our employees keep us around,” Rocco said.

“Just like, I don’t know man, I seem to have hit something that really resonates with people. I just wanted a neighborhood restaurant that I would go to and I think that’s what people feel when they get in there. I think they feel like they’re part of a family, even though it’s kind of artificial, you know,” Rocco said. “And apparently the food’s good too, so that’s something.”