A large flea market in the Poconos shut down to make way for a large shopping plaza could be getting a break.
Plans are in the works to reopen the old flea market in a new space.
In December 200 vendors at the Pocono Bazaar on Route 209 were asked to pack up and leave.
A new owner bought the site of the flea market in Marshalls Creek and plans to replace it with a grocery store and other shops, but there is hope for those vendors. A plan is in the works to give them a new place to call home.
"The flea market is being redeveloped into a commercial project. A supermarket, pharmacy and a bunch of other rental retail space," said code enforcement officer Wayne Rohner.
Right now groundbreaking for the shopping plaza could take place this spring, but it's a heartbreaking project for the 200 vendors who were booted out.
"This is what allows us to survive or do better than survival," said vendor Ruth Glatt. Selling her homemade, vegan soaps is her main source of income. "It's what we count on. I don't work. This is Keith and my business and this is what keeps us alive."
Glatt and about a dozen other vendors have set up shop right next door to the old location thanks to a fellow vendor and now flea market owner Frank Siano.
"We found this building and able to put in 20 vendors we are working with the township now to open up the outside to get 120 vendors back to work," Siano explained.
The proposed new location of the Marshalls Creek Flea Market is about only 500 feet away from the old Pocono Bazaar.
"He has a wonderful idea for how he is going to expand it and we're hoping to watch it grow and be part of it," Glatt added.
Middle Smithfield Township officials received an application to allow the flea market to relocate to the Liberty Plaza.
A public hearing on that application will be scheduled by the end of the week
