Some 20 Eastchester business owners met with town officials and contractors Tuesday, asking them to halt a $5 million construction project that would result in the closing of a busy road during the holidays.

Entrepreneurs are worried that the year-long project aimed at re-aligning the intersection of Mill Road, Fisher Avenue and White Plains Road will hurt their sales in the days preceding Christmas and New Year?s Eve.

"Right now, I'm going backward,? says Lou Valierioti, owner of a luncheonette. ?I'm not doing the business I normally did, when I first opened up.?

In response to the business owners? concerns, Town Supervisor Anthony Colavita agreed to move the work away from Mill Road until the end of the holiday season, but not suspend it entirely.

"They'll be shifting over to the White Plains Road side," Colavita says. "We can't have our contractors idle- that will cost us thousands of dollars a day."

The re-alignment project is scheduled to continue through next summer.