"There's nothing we can do about it - we're not in Europe," sighed the taxi driver. "In Europe they close off a street for a week, turn everything upside down, finish and reopen it." It was noontime one day at the beginning of the month, on Ibn Gabirol Street in Tel Aviv. The cab was crawling from south to north, and the sight was reminiscent of a scene from the film "The Blaumilch Canal": Bulldozers were digging, pipes were strewn about everywhere and clouds of dust were rising. "It's not exactly the boulevard we wanted," notes Nurit Raveh, owner of the Espresso Bar chain, which has a branch on the street, "but it still stands a chance."

Ibn Gabirol, which is being renovated in segments from south to north, has become the main axis of eateries in the city. Indeed, there are those, like chef Zachi Bukshester, who call it "the longest shopping mall in Tel Aviv."

Says Dr. Benny Maor, who is in charge of administration and infrastructure at the Tel Aviv-Jaffa Municipality: "Ibn Gabirol Street is the city's main avenue. A vibrant street where there is an appropriate mix of businesses and residential neighborhoods." According to him, the municipality will widen the sidewalks on each side by a meter, expand the road itself and narrow the traffic islands in the center. In addition, it will refurbish the street's trade-mark arcade - which allows one to walk beneath the buildings and to be protected from rain and sunshine - where the restaurants and eateries are located. It will be painted white and lighting poles will be affixed to it.

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One isn't enough

Nearly all the familiar coffee-shop chains have a local representative on Ibn Gabirol. In addition, there are also four branches of the Lechem Tushia bakery, four fine chocolatiers' shops, and a host of fast-food places offering shawarma, tortillas, felafel and sushi. It appears that every store on the street that closes is reopened as some sort of culinary institution, which joins the more veteran institutions - from the Idit Bakery to Crown of the East. In the middle of them all, like a magnet, stands The Brasserie restaurant that hums 24 hours a day and was opened five years ago by Mati and Ruthie Brodo, the owners of Coffee Bar. The restaurant's success is unusual here, in part because it was opened without any public relations. According to the proprietors, building the restaurant in a central location across from Rabin Square attracted a lot of attention, and this became the most effective vehicle for publicity.

There are those for whom one branch on Ibn Gabirol isn't enough. According to Noam Berman, the deputy director for marketing at Aroma Israel, consumer behavior in Tel Aviv is like that in New York: "There, they don't cross the street for a cup of coffee, but will look for the nearest, most convenient corner."

"I opened one store a month and a half ago and I'm already opening another one down the street. Each block here is not connected to the previous one," says Gil Bar Haim, the proprietor of the relatively new La Paneria bakery, who opened his first branch in the Ra'anana industrial zone. "These are distinct areas."

The abundance of eateries on Ibn Gabirol Street integrates into the plans for refurbishing the street and transforming it into a broad boulevard. Tamir Ben Shahar, who holds a master's degree in urban construction, links consumers' needs and financial abilities to the locations of businesses throughout the country. His firm, Czamanski-Ben Shahar, specializes in advising business owners and municipalities alike, and recommend what they consider to be the most successful locations for commercial centers and for branches of chains.

After he planned the combination of businesses in commercial centers (power centers) on the outskirts of cities, and advised mall managements and retail chains from IKEA to Castro, Ben Shahar is now declaring the death of the shopping mall. In the revival of Ibn Gabirol Street he sees the return to city centers. "A mall doesn't offer a shopping experience - it's functional. You want something and you go there to buy it. But if you also want to enjoy yourself, mingle among people and seek variety - you choose a street," he asserts. "A shopping mall is a beige-colored box that people go in and out of and they get tired of it. For the chains, the malls are becoming very expensive. They see that at the Tel Aviv Port, for example, or on Dizengoff Street, you can obtain a good intake for a quarter of the rent, and they are asking for the street."

Ben Shahar is now planning the commercial side of Jerusalem's downtown area, as well as that of the Sarona project in Tel Aviv (the neighborhood near the Kirya, where the Templar houses were located). "I'm optimistic," he says. "The market forces are dictating a return to the street, and they have planning power greater than any architect who tries to dictate trends."

Commercial instincts

There are business proprietors who are examining the municipality's plans and opening branches in accordance with careful market surveys (like the coffee-shop chains), and there are those who rely on their commercial instincts. For example, the veteran chef Motti Schwartz, who opened Sabih Hachef across from the Gat Cinema, is waiting for the opening of the rental housing that will be built on top of the cinema.

Zachi Bukshester believes that what is happening on Ibn Gabirol reflects a new need in the restaurant world for "fast-food chef" restaurants: carefully prepared food with good ingredients, served quickly in a convenient location and priced in the reasonable-to-inexpensive range. In other words, stylish joints.

"People are less obsequious today toward chefs and applaud them less for works of art," he says. "They want to stretch out in comfortable clothes, eat well and pay a reasonable price. Places like Ibn Gabirol provide this with restaurants like Minna Tomei, Il Pastaio, Amore Mio or Giraffe. The cafes along the street are pleasant spots: After all, people don't want to sit in a shopping mall and not see the sunlight. It's much more pleasant to sit outdoors."

Concerning the aggregation of eateries, Bukshester comments: "In every restaurant that opens, the first question that comes up is the location. I believe that if there are a lot of restaurants in one place, everybody benefits. Diners know that they will find something to eat."

Rimon Ben Yakir opened the Giraffe restaurant a decade ago. Even then, he says, he wanted to create "'The Gap' of food," as he puts it, "of a good standard at a medium price. This is the leading trend nowadays: People aren't prepared to pay a lot for food. Their budget is limited and with that budget the restaurateur has to be creative. Ibn Gabirol Street provides this possibility. It is surprising, because usually restaurants on main streets aren't successful - the surroundings are too noisy."

In the opinion of Nurit Raveh of the Espresso Bar chain, even here the noise and the busy traffic on the street can work to the disadvantage of businesses, which seek appropriate solutions. "It's terribly noisy here. Table time is relatively short. There are boulevards where people sit for longer than on this street. Here people come and grab something along the way. They're in a hurry. This isn't the Champs Elysees. We wanted to be on the street," she adds, "but when we realized that many people are in a rush, we also opened a stand for take-away coffee and food, adjacent to the cafe. People take sandwiches on their way to the bus or to the office, take carriers with coffee and buy food to bring home."