As he picked up the microphone, Clark Ross gazed out to a sight that had become all too rare: His bar was full of people.
These weren’t regulars drawn to Mercury for a cocktail on that chilly February night. They were Omaha business owners and residents who, like Ross, had struggled under the strain of streetcar construction.
Ross revved his voice as he recounted “the disruption outside our doors” of torn-up streets, diminished parking and ceaseless noise. The city had put them in this mess, and it should help them out of it, he said to roaring applause…