January 23, 2009 – A week after a water pipe burst near the west side of the hotel at Marina City, owners of Amano Italian Trattoria say the restaurant will re-open on February 3.

“A pipe burst,” says Joanne Chessie. “The floor has been extremely damaged. We cannot re-open until the floor has been replaced.”

According to James Terlizzi, part owner of Amano, the water pipe was in the ceiling of Amano’s dining room. “We will have to replace the wood floors to ensure there will be no mold. The repairs could take up to three weeks, after which we will absolutely reopen.”

Amano is part of the BIN 36 Restaurant Group. BIN 36, located directly above Amano, is still open.

It happened late in the afternoon on January 16. Presumably, the bitter cold is to blame. The high temperature that day was three degrees, reached at 11:59 a.m. The low had been minus 18 at 7:57 a.m.

Water from a ruptured pipe also flooded the MTCA meeting room and adjacent offices, ruining the carpet and damaging the floor. The meeting room had been in use the previous day for an MTCA board of directors meeting. No further meetings are scheduled until February 19.

It is not known if damage was confined to just the two locations. Commercial property manager Nathan Hines did not respond to requests for information.