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A coffee shop many residents in the south Silver Spring neighborhood have credited for helping to revitalize the budding area from its industrial past will close Dec. 31 due in part to complications from construction surrounding the store, its owner announced last week.

When Mayorga Coffee Factory opened on Georgia Avenue in 2003, south Silver Spring was transforming from a rundown neighborhood of vacant warehouses to a vibrant one with high-rise apartment buildings and young families.

"We were a perfect fit for the community at that time," said Martin Mayorga, the store's owner. "Any day of the week, at night, you could barely walk through the place.

"It was a really nice natural fit that allowed us to become an anchor in south Silver Spring."

But Mayorga calls the store a "victim of our own success."

When construction began last year on the nearby Veridian Apartments, traffic flow was redirected and parking became limited. Sales dropped 50 percent at the Silver Spring location, Mayorga said. And since construction was completed in the late fall, "many people left and never came back," said Barry Soorenko, who owns the property where Mayorga is located.

Mayorga said increased sales from his eight other locations helped forestall the Silver Spring store's closure, but eventually the losses became too great to endure. The coffee shop had to implement free valet parking during the Veridian construction, an inconvenience for customers looking to grab a quick cup of coffee and be on their way, Soorenko said.

Mayorga wouldn't name the Veridian or any single redevelopment project as the cause for the store's closure but alluded to traffic and parking complications as the death knell for the shop.

"It doesn't take much creativity to look through the timeline and see how an extremely successful location can be closing," he said. "You can see the need for access and traffic flow and make some conclusions."

Mayorga notified the store's 15 employees of the closure Dec. 9. He said there will be efforts to reassign the employees to other positions within the company. He said he would consider opening a new store elsewhere in Silver Spring. The shop has corporate offices and another location in Rockville, as well as a stand in Shady Grove Hospital in Rockville.

Representatives from the Veridian's developer, Chevy Chased-based JBG Companies, declined to comment.

But Soorenko said the Veridian is not all to blame. The developers gave Mayorga a "substantial rent credit" during construction, which supplemented the rent credits Soorenko already gave the coffee shop, he said. Parking spaces in the Veridian's garage are also open to Mayorga customers, and the developer intentionally did not include a coffee shop for the retail component of the project because of its proximity to Mayorga.

"Unfortunately, that business lasted through the entire construction, and now [the Veridian] is near capacity and the business is closing," said Evan Glass, president of the South Silver Spring Neighborhood Association, which held its first formal meeting at Mayorga.

Part of Mayorga's struggles may have been its size as well, Soorenko said.

"The space was very large for a coffee place," Soorenko said. "They were a little more than a coffee place, but they weren't quite a restaurant."

Before the economy hit its downturn, Soorenko offered to divide Mayorga's space and bring in an additional retail tenant, but Mayorga declined. But when the economy worsened, Mayorga asked Soorenko to reconsider dividing the space, which, at $150,000 in retrofitting costs, had become too expensive, Soorenko said.

Even after it is closed, Mayorga will pay out its lease while Soorenko searches for a new tenant, which he hopes can be another coffee shop, he said.

Mayorga's closing has some worrying about the future of independent businesses in south Silver Spring. Soorenko's sister, Susan Soorenko, owner of Moorenko's Ice Cream next door to Mayorga, had to close shop from January to April of this year, partly because of construction at the Veridian and limited pedestrian access. The Alchemy arts store at 8025 Georgia Ave. closed in late 2007 because there wasn't enough parking for customers.

"That was the problem in Silver Spring, you had to try and drag people out of the big box stores," said Brenda Smoak, Alchemy's former owner, who has since left Silver Spring and reopened the store in Bradenton, Fla., in August. Smoak said she had 3,000 people on Alchemy's e-mail list, but they complained access to the store prevented them from supporting it.

While mainstays like Crisfield Seafood Restaurant have been in south Silver Spring for more than 50 years, it's troubling that newer businesses can't survive in the neighborhood, especially ones as popular as Mayorga, its owner said.

"We've been so tight with the community, it's a very emotional thing for us," said Mayorga, who noted that the shop hosted everything from community meetings to a surprise visit from President Barack Obama in February. "It's like a bad break-up."

From Dec. 24 to when the store closes Dec. 31, Mayorga Coffee Shop, located at 8040 Georgia Ave. in Silver Spring, will be offering all coffee drinks and espresso drinks for free.