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WAYNE GLOWACKI / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Chez Sophie sur le pont closed this week in the far-from-customer-friendly space.

Everything old could be new again on the Esplanade Riel pedestrian bridge.

Earl Barish, president and CEO of the Salisbury House restaurant chain, said he would consider moving the company back into the space it occupied for seven years.

The restaurant that moved in after Sals moved out, Chez Sophie sur le pont, abruptly closed its doors this week after a year-and-a-half in the far-from-customer-friendly space.

But Barish would want a serious renegotiation of terms before he'd build a little red roof back on the bridge.

KEN GIGLIOTTI / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES The former Sals on the Esplanade Riel was packed on Canada Day in 2005 but the CEO of the restaurant chain says the site was never profitable during its seven-year run there.

"I'm not prepared to take that risk again. The only way I would be interested is if we got a management contract. It would be (the city's), restaurant, their revenue, their costs, their profit or their loss," he said.

Barish said Sals didn't earn a profit in any of the seven years it operated on the bridge. There wasn't enough business during the warmer months to make up for the losses during the cold ones.

On cold winter weekdays, it wasn't unusual to do just a couple of hundred dollars in sales. Business would pick up, sometimes to $1,000 a day, on the weekends.

"It depended so much on the weather. People had to make the extra effort to find a place to park.

"During the week in the winter, nobody in their right mind would want to walk half a mile in the freezing cold to have some eggs," he said.

Barish noted the restaurant's unique location not only required the installation of expensive systems, such as air conditioning and heating, but they were also costly to maintain on a monthly basis.

Sophie and Stephane Wild, the owners of Chez Sophie, were given free rent for the first year of a five-year lease in exchange for extensive renovations totalling $150,000 to $200,000. The couple was paying $2,000 monthly after the first year.

A spokeswoman for the city said it will now look at options for the bridge site.

"Recommendations will be developed and forwarded to elected officials for consideration and direction as warranted," said Michelle Finley.

There is one major difference between Sals' previous time on the bridge and now -- the Canadian Museum for Human Rights is just a short walk away.

Barish said it remains to be seen how many visitors will be hungry for a Nip hamburger after visiting the museum.

"It's possible the revenues could be increased if a lot more tourists are brought into the city," he said.

geoff.kirbyson@freepress.mb.ca