About 15,000 people visited the renovated mall on the weekend for Maitland Taste Festival, the city’s annual celebration of food, drink and entertainment.

Vendors lined the edge of the street and people wandered ­happily with their friends and ­families past musicians, jugglers, unicycle riders and other entertainers who added to the festive atmosphere on the retail strip.

The event coincided with the opening of a section of High Street that had been partially closed for several months while contractors for Maitland City Council ­completed the first stage of a multi-million dollar mall revamp.

Last week, with the festival only days away, most of The Levee still looked like a construction zone.

But council marketing and communications manager Rachel MacLucas said volunteers, staff and contractor Landscape Solutions had worked hard to make sure the area would be ready for the event.

“It’s been a really massive effort,” she said. 

“The last couple of days really demonstrated that it was worthwhile.

“It has given people a taste of what the area will be like [after all stages of the mall revamp are complete] and people have responded favourably.”

The event was so popular that some stalls began to run out of food yesterday afternoon.

The Maitland Taste Kids’ Patch was popular with families and the staged cooking demonstrations consistently drew on-lookers.

Ms MacLucas said attendance was up by about 1500 this year.

“As far as the event goes, overall we are feeling very happy,” she said. 

“The feedback from the general public, the stall holders and the traders has pretty much been all positive.”