This summer is the end of outdoor dining in NYC as we know it
After four years of free, loosely regulated outdoor dining, the new program overseen by the city’s Department of Transportation will add fees, limit sidewalk seating and make roadway sheds hew to a few pre-approved designs, which must come down by December but can go back up in April.“People just built like crazy, you could build on the whole block if the landlords let you,” said Manuel Colon, owner ofon the Upper West Side, where he expects to lose half of his 24 outdoor seats.
“Leading up to 2020, rent prices and labor prices were getting to a point where a lot of different kinds of restaurants, their numbers weren’t working anymore,” said Neidich, CEO and founder of Golden Age Hospitality, which operates nightlife hotspots like ACME, The Nines, and Le Dive. “A small little 40-seat restaurant that suddenly gets 30 seats outside…you go from a business that’s barely making it to a business that’s super healthy,” Neidich said. “Those additional seats are so essential to the way the economics of a restaurant work.”
The pandemic opened up sidewalk, roadway and Open Streets dining to everyone for free. Some 12,000 establishments took advantage of the opportunity to expand, according to the Department of Transportation. DiStefano said there was “absolutely zero” chance she would be applying for the new program, citing the cost. She’s frustrated that the city won’t allow her popular shed to at least stay up through the crucial warm months this year.
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