DOT’s Dining Out NYC Program
Rule status: Adopted
Agency: DOT
Effective date: March 3, 2024
Proposed Rule Full Text
Notice-of-Hearing-and-Proposed-Rules-DOT-Outdoor-Dining-Rules-FINAL-with-certifications-accessible-10-20.pdf
Adopted Rule Full Text
DOT-Notice-of-Adoption-DOT-Dining-Out-NYC-Rules-Accessible.pdf
Adopted rule summary:
NYC DOT's adopted rule establishes requirements relating to NYC DOT’s Dining Out NYC program, including the granting of licenses and revocable consents for sidewalk and roadway cafes, operational requirements and siting and design criteria for sidewalk and roadway seating areas, and enforcement procedures.
Comments are now closed.
Online comments: 446
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Robbee Fian
I am a Hells Kitchen resident. The outdoor dining sheds around the city have been fabulous! First they offer a safe place to dine with less concerns about sharing viruses. They have brought both life and creativity to our streets. It is wonderful to see people outside, sitting, laughing and enjoying themselves. The new proposal is nonsense. Roofs and enclosures make all the difference between comfort and an impossible situation. The roofs block sun and rain while walls protect us from the wind and side rain as inclement weather can happen during any season at a moments notice. Also many of the sheds have fans and heaters to keep patrons comfortable, the new design will eliminate these. Demanding a homogenized cookie cutter design rips at the soul of what this city is about. We want fewer cars on our streets and the sheds actually help in that respect. Please rethink this proposal and create something that benefits both the residents and the restaurants who have put so much money and thought into building and maintaining these structures. Thank you.
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Jason Rabinowitz
Outdoor dining has been a huge benefit to the city’s restaurant business and has proven that a repurposing of a tiny amount of curb space for something other than free parking for cars was badly needed. As such, this program must be modified to allow for restaurants to utilizing street space for the full year. The cost of taking down, storing, and re-clearing the space to setup annually will artificially suppress the success of this program. New Yorkers have shown since 2020 that using street space for outdoor dining *year round* is a success. Not all restaurants have adequate sidewalk space for outdoor dining, and restricting for no real purpose the time of year they can utilize street space will completely remove the ability for many restaurants to do any outdoor dining.
Do the right thing and make this program year-round for all types of outdoor dining setups. Or maybe make it so that cars can’t park on the street during the same months, make all users play by the same rules.
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Stephen Fenning
New York planners don’t even know how to separate large dogs and small dogs on the Hudson Parks Dog outlets. Now you want to create a plan that would take away creative NYC restaurants outdoor space and change them into what your unlimited and uncreative way of thinking the Restaurant outdoor space should look like. STOP over thinking this, you are creating more of a mess. Let the restaurants do the look they want as long as it is clean, safe for the public and NYC. That’s what your job should be, talk to the restaurant owners before setting up a situation that makes more of a mess in NYC, Your ideas need to go into the trash and you should go out and find a way to help, not hurt the restaurants and owners in NYC. Do us all a favor and think before you bring these awful solutions to our great creative city. Talk to all the owners of restaurants first and don’t move ahead with your awful plans. You’re not doing the right action with this issue. Thank you.
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Laura Dartnall
During Covid I appreciated the need to provide restaurants and diners with outdoor space to eat when it wasn’t safe to be inside. Now that has changed and yet we still have empty sheds everywhere that create congestion, noise and garbage pollution. Before Covid, restaurants were not allowed to have outdoor space on residential cross streets. I believe we should go back to that rule. There are two restaurants across from my apartment that have outdoor spaces on both the avenue and narrower cross blocks. I live on the UWS on a residential narrow cross block and we have two restaurant sheds that take up a significant portion of the road. Beyond creating a safety hazard crossing the block with kids and elderly people, they create noise and significantly increased an already rampant rat population. Also eliminate 6 parking spots for the neighborhood and making it impossible to get out of a car or unload bags without blocking the entire block. I believe sheds should not be allowed on residential narrow cross streets and go back to our city rules that were designed to reduce noise, garbage, and rats in residential neighborhoods.
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Violet
The deserted outdoor dining areas are occupying a significant amount of space designated for parking, leading to an increase in double-parked cars and less space for residents. This lack of available parking also impacts visitors who wish to support neighboring small businesses. This surge in tolling and parking-related challenges is already causing hardship. It’s important to remember that not everyone can walk or bike due to mobility limitations, and they rely on cars for disability assistance.
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William Huergo
What is the requirement for pedestrian paths on sidewalks when there are tree pits present. Minimum 8 ft , then reduce that by 4 ft because of tree pit does not leave enough space on sidewalks for pedestrians
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Matthew Danowski
Outdoor dining is a good concept. Enclosed structures are a bad implementation of it that brings blight, rats, garbage, and other problems. Prohibit enclosed structures BOTH on the sidewalk and the street unless otherwise permitted through the DOB or DOCA. There are many instances of restaurants literally building expansions on the sidewalk, with no respect to NYC Building Codes or standards.
Recommend adding rule that requires all sidewalk structures to be removed in the event of street repaving or other construction work. Current practice involves paving crews literally going around these structures and not fully resurfacing the street.
Recommend adding verbiage that the building owner (e.g. Landlord) has the responsibility for ultimately paying fines for noncompliance, and/or paying for the removal of street structures should a previous tenant default or otherwise close. Abandoned structures for closed restaurants are becoming more common and there isn’t a trail of liability for these things.
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Nick Huober
Hello — I am a resident of the Upper West Side. During the pandemic and after, I have enjoyed roadway and sidewalk dining. I support establishing a permanent roadway dining program with strong regulations to prevent unsightly, underutilized or unsafe roadway dining structures.
-I oppose the “Vertical Screening” Design Requirements for Roadway Cafes on Page 20 of the Proposed Rule. Vertical Screens above 42 inches that are near crosswalks block the view of oncoming traffic for pedestrians waiting to cross the street. Vertical screenings above 42 inches are a safety hazard for pedestrians and should either be prohibited or should be required to be opaque/transparent.
-I strongly support establishing a licensing and fee structure for roadway dining. There are many roadway dining sheds that are unused or poorly maintained. I believe the requirement to pay a fee, submit an application, and comply with design standards will provide an incentive for owners of these sheds to take them down. This will have the effect of beautifying our streetscape while allowing successful roadway sheds to continue operation.
Thank you!
Nick Huober
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Erica Brody
KEEP OUTDOOR DINING STRUCTURES OPEN ALL YEAR LONG, NOT JUST APRIL THRU NOV.
Esp given recent winter temps, there’s lots of missed opportunity if they’re closed for winter. Humans need more outdoor time. -
Donald Z Schweter
To whom it may concern,
– Placing a floor on road bed will create hiding places for rats and vermin.
– Prior to Covid, I saw no rats on the street in front of my office.
– As soon as these structures were erected, rats were seen by myself daily. They would scurry from sight and dissappear under these floors.
– As soon as these structures were erected, the streets smelled due to the lack of cleaning under the floor structures. It smelled like death in front of my office…
– As soon as these structures were erected the traffic on my block where my office is bogged down due to lack of parking as well as blocking a whole lane on opposite side. I see this occurring on many other streets too.If these Road bed restaurant extensions are to continue, the floors need to be lifted and inspected once a week. Especially in the summer right after garbage collection.
I am against road bed cafes due to health concerns with detritus, vermin infestations, garbage, smells, poor air quality due to above and additional traffic.
Suggestions:
– NO road bed cafes.
– Expand sidewalks to create room for traditional sidewalk cafe’s…
– Create laws about deliveries and allowable times. Such as 6am to 8am and again from 7pm to 9pm daily. Not allowing Sunday deliveries…
– Create special Use Group for food establishments… (remove from Commercial Use Group 6)
– Create special restaurant designated Zones where bulk regulations, occupancy, traffic, street shaping, etc are more controlled
– Require ALL food establishments including Bodeges, delis, markets, restaurants, franchises, kiosks in buildings to have REFRIGERATED GARBAGE STORAGE under sidewalk vaults.
– Refrigerated garbage storage to be vermin proof and have a floor drain for cleaning.
– Require Sanitation workers to enter REFRIGERATED Garbage Storage to retrieve garbage instead of placing on street.Sincerely,
Donald Zachary Schweter, R.A. -
Zachary Kazzaz
I’m happy to see that outdoor dining will continue to be an essential lifeline for restaurants in NYC. However, I am deeply disappointed by the restrictive rules around the rules around enclosure. The period from April – October includes significantly varying weather, with frequent participation. By barring restaurants from having fixed roofs and walls, diners will be readily exposed to the elements. I am concerned for several reasons. 1) Diners could be sitting just a few feet from running cars, without any physical barrier. Drivers have also shown time and time again that they are less likely to impede on spaces reserves for pedestians, and i worry the low walls will lead to additional incidents of cars and trucks hiting dining shed. 2) In the spring and fall, restaurants will be required to return to use of space heaters, which are extremely environmentally inefficient. Lacking enclosures is a poor climate safe solution, which we cannot absorb given our climate emergency. 3) the dining experience itself, if diners sit and it starts to rain or the temperature changes, they will be unable to finish meals.
I commend the city for advancing open dining, but i strongly recommend allowing the development of more fixed structures to allow restaurants to thrive. I also agree that the dining sheds should be made year-round.
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Megan
The expansion of outdoor dining options has continued to allow for people to patronize businesses in a safer outdoor setting. It is especially important not to forget high-risk individuals and those who care for them and allow for outdoor options to remain year round. Considering how many businesses often have full tables in outdoor settings, I imagine they also appreciate the added financial opportunities outdoor dining affords. Please continue to grant and uphold licenses to businesses able to participate in this incredible and socially just option year-round in NYC.
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Henry Mei
Outdoor dining should be permitted during all months of the year. If the removal of parking for outdoor dining can be justified for any month of the year, it can absolutely be justified for all months of the year.
There should be more detailed instruction on what restaurants located at streets corners should do if they wish to participate in the outdoor dining program. Daylighting at intersections is important, but it can also be done in a way that allows for non-intrusive outdoor dining. Perhaps have special rules and guidelines for restaurants on street corners, as to not completely prohibit them for participating in outdoor dining while still daylighting intersections.
Long term, this bill should also give provisions to physically rebuild the curb and extend it into parking lanes. This way restaurants can move their outdoor dining setups onto the sidewalk directly adjoining their storefront (i.e. sidewalk cafes). With the expanded sidewalk, pedestrians can walk in where the temporary outdoor dining sheds currently are located.
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Jeff Schwane
Please allow restaurants to operate YEAR-ROUND. Part of the reason for expanding outdoor dining was to give people healthier options to eat with more ventilation during winter when respiratory illnesses are more common. In addition, restaurants will be burdened by needing to make the shelters removable, which means they need to store them, and they won’t be of as high quality. We need this space year-round for people, not giving away free parking to private individuals.
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Daniel C
Guidelines are understandable but Totally homogenizing outdoor seating is sad. Also, there’s no reason that the seating shouldn’t allowed to be enclosed and rain resistant. It rains in NYC during the 9 months they are proposing these structures. Why have restaurants lose out on their reservations and income for no reason? As long as the restaurants agree to remove the structure if required by the city, they should be allowed to put up structures that will actually help them survive NYC’s weather.
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Andon
I worry that the seasonal rules will destroy outdoor dining as we know it. If it isn’t year round, restaurants will divest in quality spaces. Where will they store everything during the off months?
The community deserves a clear explanation for why you’d take the nice infrastructure that has been built rip it out for lower quality temporary infrastructure.
It feels like you’re trying to knee cap the program increasing the chances of parking taking back over.
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Danyell Thillet
As an immune compromised person, outdoor dining has allowed me to maintain some semblance of normalcy and a social life during the pandemic. It deeply troubles me that these new rules would prevent access during the wintertime, when disabled people are the most isolated. The colder months already offer so few opportunities to safely spend time outside of the home. Outdoor dining was such a godsend, and these new rules are taking something away from us that we truly need to still be citizens of this city.
Please extend all outdoor dining types to be available all-year-round, pending proper heating and vermin control.
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Danielle
The lack of year-round roadside dining will limit the availability of restaurant dining to people with disabilities and those still taking precautions against covid-19.
Not allowing restaurants to have year round roadside dining will harm their revenues. December is one of the highest volume tourist seasons; restaurants serve more people, hire more employees, and generate more revenue. Even in winter, the outdoor dining options I encounter in Brooklyn are always being used, and are often completely full of diners on the weekend. Our current climate crisis has produced relatively mild winters, with little snowfall, there is no substantive reason to require the removal of outdoor dining structures.
Roadway cafes should be allowed to maintain a roof and walls so long as one side is completely open to the sidewalk. This allows for adequate ventilation and limits pests.
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Barrie Covington
For the immunocompromised, outdoor dining is a lifeline. Covid will always be with us and indoor dining is not possible for people with serious health issues.
Having 4 months without this option is unnecessarily restrictive. That is 1/3 of the year.
A compromise would be to allow dining from March 1st rather than April.
Also, allowing dining during the December holidays would be helpful, when people with immune issues would otherwise be isolated at home. The winters have been warmer, so the issues with snow removal may not occur during December.
I appreciate you taking my comments into consideration.
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Steven Cobb
I support the move for universal guidelines for these structures as well as the provision for them being seasonal. There should be, however, clear requirements regarding daily cleaning, garbage removal, and rat abatement consistent with expectations for indoor eateries. There should be a universal expectation that outdoor dining structures be maintained in a manner consistent with the City’s efforts to reduce its rat population. Again, these structures should, in any way, contribute to an increase in a neighborhood’s rat population.
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Daniel Higgins, Jr
The most important thing is that the rules balance the needs of restaurants while also respecting the needs of the city and the residents. Extravagant enclosed outdoor structures that basically extend the inside of the restaurant are not necessary and are not truly “outdoor” dining anyway. For inclement or cold weather the structures just take up space and are unused by the vast majority of restaurants, save for a few that have basically built full external restaurants with climate control. I feel that the rules set a nice balance, they will improve the aesthetic appeal of the outdoor sheds while enhancing the public and visitors’ ability to enjoy dining outside in the 2/3rds of the year it is feasible anyhow. By having them removed in winter they will not become decrepit and vermin infested.
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Jack Farzan
I am a Brooklyn resident, and a Manhattan commuter. I think the proposed rules for outdoor dining will end up hurting restaurant owners and their customers a lot more than the rules will end up helping them. During the pandemic, outdoor dining was vital for keeping these businesses open, and it has given NYC a much more welcoming air. It’s great to see people laughing and talking in dining sheds year round, where those spaces would normally be reserved for private vehicles. Plus, the city gains a lot more income from taxes from a dozen diners versus one car parked for free in the same spot. While I can understand the proposal to remove any shed left unused for 30 days – I have seen a few in many neighborhoods that have been abandoned – the seasonal requirement seems so detrimental. Many sheds are outfitted with heaters and are built to withstand weather, why couldn’t they be up all year? And why charge the restaurants so many fees to use the space when cars park there for free? I do understand keeping the away from the crosswalks, but again that is a rule that has never been enforced on parked vehicles. To me, the proposed plan here is far too focused on placating the vocal minority of car owners in this city, versus actually aiding New York’s incredible dining and bar scene. Car owners would balk if they had to pay for their spaces or could only park during a certain time of year, so why are we placing those rules on something that actually benefits the city’s revenue and culture?
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Asher Sarnoff
Hello,
Thank you for allowing the public to comment on this important issue. I am writing to ask that you stop the outdoor seating for restaurants completely, as well as remove all sidewalk and street seating at once. I am a long time resident of Manhattan. Many restaurants are near my building and in my area. when you allowed outdoor seating, many restaurants began to build complex enclosed structures, more akin to small houses than outdoor sheds. This construction was multiplied at times by other construction work going on after the covid 19 restrictions were lifted. It literally turned some neighborhoods into unlivable areas with restaurants thinking they could set up loud circular saws in the street and using hammers, loud drills and other noisy equipment as if the street was their saw mill. Some of this work was also done on weekends further angering many. This noise went on for many months and ruined many people’s summers and their peace of mind they had on weekends. All enclosed sidewalk sheds should be removed immediately and those in the roadway as well since the covid 19 pandemic was not even a real pandemic. Mask wearing is ineffective therefore all restaurants can return to full indoor seating, making outdoor seating unnecessary. I want my old neighborhood back and city back. Remove all outdoor seating immediately and never let it be built again. Open seating outside doesn’t stop the problem. The sidewalks are for the movement of pedestrians, not seating for restaurants. A restaurant only rents the space inside they have power over, that doesn’t always extend to the sidewalk for additional seating, the pedestrians right of way comes first. I pay a lot of taxes to live here I shouldn’t have to be living in an open construction zone so some restaurant owner can pad his pocket with extra seating at the public’s expense and at the expense of my sanity and peace and quiet.
Thank you.
Sincerely,
Asher Sarnoff
Manhattan. -
Zoë Beery
Year-round outdoor dining is the only good thing that came out of the pandemic. It makes the city more livable and welcoming and serves as a reminder that New Yorkers are resilient people who always find a silver lining even in the darkest of times. I smile every time I see my neighbors spending time together in one of the sheds. But as written, these regulations would destroy outdoor dining. Listen to business owners, and don’t take away something New Yorkers treasure. If the concern is street space perhaps do something first about the city’s absurd policy of free, unpermitted parking.
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Emiliano
Hello, Thanks for this opportunity.
My proposal is to identify a series of exceptions and amendments that would make it possible for all commercial establishments to create these spaces on sidewalks and streets equally. The reason appears undemocratic, as often some restaurants have minor architectural barriers (such as fire hydrants, lampposts, trees, bike racks) that make it impossible to apply the general rule. Unfortunately, a discriminatory atmosphere has been created among restaurant patrons, resulting in this: those with an outdoor space are good, and those without one are not. Not giving EVERYONE the opportunity to create an excellent and beautiful outdoor space due to the reasons listed above would be a significant risk for many honest and highly important restaurants.
We should prioritize the beauty of design and safety, offering flexibility on certain rules when these urban barriers obstruct the establishment of a commercial space. Therefore, we should provide the opportunity for an in-person hearing, along with a licensed architect, for restaurant owners facing these challenges to work together to resolve them without creating insurmountable laws that benefit some while penalizing others. This isn’t just about creating an outdoor space; it’s about entire families who have invested their lives in their restaurant and want to offer the best to their customers and their city.
Thank You very Much. -
Marcus Ziemke
I’m a long-time resident of the West Village, and have appreciated deeply the transformation of the streetscape as a result of outdoor dining, giving more space to the pedestrian domain. I’m really disappointed to read the strict regulations regarding outdoor structures, that restaurants would have to adhere to. In particular, restaurants should be allowed to maintain enclosed spaces, and they should be allowed to have them year-round. The street-scape shouldn’t be dominated by parked cars, which to me also seems in line with the purpose of introducing congestion charges. Please reconsider the current proposed rules to include those changes, and make it easier for New Yorkers to keep enjoying the city from the pedestrian perspective.
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David Ruder
Assistant Commissioner Craven –
I am a New Yorker who has relied on robust outdoor dining structures for the past few years to stay healthy, patronize restaurants I love, and be safely social. I am immunocompromised and have long Covid symptoms, so I am very careful when gathering with others and when eating. I have avoided dining indoors since March 2020, but I have made extensive use of our city’s expanded curbside dining.
The proposed changes to curbside dining structures would be detrimental to the health of New Yorkers and the business of our food sector. We need to make outdoor dining less expensive and more possible, rather than undo its expansion, one of the silver linings that has emerged in the past few years.
Requiring structures to not have sturdy roofs will ensure they are less useful in a world of more and more extreme weather. The two months of rainy Saturdays that we are currently going through is a great reminder of how detrimental flimsier structures will be to the chance of socializing outdoors.
With the high cost of commercial rent and ingredients, NYC restaurants deserve every help they can get to continue to exist today, and expanded seating is a boon to that end. Elderly and immunocompromised New Yorkers deserve safe ways to interact with what our city has to offer, and if outdoor dining structures are reduced, we will not move indoors, we will simply disappear from public life. That is unacceptable.
I urge you to continue to allow robust structures at low cost moving forward. There are so many reasons why it is a benefit to our city.
Sincerely,
Comment attachment
Dave Ruder
Brooklyn, NY
in-support-of-outdoor-dining.pdf -
Lucy Drotning
It seems the new rules for roadway cafes would allow them to be located in a parking spot that is on the opposite side of a bike lane from the sidewalk. If servers and patrons have to walk through an active bike lane (as they do now at several locations on Amsterdam) to get to the outdoor tables, it’s really dangerous. This shouldn’t be allowed under the new rules.
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Shayna Finman
Outdoor dining is a mess. We desperately need standards and regulations. It’s insane that in a city which highly regulates all buildings we have been allowing ramshackle shanties in our streets. It is an eyesore. It encourages rats. It prevents the streets from being cleaned. It prevents the streets from being plowed during snow storms. It prevents emergency vehicles from navigating streets. Many of the shacks are even fully enclosed, meaning they are not outdoor dining anymore, they are a land grab of public space by private business, without paying for the use of that space. Many of them do not get cleaned regularly, many do not get used regularly, many are left abandoned. People who lived on quiet blocks before are now forced to listen to music and loud taking outside their windows until late at night. I absolutely do not support the continuation of roadside dining. However, were it to continue, it should follow the following guidelines:
-Roadside dining should only be allowed May through October, it is entirely too cold for outdoor dining in April and November, and certainly too cold in winter
-All outdoor dining should conclude by 9pm, and all cleaning/work in the outdoor sidewalk or street cafe should conclude by 10pm
-Designed to prevent rats living under them
-Designed to actually be open to the air, outdoor dining should be outside
-No resturant should be allowed to set up a roadside structure larger than it’s storefront, I have seen some roadside sheds that are half a city block long, for one resturant, covering multiple storefronts, seating many many many more people outside than ever sat inside
-Roadside dining should only be allowed on streets that are wide enough to still navigate with emergency vehicles such as fire trucks, delivery trucks, cleaning trucks, and garbage trucks
-Roadside dining should either have to be dismantled every week for street cleaning, or restaurants should be responsible for cleaning the street outside the roadside dining shed, and should be fined for failing to comply
-Sidewalk dining should only be allowed on sidewalks that are wide enough for people to still walk and pass comfortably
-Sidewalk dining should only be allowed on one side of the sidewalk, preferably that closest to the physical restaurant, allowing a clear corridor for pedestrians on the side next to the curb
-Sidewalk dining should be clearly delineated, not flimsy outdoor chairs strewn half hazardly around at night, presenting a tripping hazard to the elderly
-Restaurants should proactively prepare for the removal of roadside dining structures by the end of autumn, and should be fined significantly for failing to comply. We can already anticipate the problem of every restaurant wanting their roadside dining structure removed on the last day it’s allowed for the season, and we know that it is impossible to remove them all in one day. Restaurants need to know they will have to remove them on time or early, and it is absolutely unacceptable to leave them up for weeks and months later than the end of the program each fall. -
Lisa Z
There needs to be some distinction between cafes and bars. And a limit to when they can stay open. I live on the LES with FOUR bars on my block. Before COVID, they weren’t a problem because all the noise stayed indoors. Occasionally some drunk got into a fight on the street, but it was mostly quiet. Now all these bars are outdoors and open all night. It turned my block into party central, with the noise continuing all the way until 5 am. The local food joints also stay open till then to take advantage of the late night crowd. So there’s nonstop noise all night, often music.
I have no problem with cafes and restaurants having a few tables outside during the day, but it’s absurd that this has been allowed to go on for so long. Residents should be allowed to have some peace in their own homes. If I wanted to live in Times Square, I would have moved there!
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S.Z.
Regarding SIDEWALK CAFÉ’S SITING REQUIREMENTS:
• I think the 8-foot clearance to Street Trees is great. Wondering why they didn’t list “Raingardens” here?
• To be inclusive, they should address ROW Bioswales, Greenstreets and Infiltration Basins, as they’re sited on the SIDEWALK.Regarding ROADWAY CAFÉ’S SITING REQUIREMENTS:
• Raingardens are typically on the sidewalk; perhaps it should have been listed as Stormwater Greenstreets – those are in the roadway.
• What about permeable pavement? Could Roadway Café’s be sited atop Precast Porous Concrete Panels (PPCP)? -
Irene Siotka
I understand there was a need for the dining sheds during Covid, but that need has passed. The sheds are an eyesore and essentially a land grab by restaurants /bars. Why should they take over public property? They attract vermin, cause increased traffic, and create chaos on the sidewalks as pedestrians try to navigate narrow passageways. New York City is not a charming, old world European city where outdoor dining is attractive. Presently, NYC looks like a third world country with a mishmash of structures. If outdoor dining can’t be eliminated, at a minimum make everything uniform and make businesses pay the city annual fees for taking over public space.
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Davindranauth Shiwratan
NYC Dining Out rules proposal is another City Hall’s pricing plans with enforcement penalties for NYC-based businesses and increase cost to consumers. The demand for dining out is going to cost you with a service fee to maintain the structural integrity in accordance to NYC buildings code.
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Ellen Edelman
1. Flooring: All flooring should be eliminated because it creates harborage for rats where they can nest and eat food scraps. The fact that there is a requirement for them to be moveable does not address this issue.
2. Side walls and any other parts of the structure should be solid and not have interior spaces (for example on posts) because even the narrowest space will provide harborage
for rats.3. Ramps for accessibility: They must be moveable and also be solid with no interior space available for rat harborage.
4. Planters need to have wire screening at the top of the soil so as to prevent rat burrows. (This pertains to planters with soil and live plants, not to planters with artificial plants and artificial soil.)
5. If sidewalk and roadway structures are required to be dismantled from Nov. 30 to Mar.31, this puts a burden on restaurant owners who may be operating on a slim margin, thus discriminating against them and favoring the already-prosperous businesses. This fact added to the use of heaters in many of these structures facilitates year-round use In addition to providing a pleasant place for New Yorkers to eat, we need to remember that many small business are presently having difficulty staying afloat, and
the economic result of closing would affect many working-class New Yorkers, for instance their staff. Also, the period from Nov. 30 to Mar. 31 includes many warm days. All restaurants would benefit from additional days for doing the increased business that outdoor dining provides. -
Marc Gardner
I really enjoy outdoor dining and I’m glad the city is pursuing a permanent plan to keep it BUT I think there should be limitations on what type of “food service” places can get approved. It seems the only sheds that are properly maintained are the ones with table service. For example there is a Bagel store near me that has 3 parking spots worth of shed and it’s always empty and barely ever cleaned. Mostly they use it to store large trash cans. I don’t think that’s what the program was meant for. So yes to outdoor dining but for table service restaurants only.
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Anupam Bhaumik
The rule for not having the structures on the street all year round (and just for 8 months) is simply not realistic. The cost and time to dismantle and reassemble would be very difficult for a restaurant to manage and incur. Also, dismantling a secure structure every few months can compromise the structures’ integrity, making it a safety issue. Imagine having to dismantle a house or a building every 8 months… it would make the whole structure unstable, thus unrealistic to live in. Also, the added revenue the City and State would have by allowing the street structures to stay all year round is essential during a time of deficits and budget cuts. With our warmer winters and barely any snow, the need to have the structures removed for the winter is diminished. Hope the city council reconsiders this part of the law.
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Shane Sauder
I’m glad outdoor dining is being made permanent but I have a lot of issues with the proposed rules. First and foremost, I think the seasonal aspect is absurd. We are living in a changing climate, we have plenty of February days that are beautiful for sitting outdoors. This also makes it extremely hard for businesses as they will have to break down, store, and set up their dining setups every single year. All for what? Preserve a few parking spaces? That is reprehensible considering our climate crisis. Speaking of parking, I don’t understand why dining structures are bound by NYS daylighting laws prohibiting them from being less than 20’ from an intersection but cars are not. Another ridiculous giveaway to car owners. An SUV parked at the intersection blocks more visibility than a dining set up. I’m also disappointed that these structures can only be covered by canopies or umbrellas. The built structures that a lot of places currently have are beautiful and protect diners from wind and rain. This new enforced standard will not do that. Seems like a way to make outdoor dining less popular.
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Jonathan Michael
I like outdoor dining but I do have some issues. One being bars/clubs offering light fare ONLY to establish a means of having outdoor tables. This essentially creates an indoor atmosphere outside your window at 1am on any given day of the week. There simply needs to be an hours of operation cap on outdoor structures. I suggest 9pm. Another big factor with this is that most establishments allow the people outside to get away with things they would never allow inside. I live on a small residential working class street on the Les with a bar across the street. There were never any complaints until they took over a restaurants outdoor dining shed after they closed down. They’ve essentially created an outdoor bar. There’s other bars on the street that have outdoor setups that close around 9/10pm and it’s perfect. But this one has driven the block mad. Please cap the times
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Christopher P
At the end of the day just cap the hours of operation. A bar or restaurant doesn’t need to have the outdoor going past 9/10pm. Yeah it’s nyc but outdoor dining, as much as I love it during the day, has brought bar and club atmosphere/noise onto the street at all hours of the night. Keep it inside where it’s always been and belongs. The places that already do this have no complaints about it. They employees actually prefere it! And the neighbors appreciate it!
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Jason z
Do like the rest of the world does and what many already do here in the city. Put out tables and chairs that get brought in after a certain hour. France, Italy, Spain, UK name it. This is what they’ve been doing for generations. Only did we try to replicate this for some reason with sheds. Europe has just as real winters as we have. There no excuse.
The place across the street from me does this. If it rains the tables don’t go out. If it stops, the tables go out. If they’re already out when it starts raining they get wiped down when it stops. If it’s uncomfortably cold, they have the heaters. Why is this hard for us?
I love and hate outdoor dining. When it’s done right it’s great and when done wrong it’s absolutely terrible.
Been reading all the comments and want to address a few popular things:
1. COVID is over. This isn’t political. I’m vaccinated. It’s over.
2. Restaurants are no longer
struggling due to pandemic restrictions. If you’re not surviving at this point you only need to look internally as it’s only the restaurant’s fault for not performing. You cannot blame this on anything but yourself.
3. Outdoor dining sheds, which created an “indoor” structure shared with other people, in the winter provided no safety toward immunocompromised. One could argue it was more “dangerous”. Sitting outside in the open air is obviously safe for people with issues. Crammed in a shack with less circulating air is not going to help you. -
Justine Kirby
I am a longtime Upper East Side resident. This evening, October 25, I sat at an outdoor table at a local restaurant to enjoy a meal. The temperature was in the high 60s. I have not eaten inside a restaurant since the pandemic began, and I suspect that it will be a long time before it is again safe to do so. I encourage you to allow outdoor dining, including sheds, all year round. Leave it up to restaurants and patrons to decide. Otherwise, you are depriving many of us of the opportunity to eat out, which in turn affects restaurants’ profitability. Outdoor dining has been a proven success, and there is no good reason to restrict it by law to only certain times of the year.
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Adrienne Cohen
Outdoor dining during winter has allowed people with health issues to actively patronize restaurants they otherwise would have to avoid. It is a boon to the NYC economy as well as enabling equal opportunities to those who otherwise would be isolated due to the ongoing pandemic and other health factors.
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Rohana Elias-Reyes
I’m pretty tired of so much of the street and sidewalk being taken up by restaurants. It was needed when it wasn’t safe to be inside. Now it’s just more real estate eating up our already crowded walkways and parking spots. Less is really more in this case. Please don’t grandfather in everything just because it’s already there. We need our outdoor space back.
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Danielle Joseph
One concern is that any proposed flooring provided a home for Rats given the space between the floor and the pavement. I would propose that the city actually remove the flooring and instead provide ramp access from the sidewalk to the street level such that the outdoor seating remains accessable, but we do not create additional shelters for Rats.
Said another way, Rats and disease may find a home wherever there is a barrier to cleaning the streets. Platforms over the pavement provide rats shelters and don’t significantly add to the outdoor dining experience. I strongly recommend banning these platforms.
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Tzvi Liberman
While I acknowledge the importance of regulating outdoor Dining, I would just like to comment that the proliferation of new outdoor dining spaces in an already vehicle congested city makes it even more impossible to park than it is already. In my neighborhood, outdoor dining has been taking up valuable parking spaces for the last few years and it is very frustrating.
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Monica Berger
The Dining Out NYC program is a farce and will result in very few businesses having outdoor dining areas. As an individual who is immunocompromised, I can’t afford to get COVID by dining indoors. The pandemic may be over for most people but not for all–Dining Out NYC is exclusionary and abelist and panders to the vocal lobby of individuals concerned about parking.
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Devin Lilly
I hate the restaurant’s outdoor dining kiosks. I am against the privatization of public space for commercial use. I as an individual New Yorker can no longer use these spaces, much of the time empty, unless I pay money now. These spaces can no longer be used as bike lanes, these spaces can not generate money for the city by charging the metered rate as they would if it was being used for parking, and these spaces bring unnecessary noise and garbage to neighborhoods. I wish the city would get rid of them entirely.
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Carole Vandermark
I see many large roadway dining spaces built very close to corners. This makes crossing the streets hazardous because both drivers and pedestrians have difficulty seeing around them and the resulting narrowness of the driving lanes increases the danger. Please be aware of the inherent danger that is being created and do what you can to minimize the danger.
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Alex Landes
They should hose down the outdoor areas each night to avoid rats coming around to eat the crumbs under the tables. Anything that discourages rats should be done.
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Jeanette Reza
The outdoor dining makes the streets much more congested and dirty more rats and trash. There is annoying drunk people. The streets are so much more chaotic and hectic and insecure. Difficult to walk in the street there is no room for wheelchair or walking my dog. Please remove. Stricter regulations could help but over all too chaotic. Not a good look and unfair for real estate prices.
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Dan Miron
There are far, far too many unused rat infested dining shacks. They are also too far into the roadway, causing congestion and ruining sightlines, making our already bad traffic situation even worse. I absolutely support yearly removal, with an opportunity to properly pave the impacted areas. As the sheds exist now, it is impossible to pave smoothly. Areas near the sheds, both in bike lanes and between the sheds and traffic lanes are extremely difficult to navigate for bicyclists. If people want to live and eat in public, more roadways need to be closed to vehicular traffic, allowing for truly pleasant and well constructed spaces.
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C deBen
Still strongly opposed to the dangerous, disgusting roadway dining SHACKS. East Village streets have enough crowding and filth. The pandemic is over.
Let food establishments serve customers indoors or in sidewalk seating ONLY AFTER full vetting and approval by local residents, community boards and the NYS Liquor Authority. NO STREET SHEDS. -
Reservation Name BETTY ANN JORDAN
I am for helping small businesses in all the boroughs as long as they follow the rules and keep the areas cleaned.
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Tiffani Davis
The roadway cafes need to stop. Restaurants should either use the building in which they chose to establish their dining rooms or have a sidewalk table. People should be able to have a safe roadway to drive and park. Many roadway cafes in Brooklyn take up residential parking.
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Cee
If NYC is “back” why are we eating on the street? Why? It makes no sense to combat the growing rat population and even host a rat academy workshop and then create an environment for rats to thrive. I don’t get it. NYC is losing its flavor. Maybe that’s why folks are leaving. Good luck. I’m going to try to leave too… along with my tax dollars.
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Roberta R Bickford
Outdoor dining ris a disaster for old and impaired citizens of New York City. Outdoor dining results in extremely dangerous situations for old people.
Outdoor tables and sheds, waiters going to and fro make formerly safe wide pavements into narrow obstacle courses. Heavy pedestrian traffic on Columbus and Amsterdam Avenue used to be accommodated by wide pavements. Now high-volume pedestrian traffic is funneled into a narrow channel formed by tables on one side and sheds on the on the other. Old peeople must negotiate the narrow interstices complicated by the unpredictable transverse crossings of bustling wait staff. Also line of waiting customers and pre- or post dining clots of conversing clients, animals, double-wide strollers, oblivious cell phone users, unsupervised young children on scooters, and deliveristas returning and exiting from their homer restaurants. Through this churning, congested pavement, old people, low vision people, people on walkers must thread their way through at their peril. SHAME -
SUSAN M FRODERBERG
Get rid of the restaurants taking up street space.
Enough of pandering to the restaurant lobbyists.
Enough of pandering to tourism.Adams needs to think more about quality of life to the majority of people who live here.
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Tatyana
I live on UES. The outdoor dining sheds are a real nuisance. First, some did abuse the amount of space given to them, and literally built the sheds all around the blocks. Music was loud, disrespecting the quiet hours rules. etc. In the post-Covid era: – no sheds on the streets and avenues, we need parking spots! (agree with the comment on double/triple parking: City bike s and sheds took them all out) – Outdoor dining space should be on the sidewalks only, as it is in other cities all around the world; – restaurants should pay for that extra space that they are using, – permits for outdoor dining should be easy and fast to get.
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Jacob Seifert
Sidewalk dining blocks sidewalk traffic and is annoying. Repeal all sidewalk dining. It sucks!
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George Jannes
Eliminate all make shift restaurant extensions that are in the street. No space past the sidewalk should be given to restaurants. They will linger there another winter used as outdoor trash storage for restaurants. They will take up street parking that is needed by residents that live in area. There is no ability for street cleaners to clean the streets goin on 3 yrs now. All dining should be by permit on the sidewalk where it is safe. All outside dining area must be able to be fully removed by end of season. No outside areas should be built out of cheap wood planks that create homes for rodents and pests. These needed to go 2 years ago. Many are just eye sores in communities. Thank you
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Jennifer
There should be strict rules for cleaning and how the structure is to be used. The restaurant next door to my Apt bldg has not used the seating since summer 2021 but has kept the unsightly structure up. They have NEVER cleaned it and their employees and their friends use it as a hangout late into the night – booze, loud music, loud voices, peeing – I have reported to 311 but they note it as a restaurant noise violation. But the noise is after hours so according to 311 there is no noise coming from the restaurant during restaurant hours (duh). There was no way for me to get 311 to take the complaint correctly and the only way to make the complaint would be to call the cops which is a ridiculous waste of city resources and honestly what would cops do in that situation. Nothing. There needs to be a way to report misuse and uncleanliness of the structures.
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Dee
Outdoor structures for restaurants should be torn down. There are not enough walkways or space for pedestrian traffic. Not enough parking spaces for tax-paying vehicle registrants. Now we have a lot of unlicensed, makeshift pop-up “restaurants”. Tents with stoves made from garbage containers, remind me of Caribbean island street BBQs. No real estate tax, no food tax payments, no food inspections. There are these makeshift structures on every other corner. At night the rats run amok through the structures leaving feces for the people to cook food on the next day. Get rid of all of them.
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Ru
The outdoor dining should be made permanent; this will allow restaurants to seat more people and, as a result, bring in more profit. Moreover, having indoor and outdoor seating means customers have more choices on where to sit, which is typically a good thing. Personally, I’ve preferred outdoor seating in all seasons and in every country I visit. It would be nice to have this as a permanent fixture in NYC.
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Ivy
I say get rid of them period. The city is not going to ensure that guidelines are kept and our boroughs are clean and rat-free! Let it for the city where you have more activity. You don’t even have street cleaners for our public streets in the 4 boroughs like years ago. Oh, except in the NY City! You don’t have the man-power. All you are doing is encouraging anyone to set up a make-shift stand and sell food. However, if you do proceed with this, ensure that guidelines are followed, neighborhoods are safe and rodent free. You do know unlike the city the boroughs have racoons and opposums! Widlife. We try to keep our homes safe from these animals. All you are doing is making more problems in the community.
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Ronald Janesko
Although I live in New Jersey, my wife and I drive into New York several times a month for theater and dinner. I totally understand the need for outdoor dining but in areas that are suitable. These sheds on the city’s streets are ugly for the most part, snarl traffic on most side streets not only because of their being on the street but add the bicycle lanes and then there is one lane for cars. Add to this delivery trucks often blocking the streets and the increase of double parked cars as well as emergency vehicles attempting to get through. There is also the issue of where to place garbage bags for pickup. Sidewalk dining, if the sidewalk is large enough is great. It did help many restaurants survive during Covid. We dine in New York a great deal but have never eaten in one of the sheds. We have seen, on many occasions, large rats around these establishments. Outdoor dining should be limited to sidewalks If wide enough, pedestrian walkways (for example Times Square, Herald Sqauare, etc.), parks and pocket parks throughout the city, and places that do not snarl traffic.
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Deborah Marquit
I am very opposed to the outdoor dining shacks that were constructed during the pandemic. They are an eye sore, dirty, track restaurant grease across the front door of the restaurant out on to the pedestrian sidewalk to the out door shack. It defaces the sidewalks, takes up what otherwise would be several parking spots, and blocks traffic. I think all these shacks should be removed…
On the other hand, retaurants that maintained alfresco dinning prior to the pandemic are ok except that the plastic shielding around the tables is
awful and should be removed and set back to the way it was before the pandemic. These shacks that line side streets in hells kitchen an Lincoln center and Greenwich village, east village are totally unsightly and also, when the restaurants are closed they attract drug users and pot smoker hangouts at night.
They have brought NY way down and I miss the luxurious wonderful NY prior to the pandemic when you can walk down clean streets and a restaurant was inside the building and not in a shack on the curb! -
G.G
The city has enough outdoor eating space. We need clean spacious sidewalks to walk through, that isn’t a sanitary hazard.
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Melanie Whinnery
I love the outdoor dining, including the street dining, not just the sidewalk dining – keep it! Get rid of the abandoned structures and keep the good ones! Many restaurants have invested a lot of time and money into really nice structures. Don’t penalize them for others who abandoned their structure or are insufficiently built or maintained. I even like them in the winter with the heat lamps, although I acknowledge the street dining could create problems for the snow plows.
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Jeff Raheb
I am not in favor of the outdoor dining. The facilities are used mostly in warmer weather. They have exacerbated the rat problem, are unsightly, prevent sanitation services, reduce parking, and are not kept clean
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Mark Dallara
1. In general, sidewalk dining is preferable to street sheds as sheds catch debris which street sweepers cannot reach.
2. Whether sheds or sidewalk dining, the number of tables or square footage should be limited to allow easy pedestrian passage.
3. Both sheds and sidewalk dining should not be permitted for the same restaurant. This is public space and the pandemic emergency is no longer a good excuse for “double dipping.” -
A Whyland
Sure, build out into the street and increase dining capacity. Give restauranteurs an opportunity to make more money. Anyone else thinking about… the kitchen? They’re being asked to output more food in the same amount space. (No one’s knocking down walls for the kitchen!) Who’s making sure they’re getting compensated accordingly? Also increase the wages for servers who are tasked to setup and breakdown these structures every night. This isn’t just about having a cute brunch with your besties next to a bike lane – watch out! – every Sunday.
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Alan Flacks
I favor the use of the street (roadway) for out-of-doors dining like we have the sidewalk cafes; however, it is City property and as we do require a fee for a restaurant to have an outdoor sidewalk cafe, we must also have a fee for an outdoor roadway cafe. It is N.Y. City property and there should be a reasonable fee for its use as the City has to maintain the street, clean it, light it, et cet. Also, sheds should not be allowed on residential cross streets. I am surprised that we haven’t heard from automobile owners, who are having their parking taken away. Nor from the “Triple A” (A.A.A.) And I’d like very much to know what the N.Y.C. Fire Department has to say as to how such cafes in the streets might inhibit keeping fire engines from getting nearer to buildings.
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R Kraut
I live on East 10th St near Ave C in Manhattan. Now that very few people are wearing masks, I see no reason for restaurant sheds. There are too many restaurant sheds that are in disrepair and/or not being used. They are hazardous. Many sheds take up significant street space where traffic is. I ride a bicycle and that makes going down some streets such as Avenue B dangerous. The sheds are a foot beyond the width of a parked car. Why do they get to take up so much area of the actual street.
I am concerned that there is a shed on 10th St where there is no parking on 10th St Mon to Fri from 8am to 6pm. Gnocco at 337 E 10th St, 10009, has a shed right in front of the bus stop. Why has this restaurant been given permission to have a shed on a block with no parking? This restaurant has a backyard space. Why do they need additional outdoor space on the street?
On Ave B, there have been broken black bags of garbage strewn over the street. The website is not letting me attach a recent photo of the garbage. In addition, a lot of other trash accumulates around these sheds. The street cleaning trucks can’t clean around them. Why is cleaning around the structures not being done by the establishments.
People are not wearing masks. I ride a bike throughout the East Village/ Lower East Side and Downtown. Most of the time there’s not many people in these structures, even in the evening. I see corner restaurants taking up two sides of the street. I see a restaurant with a 15 foot storefront taking up 50 feet of street with very few people dining in the structure. I feel restaurants should go back to their indoor dining. I don’t see why we need these structures taking up street space, creating hazards and eyesores, and accumulated garbage in the street.
If there is going to be restaurant sheds, I feel the restaurants should pay for a license to use the street. It should not be free. In addition, the rules need to be stricter regarding size of structures.
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Julia Savinkina
Street dining is a disaster for NYC.
Please make every effort to stop this practice. The city lost its glamor and gained third word charm.
Very upset. -
john wong
I feel in the current situation, too many restaurants have much too big of an outdoor dining shelter. The outdoor shelter is even bigger than the inside restaurant size itself. They even have both the sidewalk tables & dining shelter together. Not much room for a pedestrian to walk through. They got the waiters walking back & forth as I was trying to walk through on the sidewalk.
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Whitney
Have the folks that work enforcing parking regulations in each neighborhood report the unused outdoor dining spots and the sanitation department should remove them asap.
Keep outdoor dining only one area per restaurant – some have two areas esp at corner spots. Keep outdoor dining year round.
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Vivian Joan Oleen
I am a native New Yorker who lives in the North Riverdale section of The Bronx. I want to encourage our small business community which includes many restaurants. I am in favor of outdoor dining provided that the permitted structures are sturdily constructed and that they do not impede the flow of pedestrian traffic.
For example, in our community, there are two contiguous eating establishments that have installed permanent and semi-permanent chairs, tables, an advertisement sandwich board in the middle of the sidewalk, greenery, and other seating on both sides of the sidewalk, making passage by pedestrians, baby carriages, etc., similar to negotiating an obstacle course. Therefore, my neighbors and I would greatly appreciate clear and detailed rules regarding the placement of these outdoor items, including the amount of sidewalk space that must remain clear for pedestrians. It would also be desirable to specify allowable items that can be put onto the sidewalk.
Another concern is the amount of noise emanating from one of the storefronts; currently, it is in the form of Halloween utterances. Therefore, it would be helpful to provide decibel count limitations in the rules. (These eating establishments are right near private houses.) -
Maribel Mendoza
How about using garbage bags that are peppermint scented. Rats hate that scent.
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SF
PLEASE PERMANENTLY ELIMINATE THESE SHEDS ALTOGETHER. They were a temporary fix during a pandemic. There are many reasons why sidewalk dining in NYC at scale wasn’t allowed prior to that. The pandemic sheds are ugly, poorly constructed, badly placed, dangerous, filthy, and many sit vacant because they are no longer needed or viable for the business to use. Stop pandering to whiny restaurants. There are too many in the first place. There are too many liquor licenses. Please spend time fixing problems that matter. The City does not have enough employees to regulate and inspect. Please do not continue spending my taxes on this ridiculous and unnecessary program.
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Rebecca Calvani
Please dismantle the street dining. All of it. It’s filthy, nasty, horrible. There’s plenty of space on the sidewalks; there’s no need to disrupt bike lanes, parking, handicapped- accessible access, and street cleaning. It was a nice gesture three years ago but it’s got to stop. Please.
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Kate Cascone
There are pros and cons to these and cleaning / health regulation is a major need, i think we need to gwt rid of them, they served their purpose.
These structures here is Queens look like shacks (unlike the nicer upscale versions in manhattan. They sit in the gutter where street cleaners now can never go. there is a process which takes millions of tax dollar and hours of our time each week, street cleaning is in place for a reason, these structures collect water, leaves garbage, rats, etc. and the were built many on top of pallets which are the perfect little rats nests.
The flip side, these structures allow businesses previously limited to X number of patrons to X+20 patrons an hour, which helps businesses.
They also cause waiters with trays of food and drinks to have to cross the fast lane of foot traffic, and ive seen many collisions on ditmars during dinner rush, commuting hour.
Get rid of ’em.
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Magda Salvesen
I am in favor of outdoor restaurant and cafe dining.
Magda Salvesen -
Lenore Lorentz
Most of the outdoor dining spaces are too large, taking up space in the street where traffic, garbage, sidewalk pedestrians interfere with dining. It should be permanently discontinued . Many of the outdoor dining spaces have been badly neglected , often a space for the collection of trash, rats , mice & other unwanted pests. Outdoor dining during warm months is pleasant and practical only when a few tables and chairs set close to the restaurant are available.
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Renee M
The outdoor dining sheds are completely unnecessary as they have just moved indoor dining outdoors. They are unsightly, rat-infested, and lead to very dangerous situations. I live in a neighborhood where our sheds have been hit a LOT, once even leading to several injuries of the diners. I like the proposal to at least have them uniform but I do not think the spaces should occupy the streets at all. A couple of sidewalk tables are one thing but having a street space on streets that are really not designed to have people sitting out on them (especially without proper protection). Abolish outdoor dining all together unless it’s a few small cafe tables on the sidewalk.
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Steve
This program is a huge gift to the restaurant industry. If we’re going to allow, then they need to pay fair market value for the additional space. Ost places have doubled or tripled their space and they still complain. Sone neighborhoods are fine and welcomed. Others have an entire street of rat-shacks and you need to fight your way down the sidewalk. God forbid there’s a fire or you need an ambulance. I keep hearing how this was a lifeline to the restaurant industry. No, it was a free gift. Unless you own the place, these are not good jobs with great benefits. People that work in restaurants cannot afford to live in the neighborhoods they serve unless they live in subsidized housing. GET RID OF THE SHACKS !
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Maria
Out door dining is good during the pandemic . This Invites rodents as they don’t clean the floor like if it were inside.Some out door facilities are not very welcoming.
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Paul - NYC
As we may have all seen the importance of outdoor dinning structures these past 2 years, I think the City for tightening up there required policy. It seems that many comments made surround this fact that cars are no more needed on our streets. Sadly, that’s a false statement as I’m sure most persons may not own a car but uses there uber account. As for sidewalk caffe’s with ample Sidewalk space, within these guidelines, perfect! We all want to walk & ride our bikes, but also want our Amazon orders to be delivered to our door steps, you can’t have it all in a City that is growing daily with more & more people. So let’s get back to one main fact that was not mentioned once, what about the space that the Resturant owner is paying rent for indoors, the safer areas for cleanliness, HVAC, food safety, rat free, and above the curb so a bus or car will not be inches from ones body as they would be sitting in a NYC street with what type of bodily protection.
Please support all Resturant’s, let’s make this CITY cleaner and safer. I support outdoor dinning on a sidewalk, indoor dinning and I believe restricted rules as what we now have will tighten up, cleanup our CITY and just make sense for better safety for all NYC residents. Let’s all just get used to going back indoors safely to Dine.Thank you.
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Rose Ann Cimino
I think outdoor dining sheds are Horrible . Who wants to sit on the sidewalk or in the street maybe if it was on a street in Paris! Or in a beautiful backyard garden. They take up much needed parking spots & are a breeding atmosphere for rodents & other creatures of the night . They don’t belong in Brooklyn .
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michael winburn
I’m in favor of the outdoor dining spaces. however two caveats
a) the spaces need to be beautified installations – not “shacks on the street”. If the restaurant cannot afford to make it classy and a blessing to the neighborhood and passers-by, they should not be allowed to install it.
This said, standards need to be set.b) The spaces need to take the least amount of parking as possible – allowing for most of the dining space to absorb partial sidewalk, partial parking lane.
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Anonymous
My comment is that all dining sheds should have gates or doors that can be locked at night so no homeless people can use them as a sleeping place/camp ground overnight.
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Carmen Alvarado
Outdoor dinning was a great idea during the pandemic when restaurants needed a way to continue to operate safely. It is no longer necessary and it has created a lot of problems. Traffic is worse because of sheds on street, sidewalks are overcrowded because of dining chairs that take the walking space, the rats have a new outdoor hotel and most people refuse to sit outside anymore, it is dirty and it’s getting colder. Keeping this outdoor dining sheds is the worse idea for NYC. NYC has a trash and rat problem and removing all those sheds will alleviate the problem.
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D Katz
Outdoor dining was intended to save businesses during the pandemic. The pandemic is over and these businesses have doubled their capacity at the expense on the city. There is no need for this extra help paid for by tax payers and residents who have sacrificed their quality of life in their homes to accommodate a once struggling business. These are residential streets, people’s homes are feet away, diners do not care when they feel they are “inside” when in fact they are outside as everyone can hear.
Reducing parking does not reduce the number of cars on the street. It creates unsafe driving conditions, more traffic, double parking, stuck trucks and buses that can not navigate narrower streets, driver aggravation, etc.
Bring back neighborhood parking spots! Allow more sidewalk dining permits. Get rid of street dining. -
Bushra Muzaffar
I find the outdoor dining sheds dirty, rat infested at night and an eye sore, restaurants already use part of the sidewalk for outdoor dining and that should be enough. Occupying the roads is congesting traffic, and sidewalks when waiters are seating customers or serving them to crossover from restaurant to street. Pretty annoying!
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Jonique Encore
I am against outdoor dining because it often creates more obstacles for disabled people and people with strollers and people with mobility devices. They are also really dirty and smelly from all the spilled drink & food on the ground. They should not be narrowing the public right-of-way on the sidewalk as there is enough to navigate through: garbage bag piles, tree pits, other pedestrians, etc. I live in Midtown and this has been a HUGE problem!
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Olivia
Thank you for the opportunity to comment. As a New York resident, I am glad to see that outdoor dining will become permanent. However, I am concerned to read about the strict regulations in regards to outdoor structures. I’ve really enjoyed the transformation of the streetscape based on outdoor dining, and it has helped me feel safer at night when walking alone. It has also provided a key lifeline for restaurants that continue to struggle since COVID and provides a safer dining experience for those who are immunocompromised. I’m thus disappointed to read the strict regulations in regards to the outdoor structures. In particular, restaurants should be allowed to maintain enclosed spaces, and they should be allowed to have them year-round. The street-scape shouldn’t be dominated by parked cars. Please reconsider the current proposed rules to include those changes.
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Niels Alpert
The outdoor dining sheds are a vermin attracting nuisance and an eyesore. In addition they are a disruption to both vehicle and pedestrian traffic. Can we at least get rid of the unused or barely used ones that sit rotting on the streets?
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Lily C.
I tried to read the proposed rule so I am sorry if I got anything wrong here (reading legal documents is definitely not one of my strong suits).
I am glad that the often ugly “sidewalk cafes” and “road cafes” are getting fees and more regulation. And that the city is getting some money from them in lieu of parking fees.
It still sucks that these sidewalk / road buildings are still going to be around. I understand the push to have less cars around, to have people use public transit, and the idea of restaurants being able to offer outdoor seating and being able to expand their business without moving. I also understand that it is a complicated mess of issues that is going to take time to make better.
Let’s face it, if you live in the outer boroughs, chances are that you have a car. Taking public transit can be scary, dangerous, or take way too long. That is why some people take their cars to restaurants.
That being said: I honestly wish we could get rid of those darn constructions that tend to block parking spaces, sidewalk spaces, bike lanes, and usually don’t look that pleasing to the eye…
Of course, I have seen some pretty ones that don’t usually contribute to blockages mentioned above.
I don’t super understand people’s fears of “sharing viruses”. Like, I understand these “safe” outdoor spaces are great if you’re immuno-compromised and that it can lessen the anxiety of getting sick. But to what degree are they “safe”? There’s still the travel that people have to take which increases chances of getting sick. There’s also the contact with the server to keep in mind (not all viruses are airborne so a mask won’t protect you from all). And not to mention the people walking by: talking, shouting, coughing, etc.
(I just read some comments below and will now comment on this notion that this rule takes away “creativity” from the restaurants) If it’s true that this rule is going to make everything more standardized to the point where it will all look monotone and blegh, then I definitely think that there should be some leeway to allow for restaurants to get creative and have the obstructions reflect the look of their restaurants.
And one more thing: if restaurants are looking for space, why can’t “the empty office spaces” i keep hearing about be viable options? If it is because of price, UGH (another complicated mess of an issue that I will not comment on any further.) Buildings exist for a reason. otherwise, why are we occupying unnecessary space?
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HANK POWELL
My son, an expert and daily cyclist in New York had to land his bike sideways, fracturing his clavicle and a few ribs, due to a food shed in the street at the Love BBQ on 32nd near Fifth Avenue. The restaurant washes off the grease it exudes from the sidewalk, as required by law, but then it makes a very slick patch in the street in a blind spot just after a cyclist is leaning left and bending to get near the left curb at Fifth Avenue. He tells me this situation also occurs along Grand Street, where most cyclists are familiar with that. NYC SHOULD REGULARLY CLEAN THE STREETS IF FOOD SHEDS REMAIN!!!
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Shan
GET RID OF THEM! They are eyesore. They are not well maintained. Homeless people sleep in them. They are taking up vital parking spaces. They are causing the sidewalks to be crowed and impeding pedestrians!
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Steven Rocco
Outdoor dining sheds are another example of a good idea run amok. I live in Brooklyn near Dekalb Avenue’s Restautant Row. There are many ramshackle structures with no uniformity and certainly little regard to safety. Many were put up in a hurry and the city is right to provide guidance and rules around them. There is a lot of reference in the new rules to “temporary” but some sheds are built like building structures. I’d recommend they be dismantled once a year, so the streets and or curbs can be cleaned and/or repaired. Also, I see many encroaching on the little sidewalk space making it difficult to walk on crowded evenings. Some are even connected to the restaurant building. Let’s get some order around this like with everything else.
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Loucas
I hate the outdoor sheds for dining. They are dirty,smelly and an eyesore. They also take up valuable parking spaces. Take them all down. The sooner the better
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Nancy Bommer
Unless you are on an extra wide street with defined area separated by up kept plantings this just finished the desirability of an area with trash, noise and smells
Already all the food carts in Jackson Heights have decided this applies to them too and set out seats which is unacceptable and unregulated. Scrap most applications enforce keeping sidewalks clear for walking and stop trying to pretend this is a tiny town. We are a great fast paced city move this crap out of the way – were walking here! Oh and shanty town structures in Jackson Heights are rotting and homeless are often observed in them at night – extremely unhygienic. -
Richard Brause
No roadway cafes / roadway seating in any “Floating parking lane” as defined on Page 4 of the Proposal. Any roadway cafes / roadway seating must be directly adjacent to a curb / sidewalk. (Eliminate § 5-11 Design Requirements (b) Roadway Cafes / (1) Siting Requirements / (vii) Floating Parking Lanes)
Explanation: Roadway cafes / roadway seating requiring customers or servers to cross an active bicycle lane are an unacceptable hazard to customers, servers, and people riding bicycles.
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Richard Brause
Fees: Fees must include a required deposit equal to the cost of removing abandoned structures permitted under this proposal. This deposit should be separate from and in addition to any other fees associated with this proposal. This deposit should be refundable when and if a structure permitted by this proposal is fully removed by the permit holder.
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karen bernsohn
I am totally opposed to the hours of operation that allow the roadbed cafes and unenclosed sidewalk cafes to operate until midnight every single night. I only have one roadbed cafe on my block and they had agreed to close it at 10 on weeknights but now I am afraid they will change their mind. Also, right now the cafe is enclosed so the noise is reasonable but once the roof and walls come down I can only imagine how noisy it will be. How are residents supposed to get their sleep, work the next day, children to study? I feel sorry for people who live right over one. Please change the weeknight hours to 10 PM! If the are allowed to stay open until midnight, then we will also have to listen to the noise from the staff cleaning up and securing the furniture. Unacceptable! Thank you.
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Kim
This is a gift to an industry that is no longer suffering. I think they never should have been made permanent but as they are, they should be pay the same per square foot as the are for the inside. Why is the city subsidizing bars & restaurants ? Aside from the owner, the majority of places do no5 pay their workers well, and the City Council had to pass a law to provide sick days. It’s highly unlikely that the workers that receive tips report this to the IRS and pay taxes so what’s in it for the city ? Amplified music outside should not be allowed and enforced. It’s not allowed now but ever has it. There is no enforcement whatsoever. As the city is broke, hiring more cops to do nothing but issue fines to business will pay off exponentially.
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SCF
My friends and I were nearly struck by a fully-loaded semi truck trying to turn a corner – and it hit the corner of the shed we were sitting in. PLEASE, PLEASE MANDATE IMMEDIATE REMOVAL of all of these gross and dangerous sheds. They are rat infested, and unhoused people sleep in them.
If the restaurants are still hurting, this is because of high rents, the inflation rate, and possibly bad business practices. At some point, inflation will decrease. Rents will not. The City should spend its time on rent regulation and not on new ways to spend taxpayer money to create a program to allow businesses to take up public space.
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Peter Vario
Get rid of the shacks
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Maria
Amplified music should not be allowed and ample space for pedestrians, including the disabled, needs to be enforced.
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Michael Edwards
Sidewalks need to be clear and amplified music eliminated.
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Juan
Open dining should close at 9PM. No amplified music, no blocked sidewalks.
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Choresh
It was fine during Covid but is no longer needed. There should be a limit how many can be on a block or perhaps each business can be limited to having 50% of the indoor seats allocated for outdoor use.
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Eliot Fox
They should pay the same price per square foot outside as they are paying on their lease. No amplified music, close at 9PM.
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Erica Wolfe
The outdoor period should be shorted to April – September. Close at 9PM, no amplified music and a meal music be served and alcohol be incidental to the sale of food.
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Garrett
The fees should be substantially increased and 10% of the fees should be allocated to hire police officers whose sole function is to walk the beat and enforce violations.
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Jay
It time has come and gone. Limited outdoor spaces that are good operators and have civilized clientele are welcome. Bars with loud music should not be allow. Only restaurants serving food with no amplified music should be allowed.
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Paul
All street furniture should be brought inside when the outdoor seating closes, which would ideally be 9PM.
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Amy
The outdoor seating should be limited to a portion of the indoor seating. I’ve seen place expand four-fold due to the free city giveaway. Residents living nearby suffer.
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Joe Angelo
Increase the fees to market rate so at least the city can make some money off this program. Street and sidewalk furniture should be removed at night and the space swept and hosed down.
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Dan
Hours need to be limited to close at 9PM. Tables & chairs should be taken in when closing so they can clean the street. Music should not be allowed as it’s disruptive to neighbors.
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Anonymous
Anyone stating that this program is a ‘lifeline’ clearly owns a bar or restaurant. Restaurants and bars are no longer struggling and we should not be giving them free handouts. Anyone participating should be required to pay at least minimum wage, sick days and vacation days – and be audited every year.
Outdoor music should be prohibited and tables and chairs taken in at night.
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Carolyn Jacobs
There needs to be adequate space for people to walk on the sidewalk and the space on the streets should be limited. Having 50+ seats outdoors is just too much. It needs to be scaled down so it fits into the neighborhood. People live near these places.
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Judy Caruso
I’m OK with a few tables on the sidewalk but moving a whole business outdoors for a minor fee is outrageous. The fees should be steep and be a privilege only bestowed upon good operators. Part of the fees should go to fund additional police officers who walk up and down the streets and issue violations. Noise in particular, is a huge problem.
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Catherine
The purpose of the outdoor dining kiosks was because we were not able to eat inside. Now we could. Do away with outside dining.
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Robert Pigott
I understand that the width of dining shed in parking lanes will be limited to eight feet. However, it is unclear whether an eight-foot-wide parking lane will occupy the entire parking lane or will leave a shoulder in the parking lane so that cyclists biking in the parking lane shoulder will not need to bicycle into traffic when cycling past a dining shed. It is very dangerous to require cyclists to join the traffic every time they come upon a dining shed. The width limit of dining sheds should ensure that a parking lane shoulder of at least 30 inches is preserved at all times.
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Shreen Asem Elkenani
If we have one already built that adheres to all the city rules, it would be unfair and unnecessary to take it down every year. Storing and reassembling will cost business too much money. My store is 130 square feet and I don’t seek alcohol. We sell sandwiches and we give back to the community. Cost of everything is so expensive ! Please don’t add more to our plate. Restaurants are the backbone of NYC and to continue to put us thru unnecessary fees and bureaucracy pressure is so unnecessary. Please let us keep our structures, if we are following all the rules.
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Jamie Sanders
The sheds have served their purpose and now need to go. All tables and chairs should come in at the end of the day and close at 9PM. Amplified music should not be allowed. Landlords will now double their rents when leases expire and we’ll be stuck with more of these places because the city is catering to the hospitality industry.
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Gary Keir
The sidewalk is fine but remove them from the street. The street units are in harms way, block vision, attract vermin, and take up needed parking. Unless the weather is perfect, I rarely see them used. The pandemic is over. Give us our streets back. The streets are not for a few select businesses.
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Mario S
The sheds are a nuisance and a hazard. It puts peoples lives at risk as emergency vehicles have to navigate around. All street furniture needs to be able to be removed daily and in case of an emergency. This is like winning the lottery for bars & restaurants yet they still complain. No consideration was given to nearby residents. They fees for the privilege of having additional seating needs to be market rate – no a free giveaway. Amplified music should not be allowed, nor should indoor music with French doors wide open.
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Janine D
No one forced restaurateurs to build their mini houses on the the street. If they can’t comply with basic rules then they should be fined heavily.
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nora killoran
Dining sheds attract too many rats! What happens when a business closes? The shed remains, and tax payers have to pay to have it removed by the city.
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Liza Casella
I think you should have called it Eating Out NYC
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dAVE Green
Who will enforce any rules, 0r the usual non compliance. Street noise, congestion- West 4th- Trucks, and buses can barely get by, etc, etc. Best just to get rid of them completely.
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Brian Bell
All Restaurants should be required to post a notice that they have applied for the new Open Dining License. This notice should be visible from the street and either display a diagram of their proposed open dining layout or provide a link to a web page that shows their application in detail and in diagrams. This notice should be posted within a day of their application being submitted and include enough contact information for comments to be submitted to DOT
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Tony Romano
The sheds make it difficult for people making deliveries, including to those businesses we service. There needs to be at least some space for cars and delivery vehicles. Removable furniture taken in when not open is preferable, and would enable the street to be cleaned. I also agree that some can be quite rowdy and should be fined.
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Dan Blaney
New York City has a noise code, link below. Part of the fees should be used to fund DEP inspectors that would come the same day as the offense to inspect. I’m not opposed to removable tables and chairs on the sidewalk so people can eat but the street dining is free gift to bars & restaurants. Not coincidently, they are also large contributors to our local politicians. Rules need to be enforced. Our city it our of control. People can walk into a store and steal a TV and no one will stop them because they don’t want to be called a racist. Giving away public property for such a low price is a crime. Shame on the City Council and our Mayor.
https://www.nyc.gov/assets/dep/downloads/pdf/air/noise/noise-code-guide-summary.pdf
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Jimmy Lutz
In general, I’m not in favor but as it’s legal now I think there need to be guidelines that are enforced. The outdoor capacity should not exceed the capacity of the actual restaurant / bar. I’ve seen places with 20 seats indoors and 60 outdoors. That’d hardly equitable to retail places tha5 are not afforded this luxury. Second, amplified sound should not be allowed and enforced by DEP or new city agency. The NYPD does not even show up and they close 311 complaints as if they responded. I do want them to focus on serious crime so why not an agency solely devoted to enforcing the rules ? I think May – September is more than generous for outdoor dining.
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Lisa S
The outdoor footprint should be limited to a portion of the indoor seating. Outdoor tables and chairs should be brought in every night and the sidewalk and street cleaned. If that’s too much effort, then they don’t need to participate. Outdoor music should not be allowed as some operators blast music to attract customers.
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Dee
We need tighter regulations for these outdoor dining sheds in my neighborhood in the UES we’ve had an uptick of rats since these sheds have been built… they are not kept up and some restaurants use the sheds on the cross streets for storage creating more unsanitary conditions… it seems the rat population grew due to lack of oversight leading to unsanitary conditions in residential neighborhoods… a lot of these owners do not care about our neighborhoods it’s just about the money.
Let’s just go back to outdoor dining the way it use to be with strong oversight making restaurant owners accountable..
Please we want our neighborhoods back we pay taxes and are property owners and deserve a better quality of life!!! -
Frank A Allen
We enjoy outdoor dining.
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Ellen
Outdoor dining, with umbrellas or an awning, immediately adjacent to an eatery is great. Some also offer flexible drop down shades and heating to accommodate inclement weather. Outdoor dining sheds, on the sidewalk or in the roadway, need to go. Most are an eyesore or aren’t maintained well. Most of the sheds attract garbage and rodents. The reduction in parking also comes to mind. We still have cars and delivery vehicles to plan for. I think it’s time to get rid of the sheds for many reasons.
How much outdoor seating is permitted? If a sizeable indoor eatery has significant seating adjacent to its building on the sidewalk, and a sizeable shed in the street, one has to wonder if this is just an easy way to increase the size of their establishment. I’m reluctant to name names.
I also wonder what rules if any should be considered regarding pets and outdoor dining. Not everyone wants to dine with the dog at the next table.
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Alicia Clementi
What rules are in place for the winter? These structures should be taken down each winter for easier snow removal and no giant snow pile ups next to these horrible structures that take months to melt and take up even more parking. Another rule should be if you have sidewalk seating or a backyard open space you are not elegible for outdoor structures. That will eleminate a lot of structure congestion on blocks. Please stop closing streets so people can sit in the middle of one to eat. It is a horrible feeling to not be able to get around because of closed for no reason streets. As a person who has lived here all 43 years of her life please take these suggestions to heart.
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Margaret
I am disappointed by the proposal to extend a program that began as a way to support businesses through the crisis of covid. Now that the emergency has passed, outdoor dining all too often means ramshackle construction, eyesores, easy lures for rats, and unfair unadvantages for only *some* businesses in the right locations to increase their square footage, for free. I frequently see empty tables and seats in the street while cars circle or idle competing for fewer parking spots, which has terrible consequences for the environment. This proposal seems to me to represent a step backward in the quality of life of New York City.
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Roxy
Outdoor dining spaces are causing congestion (traffic on streets and pedestrians on sidewalk) and drunk people and teenagers like to squat inside the dining spaces late at night to party and blast music which disturbs my sleep from 12am-4am every Thursday-Sunday. I work a full-time job and pay taxes, I should have the right to sleep at night.
* If restaurants want to keep their outdoor dining, the owners need to keep the space clean and padlock the doors to the outdoor dining space so that drunk people and teenagers don’t sneak into the space to party all through the nights
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R Garrin
very simple. if a restaurant has sidewalk space they should not get street space as well. i live on the upper west side and there are plenty of restaurants that have both sidewalk and street space and neither of them are full.
our streets have become a total menace. lets do whatever we can to make them safer and cleaner and start by getting rid of unnecessary street sheds. if restaurants put out tables and chairs on the sidewalk they can take them in and night and the sidewalk can be cleaned. these street structures are never cleaned and block the street from being cleaned and the rats have overtaken everywhere. lets use common sense, eat inside where it can be cleaned and then go sit outside in the park! -
Max Woertendyke
This proposal is nonsensical. I am a Brooklyn resident and property manager. The outdoor dining sheds — especially the smartly built more permanent ones have been a wonderful addition to the city. They are pleasant to eat in, allow for more commerce, keep cars farther from sidewalks and are an obvious benefit to the citizens of this fair city. Why on earth would NYC want to make a rule that would make these outdoor seating sections less secure, less safe, and less pleasant. The last 8 weekends of nothing but rain in this city is a perfect example of why enclosed sheds as they currently exist are a good idea and should remain the norm. Charge for them, make some money off applications, demand the removal of shoddily built and dangerous sheds in need of repair or that are abandoned, but do not pass these rules as they currently stand.
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Denise DeYonker
Outdoor dining has past it’s benefits for our neighborhood. I live in Prospect Heights and many other businesses are suffering on weekends because of street closures. Also, these dining shacks are unsightly, often flood and attract vermin. Time to rethink thd open streets program.
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Esther Freund
Outside dining helped keep the restaurant business alive during Covid. However, they have outlived their usefulness. They take away much needed parking spaces, spread litter , and are a menace to society. It’s time to move on, and stop the outside dining places. Basically, this is just giving restaurants rent free space, at the expense and inconvenience of the general public.
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Tobias Freund
The sheds need to go. Public opinion is clearly against keeping them. We live in the most wonderful, democratic city, where the view of the people should be what determines policy. NYC residents are grateful that the city kept the restaurant industry alive during the pandemic by allowing those sheds. Those same NYC residents unequivocally WANT THOSE SHEDS REMOVED NOW. Our needs have changed from those pandemic days, and we want our parking back, we want our streets back. We hate the noise they generate, the rats they feed, and the garbage piles they create. GET RID OF THEM. This is the best city in the world. Let’s not spoil it with these unsightly sheds.
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Ruth & Kevin McCoy
Based on feedback from NYC restaurants we patronize, once the existing outdoor structures are taken down from street locations, they will not return. Although sidewalk tables will likely survive for the most part, the loss of street structures will be a major loss. For this reason, we hope the proposed regulations can be amended before they take effect. Thank you.
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Lucy Garnett
A 40+ year resident of lower Manhattan I’m a big supporter of year round outdoor dining.
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Dennis T
Establishments with liquor licenses should not be allowed to extend their footprint to include the street. They’re just way too noisy. All street furniture should be taken in daily and the sidewalk and street hosed down. And for Gods sake, increases the fees to make some money off this. The city is taxing cars and every other business but not the hospitality industry. I guess donating to all the local politicians paid off. Sadly, we will lose more and more unique local business because landlords will increases rents and no one but a bar or restaurant can afford.
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Struart zamsky
1. All outdoor cafés, restaurants, and bars must be limited to the frontage of the establishment and never extend to adjacent buildings.
2. The operating hours are absurdly long – from 8 a.m. to midnight, even in districts where tens of thousands of residents live. Cut those hours back to noon to 9 p.m. in residential and mixed-use districts and give us some peace and quiet in our own homes.
3. The rules say no amplified sound outdoors. No interior noise should be permitted to spill into the street!
4. Change the proposed 15-foot emergency vehicle lane to 18 feet. Public safety must come before the needs of private businesses.
5. The rules ought to clearly state that all roadway cafe structures must be removed from
December through March so that our streets can be swept at least 4 months a year. The language now allows restaurants to drag their feet well into December and start rebuilding in March.
6. Guidelines must prohibit all roofs and walls, and say so. Structures must be readily removable in the event of an emergency. If a forklift or backhoe is required for removal, it’s not a removable structure.
7. Bring back the 3’ service aisle that was the sensible standard in the pre-pandemic sidewalk café program.
8. NO OUTDOOR HEATING or AIR CONDITIONING! In the midst of a climate emergency, to allow restaurants to heat the outdoors is unconscionable. -
East Fifth Street Block Association
1. All outdoor cafés, restaurants, and bars must be limited to the frontage of the establishment and never extend to adjacent buildings.
2. The operating hours are absurdly long – from 8 a.m. to midnight, even in districts where tens of thousands of residents live. Cut those hours back to noon to 9 p.m. in residential and mixed-use districts and give us some peace and quiet in our own homes.
3. The rules say no amplified sound outdoors. No interior noise should be permitted to spill into the street!
4. Change the proposed 15-foot emergency vehicle lane to 18 feet. Public safety must come before the needs of private businesses.
5. The rules ought to clearly state that all roadway cafe structures must be removed from
December through March so that our streets can be swept at least 4 months a year. The language now allows restaurants to drag their feet well into December and start rebuilding in March.
6. Guidelines must prohibit all roofs and walls, and say so. Structures must be readily removable in the event of an emergency. If a forklift or backhoe is required for removal, it’s not a removable structure.
7. Bring back the 3’ service aisle that was the sensible standard in the pre-pandemic sidewalk café program.
8. NO OUTDOOR HEATING or AIR CONDITIONING! In the midst of a climate emergency, to allow restaurants to heat the outdoors is unconscionable. -
White Trash Antiques
1. All outdoor cafés, restaurants, and bars must be limited to the frontage of the establishment and never extend to adjacent buildings.
2. The operating hours are absurdly long – from 8 a.m. to midnight, even in districts where tens of thousands of residents live. Cut those hours back to noon to 9 p.m. in residential and mixed-use districts and give us some peace and quiet in our own homes.
3. The rules say no amplified sound outdoors. No interior noise should be permitted to spill into the street!
4. Change the proposed 15-foot emergency vehicle lane to 18 feet. Public safety must come before the needs of private businesses.
5. The rules ought to clearly state that all roadway cafe structures must be removed from
December through March so that our streets can be swept at least 4 months a year. The language now allows restaurants to drag their feet well into December and start rebuilding in March.
6. Guidelines must prohibit all roofs and walls, and say so. Structures must be readily removable in the event of an emergency. If a forklift or backhoe is required for removal, it’s not a removable structure.
7. Bring back the 3’ service aisle that was the sensible standard in the pre-pandemic sidewalk café program.
8. NO OUTDOOR HEATING or AIR CONDITIONING! In the midst of a climate emergency, to allow restaurants to heat the outdoors is unconscionable. -
Brooklyn Two Cents
The willingness of our city govt-the Mayor, the DOT & the NYC Council putting New Yorkers’ health (never mind quality of life) in harms’ way is truly shameful and not to be tolerated (ergo one lawsuit after another!).
Noise from these street sheds is unfettered, unenforced, and unregulated…this is a total dereliction of duty-imposed on residents in an Orwellian denial of facts by those to whom we pay salaries! They need to be fired (aka voted out) forthwith.
Read up -if you dare:
Noise mitigation reality check:-Comptroller DiNapoli 2018 Report:
https://www.osc.state.ny.us/files/reports/special-topics/pdf/health-noise-in-nyc-2018.pdf
“Reporting complaints using 311 often does not bring relief from noise, according to the public record of noise complaints on the NYC Open Data website. Our review of responses to 1.6 million noise complaints found that agencies could not confirm that noise was occurring in most instances.”Some more data…scientific facts…white papers and medical journal reports that must inform any decision to allow ‘Open Restaurants’ to continue:
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/noise-pollution-health-effects
“According to a 2018 review, there is evidence that short-term exposure to noise pollution can temporarily raise blood pressure and increase blood viscosity. There is also an association between long-term exposure to noise and higher rates of cardiovascular disease”https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Hiral-Jariwala/publication/319329633_Noise_Pollution_Human_Health_A_Review/links/59a54434a6fdcc773a3b1c49/Noise-Pollution-Human-Health-A-Review.pdf
“Noise produces direct and cumulative adverse effects that impair health and that degrade residential, social and working environment with corresponding real (economic) and intangible (well-being) losses.
Noise represents an important public health problem that can lead to hearing loss, sleep disruption, cardiovascular disease, social handicaps, reduced productivity, negative social behavior, annoyance reactions, absenteeism and accidents. It can impair the ability to enjoy one’s property and leisure time and increases the frequency of antisocial behavior. Noise adversely affects general health and well-being in the same way as does chronic stress.”https://www.bu.edu/sph/news/articles/2019/when-sound-becomes-noise/
“At only 65 decibels—about as loud as a car going by for someone standing on the side of the road—research has shown that people begin experiencing increased risk of hypertension and heart attack. But not all sound is equal, Walker says. Someone’s favorite music could be playing at 120 decibels, and, for that person, the sound is enjoyable. If their neighbor hates hearing that same music—even if only at 65 decibels—it is noise, and may have more of an impact on the neighbor’s health than on the health of the person playing the music, Walker says.”https://thehill.com/opinion/healthcare/447529-noise-can-adversely-affect-human-health-and-quality-of-life
“According to the World Health Organization, the health effects of even short-term exposure include sleep disturbance, stress and anxiety, while long-term impacts include increased risk of ischemic heart disease, cognitive impairment among children, stress-related mental health risks and tinnitus (chronic ringing in the ears).”https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/05/13/is-noise-pollution-the-next-big-public-health-crisis
“I said that documentation like that would be useful in New York, where the police often ignore noise complaints or respond to them days later.
Studies have shown that people who live or work in loud environments are particularly susceptible to many alarming problems, including heart disease, high blood pressure, low birth weight, and all the physical, cognitive, and emotional issues that arise from being too distracted to focus on complex tasks and from never getting enough sleep.”https://www.who.int/docstore/peh/noise/Comnoise-3.pdf
Adverse Health Effects Of Noise:
Noise-Induced Hearing Impairment
Sleep Disturbance
Cardiovascular and Physiological Effects
Mental Health Effects
Effects of Combined Noise Sourceshttps://www.brainfacts.org/thinking-sensing-and-behaving/diet-and-lifestyle/2018/noise-pollution-isnt-just-annoying-its-bad-for-your-health-062718
“Adrenaline and another stress hormone called cortisol bring on physiological changes, including a spike in heart rate and blood pressure… chronic exposure to noise keeps this stress response activated continuously.” -
Hamidur Rahman
Outdoor dining is a welcome change to how we as New Yorkers utilize our public space. For too long automobile owners have treated the road as private property, their god-given right to use vast swath of public space to park their cars for cheap, if not for free. This change will give back to the people some modest amount of space — space that should be shared by all of us and not just monopolized by automobile drivers. It has been shown in countless studies, experiments, and real life data that allowing more pedestrian presence increases business revenue and parking discourages people from visiting in fear of not finding a space. It’s time the city took a step to not induce demand for driving and gave some of the space back to the public.
Thank you for your efforts in making outdoor dining permanent.
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Connie
Outdoor dining has destroyed the livability of our neighborhoods! Restaurant owners have shown their true colors; they don’t give a rat’s a$$ about neighbors when they amplify DJ sounds out into the atmosphere and encourage noisy inebriated crowds to colonize sidewalks! The sheds serve as wonderful rat hotels and hinder ASP street sweeping. Why aren’t they issued violations during ASP hours!? They’ve been the root cause of unsanitary conditions and are responsible for the drastic increase in 311 complaints for excessive noise pollution that residents endure. Additionally, these sheds decrease traffic visibility making them a danger to road users.. They’re unsafe, unsanitary, and massive noise polluters. NYC was wonderful before this stinky shanty program. Be done with it!
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melissa
These new rules are unacceptable and need to change. As someone who has lived with 5 outdoor roadway monstrosities for 3 years, this is a total infringement of my right to live peacefully with no rats, no noise, and no cleaned streets! The attached document contains my comments about the abdominal new rules!
Comment attachment
Comments-to-Permanent-Outdoor-Dining-rules.pdf -
Luis Calle
Outdoor dining has been a tremendous boon for our establishment year-round. We have a beautifully crafted, roadside dining setup made from premium wood, an investment that cost us thousands of dollars for professional installation. It’s crucial to emphasize that this isn’t your typical outdoor shed that government officials often associate with restaurants. Unlike other establishments that can easily store and disassemble simple structures, our situation is different.
Where could we possibly store these large wooden blocks and tarps for eight months of the year? Reassembling it would also incur thousands of dollars in expenses each time. This predicament raises the question of practicality and feasibility. Our roadside dining area isn’t just another seasonal fixture; it’s a substantial and sturdy structure, too substantial to stow away easily.
We were initially told that roadside and outdoor dining would become a permanent feature post-pandemic, a promise that inspired us to make a significant financial commitment. However, we are now faced with the disheartening news that we must dismantle our so-called “permanent” roadside dining area.
Mayor, I implore you to reconsider this decision and save our beloved roadside dining, which has become a cherished asset for many of our loyal customers. We have no suitable storage space for these substantial wooden components, and the financial burden of installing it again each year is unreasonably high. Please, let’s find a way to preserve what has become an integral part of our business and the community we serve.
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Mia Mclean
Thank you to the DOT for proposing clear rules, and for giving New Yorkers the opportunity to comment.
1. Rule 5.10 (i) related to noise. The rule should ban speakers and amplifiers outright. I regret that noise complaints will be referred to Mediation through MEND NYC. Like other people who live near bars and restaurants that blast loud music through speakers, I typically call 311 when it’s too loud. I don’t want a lengthy mediation process that I cannot do anonymously. Those speakers are obnoxious and just should be removed.
2. Rule 5.11 (a)- about Clear Path. Will there be inspections of the clear path? In my neighborhood, the 8 ft corridor is definitely not respected!
3. Rule 5.13(d) about not obstructing roadway feature. Some outdoor dining structures are located on the other side of the bike lane, so wait staff and patrons constantly cross the bike lane to go between the restaurant and the actual outdoor dining space, oftentimes without looking to see if a bike may be coming through. It’s dangerous for everyone. Outdoor dining should not be extending across roadway features if that means that staff and client will repeatedly block it by coming across.
4. Rule 5.10 (m) -The Operating Season from April 1st to November 29 is a good idea. It’s the best compromise between those who are in favour and those that are against. -
Janice Wilde
I have been the victim of the over crowding in the city streets as I was hit by an E Bike and thrown into the street on Sept 12. The accident would not have happened if there had been enough space in the bike path which was obstructed by a shed. Restaurant sheds create a hazard for all of us who try to negotiate busy city streets filled with tourists, bikes, scooters, mopeds etc etc. all over town. They squeeze the space we travel in so narrow that my garbage trucks can barely make it down 5th Street. You may not have had a crash like me, but your chances are very good if these sheds are allowed to be a permanent fixture in our busy streets. They make our city ugly in every way.
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Shigeo Kawasaki
I strongly recommend making planting mandatory, perhaps 10-20% of the total proposed cafe area.
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Josh Spodek
Sheds on my block routinely get covered with garbage.
Homeless people use them to sleep and take drugs off-hours.
Restaurants have gone out of business and left the sheds to decompose, making an eyesore for residents, attracting more garbage.
They lead to more noise, even more after dinner when families sleep.
That public space could be green space benefiting all — at least planters, but some blocks have enough sheds their collective space would make community gardens, playgrounds, farmers markets, and things that build enduring public value.
Sheds cause rents to rise by getting revenue from high-value New York City real estate way below cost, leading to empty storefronts from retail places that can’t compete since they didn’t get that real estate.
The claim that it’s saving the restaurant industry is self-serving and fatuous. People will always buy food. The industry does not need effectively free public land. It’s just extra profit for them and their landlords at the cost of public land.
By contrast, New York City can use more living green space and places safe for children. We could do so much more than make garbage-producing, noise-producing decaying wrecks.
Oh yeah, as we reach winter, many sheds and outdoor spaces use portable heaters to heat the outdoors. California is permanently on fire, sea levels are rising, everyone knows why, and we’re burning fossil fuels to heat the outdoors. Such polluting, depleting activities will some day be a crime. They directly hurt people.
We don’t have to pollute using public land.
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Sam Goetz
Hi! I have a bunch of questions / comments based on a reading of the rules. Sending these along.
1.) Drawings? It’s good that you don’t need to hire an architect, but I’m a little worried what level of detail you’re ultimately going to ask for. Please keep this simple and able to be done by a business owner without hiring somebody :
2.)🔥Landlord Consent? Are you saying that we have to get our landlord to sign and notarize a consent form for us to do outdoor seating? I can see this causing a lot of problems with difficult landlords (IE them trying to shake us down for $$$ / being difficult). Please please please remove this. No other permits (including alcohol!) require this.
3.) Proof of insurance / “security fee” What kind of insurance (and are you going to require our insurance to insure our outdoor area?) and what is this “security fee” ??
4.) 🔥Community Board … Am I reading this right that all of our set-ups need to be approved by our local community board? This entire section of the rules was super confusing and I could use some clarity on how this part of the process is supposed to work. Community board support will be a major headache for certain community boards who say no to everything in their jurisdiction.
5.) 🔥Hours 10am start time on Sunday? 1am close on Friday and Saturday? Why a later start time on Sunday? That seems like an unnecessary strain on cafes and brunch places for no reason. Please remove that.
6.) Music No amplified music is allowed. Quiet music from the restaurant that doesn’t bother anyone on the street should be okay. A little discretion on this would be fantastic.
7.) 🔥Sidewalk Cafe : “Furnishing Zone” / Clearance for “Edges of Street Tree Beds” 8 feet. Makes no sense to lock off a “furnishing zone” if it’s directly in front of a roadway seating area. I get not wanting to block a curb, but there’s no curb when there’s a roadway pod on the parking spot. Also, why not chairs and tables next to a tree? This small rule will really really limit outdoor seating. For our cafe this is more than half of our outdoor seating. I completely understanding wanting the sidewalk to be wide enough for pedestrians to cross, but that’s a different rule. Some sidewalks are very wide and have lots of space for chairs / tables next to trees.
8.) 🔥Fence around sidewalk seating? You have to put a fence around the sidewalk seating now? This will be a huge burden and really limit smaller cafes / frontages.
9.) 🔥Barriers for roadway seating : Confusing language here. Is it water only or can we use other fill? How do we “apply” for non-water fill? Water barriers AKA Jersey Barriers AKA Yodocks are crazy expensive and hard to store… this could be the thing that breaks this program for many small places like mine.
10.) Our current set-ups are okay to use until November 1st, 2024? That’s nice! Do we know when we have to start obeying the sidewalk rules?
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Steven Katz
The mayor’s office and the DOT, in the pocket of the hospitality lobby, has turned a blind eye to the outdoor dining sheds and their myriad problems: noise, crowds, filth, garbage, vermin, the fact that they’re eyesores, the fact that they impede emergency services, the fact that they violate the historic character of the city. I urge you to take a fresh, uncorrupted look at these things and eliminate them once and for all.
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Barry C
This is a virtually free gift. If business owners can’t abide by some basic rules of decorum or think it’s too expensive, then don’t participate. Several owners have commented that it will be expensive to take inside in the winter. Again, your choice. Absolutely no amplified music.
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Margaret
I have counted about 100 dead rats on the city streets.
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Meg
I have probably seen at least 150 squashed rats on the city streets, let alone the living ones I see scurrying across park paths.
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Susan Williams
The Open Restaurants Program was a good idea during the Covid emergency, although tightly enclosed and heated sheds never made any sense since Covid is an air-borne disease and the whole idea was for people to actually be outside so air could circulate around them. Now the Covid emergency is over, and the sheds should be too. But the Hospitality Alliance wants to maximize the economic boom all this free space offers its members, and so they have pushed hard to control the narrative around the Program, and ignored the real costs to neighborhoods that have restaurants and bars on narrow residential streets.
Neither bars or restaurants should have the right to set up yards of sheds so they can triple their indoor capacity for free. They are a nightmare for residents — with open windows; blaring music; very loud, often very drunk and disruptive patrons who party until 3-4am many nights a week.
If the Program is to be extended, (against the will of many, many New Yorkers) here are some suggestions for the DOT.
1. All outdoor cafés, restaurants, and bars should be limited to the frontage of the establishment and never extend beyond it. If the premises are located on a corner, there should only be one shed on the side where customers go in and out.
2. The operating hours are absurdly long – from 8 a.m. to midnight, even in districts where thousands of residents live. Hours should be from noon to 9 p.m. so we can have some peace and quiet in our own homes.
3. The rules say no amplified sound outdoors. The same prohibition should rule indoors in any restaurant/bar that has its windows or doors open so noise doesn’t spill into the street.
4. No outdoor heating. In the midst of a climate emergency, these DOT’s proposed rules allow restaurants to heat the outdoors in order to pamper their customers. Often the heating is left on all day, even when they are empty. Owners may well be making so much money that they don’t care about high electricity bills, but it is an irresponsible waste of energy resources.
5. The rules ought to clearly state (and should be duly enforced) that all roadway cafe structures must be fully removed from December 1st through March 31st so that our streets and drains can be cleaned at least 4 months a year.
6. Calling structures “open” is too vague. Guidelines must prohibit all roofs and walls, and say so. Structures must be readily removable in the event of an emergency.
Finally, I would just like to know why the DOT/the City never did an environmental impact study to determine the real cost of this program?
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Jesse Schoen
I feel that noise must be taken more seriously. Many restaurants and cafes fill the streets with amplified music and there does not seem to be any real way to deal with it–at this time calling 311 is the only option.
I fee that more attention needs to be paid to this aspect. -
Lisa Arzt
I wish people lived in my neighborhood (West Village) and understood what it is like to hear the din of outdoor diners all evening. Escalating to loud groups shouting “WOOOO!!!!” “BUUUDDDYYY!” “HAAAPPYYY BIIIIRRRTTHHDDAAYY!!!” as alcohol intake increases. In my case, this comes from a street where there is a schoolyard between us. And it sounds is as if these restaurants are right outside of my living room. Imagine those living just above them.
This is not the sweet outdoor dining that some here reference. This is a bar crawl. None of this existed in my neighborhood before the pandemic changed the streetscape. Outdoor TV’s. Music playing inside the sheds. We can hear this in our homes.
Our tiny sidewalks have been encroached upon, very little room to walk through. Seating is both up against restaurants and in the sheds, with wait staff passing between the two. People waiting in line stand in what little space lies between. **Everyone who is commenting here has seen this.** Please care.
Diners and revelers spend just a few hours hours in front of our homes. But WE LIVE HERE.
Restaurants are have gained far more seating (business) than they ever had before so OF COURSE they are LOBBYING (literally) hard to keep it, and more. Costs them peanuts. Costs us *taxes* and our quality of life. It’s been three years. Please, finally, let’s move on. -
David Thom
Proposed hours are ridiculous in that they are too long. Midnight and 1 am?
Which nightlife lobbyist wrote that rule? Restaurants need more space? Fine. Nightclubs do not. Any restaurant located in a Commercial Overlay on a Residential Zoning should absolutely not have hours past 9 pm. -
Natalia
I’m a West Village resident. I strongly oppose any roadbed dining, save for tables and chairs that can be removed nightly. The permanent open restaurants program is terrible policy for those of us who live on affected blocks, and these proposed further giveaways to the restaurant industry, at the expense of residents, are even worse.
I live on a narrow block that has four dining sheds, which by NYC standards are “nice ones.” Their relative niceness compared to the abandoned shacks in the rest of NYC means nothing, given the massive problems of sanitation, crowding, and pedestrian safety.
These rules will only make these problems worse.
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Nancy Preston
Sidewalk Cafes must shut down by 10 pm everyday if they are in a residential area OR if there are any residential units above or around the cafes. A great deal of noise is generated not only from music from cafes but simply noise of people talking. the close up of cafes is also noisy. People , children, elderly, those with physical and mental issues that are particularly susceptible to noise lives will be impacted negatively so as to cause additional health issues by being kept up or unable to enjoy peace and quiet inside their homes. Children will be unable to study of sleep. those that work from home will have their livelihood disrupted when unable to conduct virtual meetings because of noise. PLEASE consider this and make it so the cafes MUST be closed down and quiet by 10 pm daily if any residential living is in vicinity. People First.
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Jeff Gussow
Outdoor dining has been great for New York City, but these rules are unnecessarily restrictive and will prevent many restaurants from participating in the program. Please give restaurants more flexibility to provide seating areas that work for their customers and neighbors. Specifically, please remove the requirement for a roadside cafe to be 20 feet from a crosswalk on the side of the street where traffic is approaching the intersection. The 8 foot requirement under the current program is sufficient for pedestrian visibility, and the proposed rules will prevent many restaurants from having roadside cafes. Please remove the prohibition on roadside cafes in zones that are no standing at certain hours, which would similarly prohibit roadside dining in many areas. Finally, while requiring cafes to be open air is sensible, please allow roofs and road-facing walls to protect from weather. The city should recognize that the availability of outdoor dining is an important accessibility issue for New Yorkers with disabilities and health conditions, and every additional restriction further impedes their ability to participate in the life of the city.
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Margaret Patricia
I strongly oppose the outdoor dining program. I live on Mulberry Street between Prince & Spring. These outdoor dining sheds have turned my neighborhood into a rat and garbage-infested street every day of the year. They have taken over our streets and our sidewalks. The congestion between cars, pedestrians, and delivery ebikes is overwhelming. This used to be a residential neighborhood prepandemic, it now looks like a 3rd world country with no order. There has been no consideration given to the residents in these neighborhoods. We pay our city taxes and should have a say. This is a money grab by the city and the hospitality lobby.
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PETER L GIBSON
Please consider regulations that you could live with if you lived above a popular restaurant’s outdoor shed as tens of thousands of New Yorkers do.
Comment attachment
1. Street sheds should not be longer than the restaurants established frontage and not protrude in front of adjacent residential buildings and their entrance ways. Many 40foot sheds are a fire hazard that restricts NYFD’s ability to access a building.
2. Cut outside dining hours to 9:00 PM in residential neighborhoods. Would you like loud people drinking below you until well after midnight?
3. Please also regulate music that comes from inside the restaurant through windows, doors, when it is heard outside.
DOT-Request.docx -
David
Greed is Greed is Greed. Before Covid, there were plenty of outdoor dining establishments. The city did an acceptable job of governing the rules around capacity, hours, and quality of life. Enter Covid. The restaurants were really suffering and the citizens of NYC came to their aid. Those of us who lived in the neighborhood where these establishments proliferated, endured the noise, rats, filth, garbage and congestion in support of our neighbors. We bought their meals, and visited their outdoor makeshift spaces with the goal of keeping them in business. In return, they f**ked us. They said “Hey, this is profitable, free money, free real estate, let’s make it permanent”. And so they bought their elected officials, greased the mayor, ignored the rules requiring an environmental study, and ignored the residents of the neighborhoods who so generously supported them in their hour of need, continuing in their never ending quest of more for them, and less of us.
So here we are again, pleading for some balance, support and consideration, for the quality of life of the residents who live above and around the outdoor dining program. I am not hopeful because you (The DOT) have illustrated what a bunch of soft bellied weaklings you are, who so far have caved to the hospitality alliance without so much as a nudge. Or is it that you are now one and the same as the Hospitality Alliance?
Let’s see what the outcome of this fiasco (oops, hearing) is. I will bet, more of the same. Prove me wrong by protecting our quality of life by adopting these simple rules:1. All outdoor cafés, restaurants, and bars must be limited to the frontage of the establishment and never extend to adjacent buildings so they don’t take over our streets.
2. The operating hours are absurdly long – from 8 a.m. to midnight, even in districts where tens of thousands of residents live. Cut those hours back to noon to 9 p.m. in residential and mixed-use districts and give us some peace and quiet in our own homes.
3. The rules say no amplified sound outdoors. The same prohibition should rule indoors in any restaurant/bar that has its windows or doors open. No noise spilling into the street!
4. The rules give emergency vehicles just a 15-foot lane. Let’s make that 18 feet. Public safety must come before the needs of private businesses.
5. The rules ought to clearly state that all roadway cafe structures must be removed from December through March so that our streets can be swept at least 4 months a year. The language now allows restaurants to drag their feet well into December and start rebuilding in March.
6. Calling structures “open” is too vague. Guidelines must prohibit all roofs and walls, and say so. Structures must be readily removable in the event of an emergency. If a forklift or backhoe is required for removal, it’s not a removable structure, they’re simply talking about more COVID sheds.
7. Bring back the 3’ service aisle that was the sensible standard in the pre-pandemic sidewalk café program. Without it, the City Council and the DOT have given the Hospitality Alliance 3 feet along every sidewalk in New York – just count up the miles of outdoor diners, many of them under your windows.
8. No outdoor heating. In the midst of a climate emergency, these DOT’s proposed rules allow restaurants to heat the outdoors in order to pamper their high-end dining customers. This is unacceptable.
9. More enforcement. Have a committed city run agency (if necessary) large enough to respond to complaints (not 311, but a special number) in a timely manner with the power to enforce the rules and shut down multiple violators.
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Tanya
Some restaurants go overboard with the space they use. For example, the restaurants on Amsterdam between 84 and 85 street. You cannot even walk on the sidewalk anymore with all the space taken up and the people waiting for the million tables they have.
Then you have areas that are purely extra storage like the restaurant on Broadway and 215. They have taken up so much space outside and no one eats outside!
It is fine to have outdoor dining, but the space they use must be regulated and if it is not being used then it should be taken down.
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C.M.
I have been reading many of the comments. And I wonder if those people who are so keen on continuing Outdoor Dining, whether at sidewalk cafes or roadway sheds, live near where these restaurant/bars are located! And I think we should put more restaurants and bars on blocks where city officials live so that they can get the real measure of what we’re dealing with.
As for my take on continuing with this proposal:
1) I do not believe that the DOT should be the Agency to best oversee and regulate. [In my opinion, they have a poor record with respect to some of the other more “transportational” matters they manage.] So give this to a Consumer-leaning Agency. And, the 4-year licensing should be reduced to 3 years, with a review of renewal brought up at that time with the Community Boards where the restaurant/bar resides, and with the SLA. It says the LPC will have to approve of the dining facilities which will be put in Historic/Landmarked areas….. ha, that’s a joke!
2) Currently, many of the patrons of these businesses block the sidewalks and they don’t allow pedestrians to pass. Restaurant management should be fined for not controlling this more responsibly.
3) I am happy to see that the noise proposals for outdoor dining do not allow for musical instruments or sound reproduction or amplification devices, but don’t like the “except where authorized pursuant to a street activity permit issued pursuant to chapter 1 of title 50 of the rules of the city of New York” phrase. No music. No amplification devices. No sound reproduction. Period.
4) Am wondering how the lights will affect neighboring residences. Must we close our blinds to keep out the glare of lights these structures? At least with the roofs, there was some degree of protection from this.
5&6) Plants put out by many of the current sheds are left unattended and force people to be hit by leaves and other structures. Also, for many older people, particularly those with disabilities, walking on subway grates is a problem; but to date, many of the sidewalk sheds allow little space to walk on an even sidewalk.
7) I agree with many of the comments that say the cap on operations should be 9pm with cleaning up to end by 10pm. [There is a restaurant/bar nearby which has open windows. It turns into a nightclub some nights after 11pm; people stand outside crowding the sidewalk, talking loudly. Calling 311 doesn’t solve the problem. Outdoor dining will only compound it.]
8) If we must have outdoor dining, limit the number of sites to 2 a block. In the South Village area, there are way too many restaurants and bars to make life here anything but a disaster. And I bet it is the same for other neighborhoods with similar problems.
I think I’ll leave it at that for now. But my biggest concern is that adequate ENFORCEMENT of any adopted rules for outdoor dining will just float away in the wind. And we will be left, yet again, with another poorly regulated city policy.
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Evie S
I live on the corner of two narrow streets in the West Village. Where there was never any parking allowed ever — there are sheds. There should not be sheds allowed where there was never parking allowed. Parking was never allowed for all the obvious reasons — not enough space. But now sheds wider than any parked car would have been occupy that space and clog the street even more. Some sheds have already had the good sense to come down — since the presence of these sheds cause daily honking from the jams created by trucks and buses struggling to make it down the street or around the corner; and since the sheds make it impossible for the street cleaning vehicles to clean these narrow streets; and since those sheds are a rat’s paradise; and since the noise from the customers drinking outdoors in the sheds greatly disturb the residents. But too many sheds remain and so do all those problems they brought.
The noise from the drinking in these sheds has totally disrupted our quality of life on this residential street — with two old large apartment buildings and brownstones. Our street used to be a relatively quiet one. People might be in transit from here to there, or hanging out for a bit smoking a cigarette, but now we are forced to hear a constant din and often cacophony of the loud conversations — very very loud and drunk conversations — from these sheds. This large and successful gastropub has no regard or respect for its neighbors or the quality of life they were living before it and its sheds. And it is far from the only one.
Where there was no parking, there should be no sheds.
Where the sound from the sheds travels into and dominates the sound inside dozens of homes — there should be no sheds. -
MargeRN
The situation with outdoor dining has been exacerbated to the point where it is untenable. The city has commandeered our streets and sidewalks and given (mostly for free) this space to restaurants. This is all under the guise of “saving our restaurants” and creating jobs. Restaurants have always thrived in NYC. Please do not bring up the pandemic because this is long gone and it is not an issue anymore. The DOT has been tasked with overseeing this project and is doing a terrible job. Quality of life is the price we are paying right now. Noise has increased, and rats are in abundance. Garbage is everywhere. Yet NYC continues to champion this cause despite the protests of residents and ordinary folk who live in the city. Old ladies cannot sit outside on the streets anymore or walk down the street unassisted for fear of getting run over by a delivery bike or another pedestrian on such a crowded sidewalk. The restaurants have unapologetically taken over our streets and sidewalks, all with the consent of city hall. Please let us get back to quality of life issues where residents have at least some say in the neighborhood.
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Jennifer Wollock
Those of us who must walk on Dyckman Street alongside the current restaurants with outdoor dining of any kind now in operation have enough trouble now under the current rules. We have noise pollution for too much of the evenings, garbage to navigate around on the way to the nearest subway station in the mornings, crowds lining up to get into whatever form of dining is going on, as well as the diners themselves, more cars than can park on the street or anywhere nearby, difficulty crossing the road in safety, open drug dealing on the sidewalk, and many non-residents unfamiliar with the neighborhood wandering and cruising around in confusion.This doesn’t mention the motorcycles, the players of board games, the impromptu and officially sponsored outdoor concerts, the second-hand smoke, and the unaffordability of any of the restaurants to most of the residents who have to endure this. And no, I am not in need of a job washing dishes or waiting on tables at the moment.
What my neighbors and I want from the City of New York is to stop creating one-size-fits-all solutions for the whole city as a Big Fix so they can wash their hands of the whole situation and leave the enforcement to whoever is called in to any emergency. Sorry. You do not have a solution here, it seems to me. Uniformity will not lead to peace, harmony, or lack of responsibility. This is still your mess. You are not fixing it.
You are walking away from it as fast as you can. Wait for it to get worse after you put this in.
Please take this back to the drawing board and try again. Mentsh up.
Good luck with it.
Jennifer Goodman Wollock
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Stuart Goldstein
Either a sidewalk cafe or a roadway cafe should be allowed, but not both.
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Laura Judith Daigen-Ayala
Open sidewalks until 1pm is untenable. Most decent restaurants’ kitchens close at 9. If these are REALLY restaurants and not bars, 9pm should be the absolute latest. People LIVE above these sidewalks, and restaurants are by nature noisy. I assume I am not the only person who goes to bed before 1am.
Additionally, real restaurants don’t need to AMPLIFY THEIR MUSIC AT 70+ DECIBELS the way they do in Inwood. This is destroying QOL for residents.
Furthermore, the “valet parking” that consists of getting someone to illegally double park your vehicle must stop. -
Ruth Moore
The outdoor sheds providing outdoor dining have proved hugely popular in my Windsor Terrace neighborhood and have been used year round. We love them and they’ve allowed restaurants damaged by covid restrictions to bounce back with a larger number of tables. The outdoor sheds are needed more than ever in the Winter season when a sizeable number of diners, like me, will stay away altogether rather than risk busy indoor dining in cold/flu/covid season. Please don’t punish struggling restaurants by making them take down, store, and then have to rebuild outdoor dining facilities if they’d prefer to keep them.
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Rosamond Gianutsos
1 – Outdoor dining should be allowed year-round if the restaurant wants to operate as regularly as weather permits. If the structures are not being used during the winter season, they should be neatly and cleanly stowed.
2 – I strongly support establishing a licensing and fee structure for roadway dining. There are many roadway dining sheds that are unused or poorly maintained. I believe the requirement to pay a fee, submit an application, and comply with design standards will provide an incentive for owners of these sheds to take them down. This will have the effect of beautifying our streetscape while allowing successful roadway sheds to continue operation.
3 – Roadway structures near crosswalks should preserve the “daylighting” necessary for safety at intersections. Accordingly, I oppose the “Vertical Screening” Design Requirements for Roadway Cafes on Page 20 of the Proposed Rule. Vertical Screens above 42 inches that are near crosswalks block the view of oncoming traffic for pedestrians waiting to cross the street. Vertical screenings above 42 inches are a safety hazard for pedestrians and should either be prohibited or should be required to be opaque/transparent. -
JOHN BUCKHOLZ
I’m writing to support a massive expansion of open restaurants and to criticize my hometown for the narrowness of its vision in making the plan seasonal and subjecting business owners to lots of needless hoops and obstacles.
NYC devotes ⅓ of its land area to conveyance and (free) storage of single-occupancy vehicles. This misuse of land has devastating repercussions for flood management, air quality, equity, mobility, and for the city’s long-term aspiration to remain a global city.
Streets should be a place for people, not cars. Letting restaurants operate seating areas in the public ROW is a great idea. It should be expanded, not contracted. And until the city reforms the medieval ways it handles solid waste, it should accept the blame for any vermin issues…not scapegoat small businesses.
Allow permanent structures. Make them secure and fully closable during off-hours. Make operators responsible for maintenance. But please, Jesus, before we’re all underwater…something better than spatially inefficient, ecologically destructive cars.
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Phillip
The hours of operation for roadway cafes should be adjusted to allow for breakfast restaurants to operate prior to 8 am Monday thru Saturday and definitely prior to 10 am on Sunday. Operating hours should be allowed to start at 7 am everyday. This rule of not being allowed to operate on Sunday until 10 am is especially difficult as breakfast is almost over by that time and it would be detrimental for a breakfast restaurant.
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Kyle OBrien
No more outdoor dining sheds! Give the streets back to the people!!
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Brooke Schooley
I would like to see closing times of 10pm, no heaters and a robust enforcement mechanism including weekly visits such that things like abandoned sheds, to name one violation, do not fester. A 30 day removal time frame sounds good, but it is unclear what exactly starts the clock. Please do not make residents the policers of these regulations as has been the case since this program started. It isn’t great for us, it isn’t great for the businesses and it creates animosity in the community. Neighborhoods with high density open dining need to have the ability to create stricter regulations through their community boards.
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Maria P
Quality of life is the issue.
I live on a short block with a dozen restaurants, and more are coming.The noise from sidewalk and street sheds are loud and uncontrollable.
Expanding hours will make it worse.
Allowing amplified music and open windows equals more noise.The number of seats on the sidewalk should be limited, to help control noise and congestion.
Impossible to enforce the 8 foot rule for pedestrians.Road sheds extend past their front.
Some restaurants have both, so essentially the public sidewalks and street are their dining room.
Pedestrians have to navigate our own sidewalk space.Residents live above, adjacent and across from these outdoor spaces. There is no escape from the noise. Early in the morning it’s the brunch crowd. Then more crowds the rest of the day till evening.
There is no peace.This was a temporary lifeline, now restaurants want it for a lifetime!
They want more seats on the sidewalk.
They want permanent sheds year round.
The program is now permanent, that doesn’t mean allowing restaurants to have buildings on the street. That would be indoor dining, but in the street.
Walls, roof, doors,windows, lights, heaters, fans….that is not outdoor dining – that is a dining room, for a very very low cost to restaurants on everyone’s public space.Oh, and would be nice to get the streets cleaned.
It’s been 3 yrs.
It’s a sanitation issue.
Imagine not washing your kitchen floor for 3 years?
Nasty!It’s time for residents to be heard. It’s time for our input to be taken seriously.
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Leif
I’m a central village resident. Every quality of life & safety access norm in the book has been shredded by the temporary program. Community trust of restaurant owners is literally in the gutter that hasn’t been cleaned in 3 years.
Rules for a permanent program? Yes we need them, and most of all the faith they will not be corrupted time and again without practical recourse.
We need to uphold minimum 15’ wide emergency vehicle traffic lanes. This rule cannot be arbitrarily waived to suit restaurant business at the expense of public safety. We need minimum pedestrian access on sidewalks, unencumbered & congested by restaurant planters, decorations, patron lineups & servers. We need minimum curbspace reserved outside residential buildings commensurate with the majority residential use space & needs of the building, not totally dominated by a tiny ground level portion rented out to a restaurant.
Outdoor operations must not be allowed encroach past their actual business frontage, with strict margins maintained from their business perimeter left clear for emergency use & day to day residents use & access. Waivers cannot be doled arbitrarily to suit a business at the expense of public space used by the people who live there.
The City has a duty to reach out to residents to study quality of life and neighborhood safety concerns that have been disrupted & corrupted over these past three years by restaurant owners remaining in the public space and abusing neighborhood trust long after the pandemic ended.
The City must learn to refrain from elevating the concerns of restaurant owners and their investment groups over the concerns of the people who live there.
If a legitimate poll were taken today, with a simple question “Would you be heartbroken if the outdoor setups disappeared off roadbeds & sidewalks tomorrow, knowing they cause so many problems for the residents who live there?” my guess is 10,000:1 would answer no. Most of those no’s would also say they have more important worries about their future than wasting time and community trust trying to reign in a restauranteurs gold rush into our public space. The future of this industry does not depend on colonizing public space at the expense of neighborhoods. There will always be restaurants we all will live and support. Everybody would still find a very nice place nearby to eat, and to get drink when they really need one.
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Isabel
Outdoor dining shelters should remain, should have required criteria for maintenance tainace/repair that is enforced and should not remain open last 11pm on any given night.
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Sara Sparhawk
I strongly urge the city to remove all outdoor dining structures on NYC streets. The new proposal is not sufficient and is another example of unwise decision making.
These structures are not hygienic and only add to the rodent and insect/bug problems this city has. A year ago I dined in one of these sheds and 10 cockroaches came crawling/flying out of the wall. Do you know what the restaurants solution was….they brought out a can of RAID and started spraying it everywhere. Last time I checked, inhaling/ingesting chemicals wasn’t healthy. If these structures remain, the city will need to invest more resources in the Health Department to respond to all of these issues. Is there room in the budget for that?
This proposal is fiscally irresponsible. The $1,050 license fee is a JOKE. Has anyone ever done the simple math of how much one of those metered parking spaces generates a year? Over $20K! At minimum, these restaurants should be charged $25K for EACH parking space they take up. So many restaurants in my neighborhood have tripled their dining space. Has the city audited their tax returns to make sure they are reporting their income and taxes correctly? Again, just another expense needed.
The leaders of this city need to step up and make the right choices for residents of this city. These restaurants participating in this program have more than recouped their COVID losses.
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Louise Perazzo
First of all as a safety issue I think the sheds are nothing but a nuisance if an ambulance needs to be somewhere for any length of time while assisting a patient it will tie up traffic miserably as the village streets are very narrow and now even more congested by the MANY SHEDS
Second the sheds have doubled the seating space for the restaurants and you can’t tell they haven’t made up their money list by the pandemic. I have personally heard of restaurants who were able to open at different location from the profits of there sheds
Third the rat situation is out of control. The rats had nested in my car under the hood and I didn’t see the city pay for that damage
And while we are talking about cars. Where are we supposed to park them
Wake up Mr Mayor and deal with these issues -
Kelly Lockett
As a frequent user of outdoor dining all year round, I disagree with the design guidelines. While I do think that certain guidelines need to be put in place such as accessibility, barriers, and distance from fire hydrants, there is no reason why dining structures shouldn’t be able to be enclosed and have a solid roof. There are many times I have dined outdoors with my dog in these structures in the winter time and if it wasn’t for the roof and walls, we wouldn’t have been able to do so. Heaters don’t do much if wind is able to rip through. These designs make no sense and do not facility the creativity of New York restaurants. I have seen so many beautiful and creative outdoor dining structures built by restaurants and by limiting them to this strict design removes the vibrancy and individuality of the restaurants. I do agree that there are abandoned structures or worn down structures that should be renovated or removed. Therefore, I propose that structures, current or new, should have to go through an approval process, in which the run down structures will have to be replaced. Restaurants should be able to come up with new designs to fit their customer base, a roof and walls included in this design. Please consider allowing restaurants to keep roofs on their structures, which allows for diners to enjoy the structures in all weather, rain or shine.
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Bistro punta sal
Estoy interesado en saber sobre las nueva Reglas the out door dinning. Tambien cuando vuelven abrir la nueva registracion para el 2024, intense registrar pero estan serradas la misma..gracias
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Pam Edson
No. Why do this??? This will absolutely limit people from choosing to eat in a space that is dog friendly. Especially in a bustling city like NY, that makes no sense.
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Domenic rubio
I do not support this planned amendment to the outdoor dinning structures for nyc, having a heating and roof cover is necessary to enjoy these structures and has had a very positive impact on restaurant experiences in the city
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C.M.
Have reconsidered:
Comment attachment
If this program is allowed, renewal of outside dining licenses should occur at a maximum 2 years, at least for the first time as it will take some time to get the program going [not 4 as DOT proposes, nor 3 as I initially suggested]. And it should be only 6 months long. [Pick your 6.]
The attached show reasons why this whole program is unacceptable.
2023-11-09-email-comments-to-dot-re-outdoor-dining.pdf -
Natalia Mehlman Petrzela
I live on west 4th street between Bank and West 12th streets. We have four sheds on one side of a narrow block. They have destroyed the aesthetics and calm of the street and are a blight with regards to three categories:
SANITATION
– they bring rats, generate huge mounds of trash, and prevent street cleaningPEDESTRIAN SAFETY
– they make visibility of cars and e-bikes very difficult
– the sidewalks are often so crowded we need to walk in the street
– there is no longer a place for ride-shares to pull over, so disabled people are severely disadvantaged, having to walk a block to enter their carsNOISE
– these sheds have multiplied the number of clientele to the restaurants, during hours and off, as at least one has become a public bench
– even a conversation carries into the windows above, and bands regularly come and play to entertain the crowds
– cars honk all day because there is no lane to pass delivery trucks, etcThis block is a highly inappropriate location for roadway dining. These sheds should be dismantled and the restaurants should use the sidewalk licenses they have.
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David Ethan
I have no affiliation with MOD STREET, and I am a restaurant owner. I cite them only as an example of one company that has designed a thoughtful and practical solution for outdoor, big-city dining. Their modular enclosures are easy to assemble and disassemble. The construction material is light weight and vermin-proof. The units rest on easy to level, adjustable lifts, that allow the structures to be elevated from the street bed, and remain ADA compliant. Trash doesn’t build up under them and rats can’t live inside them. They can also be designed to have barricade planters on the sides as an added level of protection. These units can be purchased or rented, and stored remotely during the proposed off-season.
The design of these structures solve for many of the complaints associated with out-door dining and create an eco-friendly solution for repeated set up and removal. Please give them a look, they may be the best compromise we can come up with.
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victoria vicky cameron
During Covid I appreciated the need to provide restaurants and diners with outdoor space to eat when it wasn’t safe to be inside. Now that has changed and yet we still have empty sheds everywhere that create congestion, noise and garbage pollution. Before Covid, restaurants were not allowed to have outdoor space on residential cross streets. I believe we should go back to that rule.
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Sandy MacDonald
Sheds, north side of 35th between fifth and sixth.
Half the block is taken up with sheds, including one really large one that expands beyond its own footprint, and leaves a narrow aisle, usually overflowing with drunks. Passage by anyone in a wheelchair would not be possible.
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Betty Kay
I appreciate the opportunity to be able to comment on the proposed rules for the Open Dining program and hope that my comments and suggestions will help guide some modifications before the rule is adopted.
First, under siting requirements, it states that “A clear path shall remain on the sidewalk or sidewalk widening after installation of a sidewalk cafe.” It also states that the clear path is 50% of the width of the sidewalk including any sidewalk widening. (emphases mine) Including widenings as part of the sidewalk width for determining and potentially locating a clear path would not allow wheelchair users and people with other wheeled devices (walkers, mobility scooters, delivery carts, strollers, suitcases, etc.) to have access to all of the buildings on that block or would require them to go extra distance to reach them.
As a mobility scooter user, I am very aware that wheelchairs and other wheeled devices can only move between the sidewalk and the roadbed or painted sidewalk widenings where there are pedestrian ramps (curb cuts). If a sidewalk cafe is allowed, but results in the clear path being located on the extended sidewalk, then how is a wheelchair user supposed to get to other buildings on the same block? What if there is more than one sidewalk cafe on the block? Then, even going to the next corner to find another curb cut would still make it impossible to get to building entries that are located between the sidewalk cafes.
People with mobility disabilities, as well as those with other wheeled devices, need access to all buildings and should not be required to go extra distances to get to them. The lack of pedestrian ramps and the blockage of these ramps with parked vehicles already makes getting around with a wheelchair difficult. Allowing restaurants, or any other business or street activity, to block passage on/off the raised portion of sidewalk, even if it has a sidewalk extension to accommodate the able-bodied or those not interested in entering buildings on that block, is not acceptable. No sidewalk cafe should be allowed to take up raised sidewalk space unless there is enough clear path on that elevated sidewalk to allow wheelchair users and others with wheeled devices to get by their setup so that they can access every building entry on the same block.
Second, while the rule states that the perimeter of a sidewalk cafe shall be clearly and visibly demarcated by a removable and self-supporting base wall, railing, planter, fence, or stanchion and rope… it does not state how the public can know what the perimeter of the sidewalk space permitted by the DOT is. I have seen diners move the perimeter barriers outward, probably because they want more space. It must be clear what the allowed perimeter is so that it is possible to report space expansion that is likely to occur, especially where there are moveable sidewalk barriers.
The rules should also clearly state that all restaurant activities including their service activities, lines for their patrons and where customer’s pets can be kept must be inside the allowed perimeter.
Third, the rule should make mention of any seating relative to food cart locations (and vice versa). In my neighborhood a restaurant has sidewalk seating in the same location where a food cart is located. The cart’s lines extend into and along the pedestrian clear path, which is only about four foot wide due to the restaurant’s tables opposite it.
Fourth, it is concerning that an eight foot (or even four foot) clear path will not be possible on the many historic, narrow sidewalks in my district. Neighborhoods such as the Financial District and the historic districts of Tribeca have narrow streets that are also considered global pedestrian mobility paths by the DOT. This raises concerns about there being enough space for pedestrians, especially when there is scaffolding, another issue not mentioned in the rules.
Fifth, NYC ranks 93 out of the 100 biggest US cities in bathroom access, so ensuring that at least customers have access to toilets in restaurants is essential. City council is considering multiple bills to increase the number of public bathrooms, so it is essential that all city programs require that businesses are able to provide adequate bathroom access for their customers and visitors. The rules for the Open Dining program should require that all participating restaurants meet the city’s plumbing code based on its indoor, sidewalk and roadbed seating capacities combined, not just their indoor occupancy.
I support the Outdoor Dining NYC Program, but in some locations, applicants should be considered on a case by case basis, especially where the infrastructure is already inadequate or unsafe for pedestrians, especially those with mobility limitations.
Thank you for your consideration.
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Royce
Most outdoor restaurant structures in Forest Hills Queens, Bayside Queens, Astoria Queens, and other Queens NY area, are not even being used by patrons. Perhaps during the pandemic, but now they are barren unsightly dumps. Most are unkempt, and dirty. They just take up parking spaces for no reason. Not everyone takes public transportation or taxis. Loss of parking spaces means loss of customers for the other businesses in the area, what about saving those businesses. Also all outdoor structures do not provide heat in the winter nor cooling in the summer, that’s another reason why patrons no longer use them. These structures are not ventilated, they are enclosed, and cause close proximity among patrons as protection barriers are no longer set up, so realistically your chances of catching Covid are higher. And who is regulating these unsanitary and unsightly structures. I wish I can show you pics of these unused structures, they’re all over. Save neighboring businesses, let their customers have parking.
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Anonymous
1. Minimum 15’ emergency traffic lane all times all roadbeds, NO EXCEPTIONS.
2. Minimum 8’ clear path or 50% whichever greater all sidewalks, does not include minimum 3’ clearance for SW table/chairs service aisles or furnishings lane, NO EXCEPTIONS.
2. No outdoor operating past 9 pm Sundays/weeknights, 10 pm Fridays/Saturdays.
3. No outdoor operating 11 AM any day, NO EXCEPTIONS.
4. All outdoor equipment, chairs, tables, umbrellas taken indoors every day.
5. No outdoor electrical device or appliances or heaters of any kind, NO EXCEPTIONS.
6. No outdoor operating past business frontage lines, NO EXCEPTIONS. No outdoor operating opposite ground level residential doorways, residential windows, residential frontage, NO EXCEPTIONS.
7. No fully open restaurant windows & doorways to sidewalks after 9 PM ANY NIGHT OF WEEK, NO EXCEPTIONS.
8. Streets & sidewalks must be cleared of any/all restaurant equipment every day to allow for daily cleaning & streetsweeping.
9. No outdoor operating in roadbed except in legitimate parking lane, and only then where there is a sidewalk with minimum 8’ or 50% whichever is greater clear path sidewalk not including 3’ service & furnishings lane, NO EXCEPTIONS.
10. SW & RB Licenses fees should be 1 year only, subject to binding CB (and/or LPC if in Historic District) review every 2 years, NO EXCEPTIONS.
11. Extend CB review to 60 days.
12. No waivers except by binding CB review, NO EXCEPTIONS.
13. DEPOSIT BOND REQUIRED FOR COST OF REMOVAL OF NON- COMPLIANT STRUCTURES & EQUIPMENT. -
Cecilia Tornqvist-Deitzer
Re Permanent Open Restaurant Program proposed rules
Re open hours
The proposed operating hours is really obnoxious. There are many residential areas that will be impacted. Hours should be cut back to allow residents some quiet in their own homes.Re noise
Agree with no amplified music allowed outdoors, but the same should be for indoors for restaurants/bars that keep windows and doors open. The noise is often not contained indoors. The same goes for restaurants/bars for silent TVs and the sound being blasted indoors to reach customers in outdoor sheds through open windows and/or doors.Re design and site of sheds
Proposal request a minimum of 15 foot lane for emergency vehicles. That should be increased to a minimum of 18 foot lane to allow for public safety and emergency personnel to be efficient.
The proposal should clearly state that all cafe roadway structures must be removed from December through March to allow for proper cleaning at least 4 months of the year. Currently the proposal is unacceptable.All roadway structures must be readily removable, in an emergency situation. Therefore the proposal should clearly indicate no roof and no walls.
The proposed rules must clearly limit the size of shed allowed. The size should not extend beyond the frontage of the restaurant/bar.
The proposed rules should clearly explain what the wording about roadway shed citing “within space dedicated to parking” means. Added language should indicate that any street with a NO PARKING AT ANYTIME is not eligible for a roadway shed.
The proposed rules should outline a 3 foot service aile for waiters and staff serving customers. That service aisle was the standard of sidewalk cafe program before the pandemic mandating the restaurants to not use the public pedestrian clear path for private business purposes. The lack of the 3 foot service aisle forces the wait staff to constantly cross into the pedestrian clear path which is not right.
No outdoor heating should be allowed. We are in the middle of an environmental crisis and should not allow for such waste of energy.
That is unacceptable.Proposed rules should not be allowed to be waived by the commissioner. That is unacceptable and should be removed from the proposal.
The proposed rules provide several ways for restaurant owners to appeal licensing and revocable consent and violation decision by DOT, there is no mechanism provided at all for how neighboring residents and businesses can respond to restaurants rules violations. To use 311 is just not enough. Neighboring residents and businesses should be given the same consideration as for restaurants.
Also the proposed rules do not yet provide for public display of data on restaurant licenses, revivable consent, violations, fines and complaints received from the public. We need to know how this program is affecting our community.
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Rob L
Absolutely no amplified music and Al tables and chairs should be brought in by the end of the day. Permits should cost at least $1000 a month for the months used or have a tax of 2% or so. 10% of all funds brought in should be used to fund and new agency whose sole function is to do inspections and issue fine for non compliant businesses. Not allowing the required amount of sidewalk space should be fined heavily and after 3 violations, their permit should be revoked permanently.
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Lisa
As I write this, it’s 4am and my living room windows are closed (because of the noise), but I still hear the screaming from the outdoor crowd in my bedroom which is all the way at the other end of my apartment.
Anyone proposing this be permanent should have to live like this for a few months first.
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faye rimalovski
I am writing in support of S.C.R.A.M., which is committed to mitigating the number of rats in our city.
Outdoor dining was the city’s response to a unique crisis for our city, and it has become a boon for restaurants and street life in general. However, it has also greatly contributed to the population explosion of rats. We are pleased to see that the new rules require walls be filled, since empty walls are a primary source of rat harborage. But we also beg the city to require dining sheds not have FLOORS or PLANTERS (unless lined with wire mesh to prevent burrowing).
Any flooring creates a protective space for rats to eat food scraps and procreate, and planters allow for nesting and birthing pups – to allow these would create an opportunity for further growth of the rat population, which would lead to the more infestation and threat of human disease.
It is critical that the new rules for outdoor dining ensure the elimination of all forms of rat harborage, so we can transition to safer outdoor dining and a better, healthier city.
Yours truly, Faye
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Michal Petrzela
The proposed rules should mandate that the restaurant do not use the public pedestrian clearpath for private business purposes. The lack of the 3’ service aisle in these proposed rules will also affect service to roadway cafes as wait staff will constantly be crossing the pedestrian clearpath to serve customers in the shed. Make the clearpath truly clear for the use of pedestrians only!
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Carol Morrison
I am emailing because the DOT has proposed new rules for outdoor dining. The Prospect Heights Rat Task Force is aligned with most of these rules — EXCEPT when they allow for dining sheds to have floors (which protect rats while they eat and procreate) and planters (if you don’t require mesh covering, rats will burrow and have babies in them).
The Prospect Heights Rat Task Force ask that DOT support community efforts to minimize the proliferation of rodents, and ask that DOT stand in support of the elimination of floors and planters (unless mesh is required).
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Anthony Guarisco
I am writing in support of S.C.R.A.M., which is committed to mitigating the number of rats in our city.]
Outdoor dining was the city’s response to a unique crisis for our city, and it has become a boon for restaurants and street life in general. However, it has also greatly contributed to the population explosion of rats. We are pleased to see that the new rules require walls be filled, since empty walls are a primary source of rat harborage. But we also beg the city to require dining sheds not have FLOORS or PLANTERS (unless lined with wire mesh to prevent burrowing).
Any flooring creates a protective space for rats to eat food scraps and procreate, and planters allow for nesting and birthing pups – to allow these would create an opportunity for further growth of the rat population, which would lead to the more infestation and threat of human disease.
It is critical that the new rules for outdoor dining ensure the elimination of all forms of rat harborage, so we can transition to safer outdoor dining and a better, healthier city.
Yours truly,
Anthony Guarisco
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Michael Wallin
Outdoor dining should be year round. And if it is not year round, the location of outdoor dining should not become parking spaces for vehicles in the winter. Lots of restaurants provide heating lamps that make outdoor dining comfortable in cold weather. Also, the design standards should be loosened. Lots of restaurants have built beautiful spaces on the street. I’m t would be a shame to see them removed.
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David Miller
The amount of street dining sheds should be reduced severely, and those that are left over should undergo as rigorous a process as anything built under the rules of the NYC Department of Buildings … especially when it comes to materials used to build the structures, that anything electrical in nature must adhere to city rules as well as the National Electrical Code. Street dining sheds should not block street corners. If it were up to me, there would by NO street dining sheds; any outdoor dining should be on a sidewalk immediately adjacent to the permanent restaurant building structure.
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Lisa Bowstead
Restaurants rent their space. If restaurants want to rent additional space from the city, they should be charged the same rate per square foot that they pay for their privately leased space. There should be no city give-away to businesses that happen to be in locations that can accommodate their expansion. All health and safety rules and regulations should apply to the entire capacity, not just the privately leased areas.
The revenue collected from restaurants leasing city property should be earmarked for safe streets infrastructure projects throughout the city.
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Patricia nolan
Making the sheds removable is excellent…I have seen roads being resurfaced around the structures which is unsustainable. I have also seen rats during the day feasting on garbage in the structures…and when I told the owner of the restaurant he shrugged and said ” it’s New York so what do you expect ?!”
Noise is also a problem so please include prohibition of speakers and tv’s in these structures. I appreciate the new rules that still allow restaurants to offer outdoor dining and enforcement will be paramount. -
Angela Weisl
I hope Outdoor dining can be continued throughout the year. It’s particularly helpful in the winter (if not as charming) because that’s when people are sick, so anyone with health concerns or pre-existing conditions probably can’t risk indoor dining in the winter. (This isn’t just a COVID concern; for many people, the flu or RSV are just as dangerous.) I hope the Outdoor dining licenses will be allowed all year around.
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Cathy
Midtown New Yorkers living in buildings on low floors have suffered with Outdoor Dining. We have to put up with constant noise living over and across from the many restaurants filling our neighborhood. Restaurants ignore the rules and play amplified music all day for their outdoor patrons. There is no way residents cannot hear this music when it is directly under and across from your windows. Since restaurants will be open from morning until midnight, who will enforce the rule of no amplified music? Complaining to 311 does nothing. The police come and “fix” the situation and after they leave, the restaurants turn it back on again. The police have more important things to handle than noise complaints of illegal amplified music.
Please help restore our quality of life and health and stand up for residents who are forced to keep their windows closed and sleep with noise machines so they can try to get enough sleep before rising early for work in the morning. -
Hisham Oumlil
To who may concern at the DOT,
I and many of my friends think that outdoor dining should be limited to the period running from April to October, and to restaurants with an outdoor capacity of a minimum of 8 tables as there are many outdoor sheds that are too small and occupy public spaces without much return on investment. We also believe that outdoor dinning should be available on the sidewalk and absolutely not on the street on the main streets, meaning no outdoor sheds but rather designated outdoor dining areas. With outdoor dining, the DOT in collaboration with NYPD traffic division must regulate the craziness of the speedy mopeds and others on our streets. You can’t comfortably dine outside with all that noise and chaos.
Thank you
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Roslyn Biskin
Year-round outdoor dining! I love that restaurants have added some beauty and color to the space in front of their storefronts. It animates the city streets and sidewalks – much more so than parked cars do! It demonstrates what the city is all about – a creative and personal touch wherever and whenever possible. The city is very good at adding bureaucratic red tape to ideas – killing the joy in the process. Let the outdoor dining sheds remain a joyful, unique expression in our city, without quashing individualism.
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Melissa Russell Paige
I think we should get rid of restaurant sheds altogether. But if we must keep them, no floors (so rats can’t eat and procreate there) and no planters (so rats can’t live and procreate there). Thank you.
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Tara Prout
Outdoor dining was the city’s response to a unique crisis for our city, and it has become a boon for restaurants and street life in general. However, it has also greatly contributed to the population explosion of rats. We are pleased to see that the new rules require walls be filled, since empty walls are a primary source of rat harborage. But we also beg the city to require dining sheds not have FLOORS or PLANTERS (unless lined with wire mesh to prevent burrowing).
Any flooring creates a protective space for rats to eat food scraps and procreate, and planters allow for nesting and birthing pups – to allow these would create an opportunity for further growth of the rat population, which would lead to the more infestation and threat of human disease.
It is critical that the new rules for outdoor dining ensure the elimination of all forms of rat harborage, so we can transition to safer outdoor dining and a better, healthier city.
Yours truly,
Tara Prout -
Kiri Blakeley
Outdoor dining should be allowed provided that the areas are kept clean, garbage-free, and not allowed to degenerate into “hangout” areas or homeless shelters. There shouldn’t be music, etc allowed in the sheds due to noise. There should be enforcement of these restrictions.
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Jessica Simmons
I am in favor of businesses that want to use outdoor dining and can maintain it to do so. My concern is about several restaurants in my neighborhood that haven’t used their structures in months and are still up/gathering trash and rats, taking up parking. I hope that the new rules allow for maintenance/usage (V spot on 5th ave in park slope is an obvious one)
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jane y
PLEASE DO NOT ELIMINATE or make outdoor dining options difficult/expensive/unreasonable for restaurants/cafes/food establishments. It has added tremendous charm and character to so many neighborhoods, making it rival Paris’ charming sidewalk aesthetic and liveliness. It revitalizes the neighborhood as long as it is not a hazard to the community, well maintained, and deemed a benefit to the neighborhood. Pre-covid, it was becoming a drab, predictable city. Don’t dismantle the one good thing that happened to this city during COVID time!
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Aaron Agne
Please require that outdoor structures do not contribute to rat infestation. From what I understand, having floors and planters creates spaces for rats to hangout and procreate so there should be thought put into whether to disallow them.
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PV
Outdoor dining has been a creative solution for restaurants and invigorated street life during a challenging time. I love it! However, it has also contributed to more rat activity.
We are encouraged to see the new regulations require sealed walls, as open walls readily harbor rats. We urge the city to also prohibit flooring or planters in dining sheds, unless protected with wire mesh.
Any floors or unsecured planters allow rats to nest, breed, and multiply – exacerbating infestation and public health risks. By eliminating these forms of harborage, the updated outdoor dining rules can help curb rat populations for safer streets.
We share the city’s aim of transitioning to outdoor dining that is both community-minded and sanitary. With prudent restrictions against rat access and habitation, we believe that vision can become a reality.
Thank you for considering this feedback as you finalize the new outdoor dining regulations. We appreciate the city’s efforts to balance innovative public spaces with public health.
Best,
PV
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Wendy Blum
I am writing in support of S.C.R.A.M., which is committed to mitigating the number of rats in our city.
Outdoor dining was the city’s response to a unique crisis for our city, and it has become a boon for restaurants and street life in general. However, it has also greatly contributed to the population explosion of rats. We are pleased to see that the new rules require walls be filled, since empty walls are a primary source of rat harborage. But we also beg the city to require dining sheds not have FLOORS or PLANTERS (unless lined with wire mesh to prevent burrowing).Any flooring creates a protective space for rats to eat food scraps and procreate, and planters allow for nesting and birthing pups – to allow these would create an opportunity for further growth of the rat population, which would lead to the more infestation and threat of human disease.
It is critical that the new rules for outdoor dining ensure the elimination of all forms of rat harborage, so we can transition to safer outdoor dining and a better, healthier city.
Yours truly,
Wendy Blum -
Johnny Planchin
Outdoor dining has been a huge boon to New York City, and it’s only a shame that it took a global pandemic to get us to reclaim a little space from cars and repurpose it for these outdoor “dining sheds”.
That said, it must be acknowledged that these sheds are using public space for private business. As such it is reasonable to ask that the restaurant owners pay the city for the use of this space.
HOWEVER, it would be ridiculous to prevent restaurants from using the public space for free while still offering free curbside car parking. It’s all the same public space being used, so I’m not sure why parked cars — a particularly inefficient use of space, storing a private, polluting, deadly, object — get to use it for free, while dining sheds — seating tens if not hundreds of people in an evening, strengthening local businesses, livening up the neighborhood, and leading to all of the positive knock-on economic effects of people leaving their houses (spending money elsewhere before and after they eat) — would be forced to pay.
As a city, we have to decide: our public curbside space is either free for everyone, or it’s paid for everyone. But we cannot charge only the restaurants, in many ways the backbone of this city, while continuing to offer curbside parking for polluting, deadly, *private* vehicles for free. That would be getting our priorities as a city completely backwards.
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When it comes to *sidewalk* cafes, I’m a bit more ambivalent, as those often take up valuable pedestrian space and lead to overcrowding, and in some cases really make a sidewalk impassable. At the very least, permitting for sidewalk cafes should be made more stringent.
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Katie T
I am writing in support of S.C.R.A.M., which is committed to mitigating the number of rats in our city.
Outdoor dining was the city’s quick response to crisis, and it has become a boon for restaurants. We now have an opportunity to improve the regulation of these structures, since it’s clear that these have greatly contributed to the population explosion of rats. I have personally dined in sheds on several occasions with walls that are filled with active rats and littered with droppings.
We are pleased to see that the new rules require walls be filled, since empty walls are a primary source of rat harborage. But we also beg the city to require dining sheds not have FLOORS or PLANTERS (unless lined with wire mesh to prevent burrowing). It is critical that the new rules for outdoor dining ensure the elimination of all forms of rat harborage, so we can transition to safer outdoor dining and a better, healthier city.
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Ange
It is senseless to take down and/or remove outdoor dining infrastructure during winter months. Local businesses have done very well to keep NYers cozy on cool/cold weather days and nights. We know there are many ways to reduced the rodent population. With proper cleaning by the business establishments this issue can be addressed. Annual remove of the infrastructure causes undo stress to the business owners and community confusion. Please allow for outdoor dining facilities to be in place year round for community building and greater access to our beloved local eateries, cafes, and bars.
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Rachel Bonsignore
Outdoor dining was the city’s response to a unique crisis for our city, and it has become a boon for restaurants and street life in general. However, it has also greatly contributed to the population explosion of rats. We are pleased to see that the new rules require walls be filled, since empty walls are a primary source of rat harborage. But we also beg the city to require dining sheds not have FLOORS or PLANTERS (unless lined with wire mesh to prevent burrowing).
Any flooring creates a protective space for rats to eat food scraps and procreate, and planters allow for nesting and birthing pups – to allow these would create an opportunity for further growth of the rat population, which would lead to the more infestation and threat of human disease.
It is critical that the new rules for outdoor dining ensure the elimination of all forms of rat harborage, so we can transition to safer outdoor dining and a better, healthier city.
Best regards,
Rachel Bonsignore -
Some New Yorker
The real question we should be asking is: how come a private industry (regardless of this program being successful in the past) is going to benefit in perpetuity from the use of public space as opposed to other industries who are struggling to stay afloat (and struggled through the pandemic with no “program” in place to save them)?
I don’t see the local mom and pop tailoring shop or the furniture store being given free public space to conduct their businesses. Like, yes, we saved the restaurant industry. There was a pandemic. Great. I get it. But now we’re going to give them perpetual access to a public commodity just because what? They make money? This is an exclusive treatment and a wrongful use of public goods to benefit a private sector that is no longer struggling to stay afloat, and if you want to make the argument that it is, you’re not really taking into consideration the vast array of other businesses that are rapidly disappearing around the city.
The restaurant industry should NOT benefit from preferential treatment.
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Daniel Evans
I have greatly appreciated the city’s pivot to supporting outside dining. While there are space and safety issues to navigate, it feels like it’s been a net boon to our unique community that has supported our vibrant food scene.
However – it has also greatly contributed to the population explosion of rats, and as part of the rule update I would encourage the city to require that all dining sheds not have floors or planters (unless lined with wire mesh to prevent burrowing), as both have proven to be incredible rat habitats and direct contributors to a growing and very visible rat population, one of the biggest downsides of our embrace of outdoor dining operations.
As S.C.R.A.M. and some of the other NYC based rat-mitigation groups have accurately noted, “Any flooring creates a protective space for rats to eat food scraps and procreate, and planters allow for nesting and birthing pups – to allow these would create an opportunity for further growth of the rat population, which would lead to the more infestation and threat of human disease.”
Please support outdoor dining and help ensure its long-term viability by changing the rules to prevent the creation of rat-friendly structures and help create a better, safer experience for all New Yorkers.
Thank you,
Daniel Evans
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Kristin O'Donnell-Rizzo
All rules need to be fair across the board and the opportunity needs to exist for all restaurants. Some rules don’t particularly make sense like, no set ups in “no standing zones or no stopping zones”. If cars can stand or stop here, isn’t this a better place to set up outdoor dining. What is the no standing zone for anyway? We have a no standing any time sign in front of our establishment that is being extended for city bike, and not removed for outdoor dining. Is this fair?
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ANDREW WINFREY
Outdoor dining was the city’s response to a unique crisis for our city, and it has become a boon for restaurants and street life in general. However, it has also greatly contributed to the population explosion of rats. We are pleased to see that the new rules require walls be filled, since empty walls are a primary source of rat harborage. But we also beg the city to require dining sheds not have FLOORS or PLANTERS (unless lined with wire mesh to prevent burrowing).
Any flooring creates a protective space for rats to eat food scraps and procreate, and planters allow for nesting and birthing pups – to allow these would create an opportunity for further growth of the rat population, which would lead to the more infestation and threat of human disease.
It is critical that the new rules for outdoor dining ensure the elimination of all forms of rat harborage, so we can transition to safer outdoor dining and a better, healthier city.
Yours truly,
Andrew Winfrey -
Cynthia Spencer
I was dismayed to see that the new rules will not allow for the outdoor dining during the winter months, December through March — yet this is a time they are needed the most for many of us! This means there is no restaurant dining-out option for those four months of the year, particularly for those with a health risk relative to COVID or other respiratory diseases.
In addition, I have read that restaurants will be required to take down the outdoor areas during that winter period. This seems like this would be a disincentive to maintain outdoor dining at all, due to the cost of putting up and taking down. It would also be likely to create enormous unnecessary waste of building materials, which is not good for environmental reasons, and will contribute unnecessarily to landfill. Even if some parts are reusable, it’s likely some will not be. And many restaurants would not have space for storage of reusable materials.
Please reconsider this limitation and allow outdoor dining to continue throughout the year. It would be more practical for the restaurants, and more beneficial for the customers.
Thank you.(m) Roadway Cafe Operating Season.
(1) A roadway cafe shall not operate on any day from November 30 to March 31, inclusive. -
Hope M.
I live near Union Square on a residential mixed use block which until recently had six roadside dining sheds on one small block. Those sheds have come down for the winter but the many problems will undoubtedly return when they go back up next spring. Those include excessive noise from loud patrons, late night diners who with alcohol become late night revelers, overcrowding on the sidewalks making it difficult to move though our streets, rats , vermin and excessive garbage, difficulty accessing emergency vehicles, and more. We are tax paying citizens of NYC and deserve the quiet use and enjoyment of our homes. How does outdoor dining contribute to our lives? It doesn’t. It contributes to the coffers of the city and the restaurants who get more seating at our expense. Please eliminate this program altogether in residential and mixed use neighborhoods.
Thank you for considering the tax paying residents of Manhattan. -
Gilly Nadel
It’s important that new rules for restaurants balance the needs of people who eat out, people who live in the area, and the restaurant owners. I’ve never run a business, but I see restaurants shutting down because of the many pressures on them — the increasing cost of food and labor, the ongoing worker shortage, and the often difficult bureaucracy they must navigate. So we need to make sure any new regulations aren’t too onerous.
I do think it’s reasonable to require restaurants that operate a sidewalk or roadway cafe to apply for a license, so that only those that use their outdoor space continue to have it set up. However, it’s silly not to allow such cafes to build light shelters for their customers, when this is a city with hot summers, cold winters, and rain all year round.
A final word — parking should not be a consideration when balancing the needs of community members. New York City is dense, and it needs to become a city of mostly pedestrians, bike riders, and mass transit commuters. The best way to ensure that is to deprioritize parking.
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Robert Zerillj
As one of the Co-Owners of Veniero’s Pasticcera, I’d like to know after all the new rules are legally in effect would we need to have a permit to put out 3 small self-service tables along with 6 small deck chairs located in front of our cafe. We know that the pandemic rules were relaxed and that old licenses were also not being renewed.
I assume that permits/ licenses will be required but just note that we are not having any waiter/waitress service it’s just people bringing out drinks/pastries purchased inside and they are sitting for short periods of time. There is a trash receptacle nearby where the customer can put their trash into.Thank you for your time.
Sincerely,
Robert Zerilli
President
A.Veniero Inc. dba Veniero’s Pasticceria -
Michele Travis
The operating hours in the statute are absurdly long, especially in residential districts, and the proposed DOT rules manage to make the situation even worse. Local Law 121 specifies 10 a.m. to midnight, not 8 a.m. to 1 a.m. on some days. Residents need to sleep. Seventeen hours per day of outdoor dining noise is unacceptable. There should also be no amplified sound outdoors, including restaurants/bars that open their windows and doors to let sound spill out to torture their neighbors with over-amplified music and screaming patrons.
Outdoor structures, whether on the sidewalk or at the curb, should not block pedestrian access or create an unsafe space by blocking fire lanes or hydrants. In my neighborhood, I have seen many hulking structures on sidewalks that are basically extensions that could never pass building codes, leaving only 2 ft of space for pedestrians to pass.
Bars and restaurants aren’t entitled to all of the public space around their storefronts, nor should they be able to disturb neighbors with excessive noise at all hours. The Permanent Open Streets program needs to be far more stringently regulated.
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Carolyn Cryer
I am writing in support of S.C.R.A.M., which is committed to mitigating the number of rats in our city.]
Outdoor dining was the city’s response to a unique crisis for our city, and it has become a boon for restaurants and street life in general. However, it has also greatly contributed to the population explosion of rats. We are pleased to see that the new rules require walls be filled, since empty walls are a primary source of rat harborage. But we also beg the city to require dining sheds not have FLOORS or PLANTERS (unless lined with wire mesh to prevent burrowing).
Any flooring creates a protective space for rats to eat food scraps and procreate, and planters allow for nesting and birthing pups – to allow these would create an opportunity for further growth of the rat population, which would lead to the more infestation and threat of human disease.
It is critical that the new rules for outdoor dining ensure the elimination of all forms of rat harborage, so we can transition to safer outdoor dining and a better, healthier city.
Yours truly,
Carolyn -
Jesse Hendrich
I am writing as the chairman of S.C.R.A.M. (Sterling’s Committee for Rat Awareness & Mitigation), a committee of Sterling Place Block Association in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn, committed to mitigating the number of rats in our neighborhood and in this city.
Outdoor dining was the city’s response to a unique crisis for our city, and it has become a boon for restaurants and street life in general. However, it has also greatly contributed to the population explosion of rats. We are pleased to see that the new rules require walls be filled, since empty walls are a primary source of rat harborage. But we also beg the city to require dining sheds not have FLOORS or PLANTERS (unless lined with wire mesh to prevent burrowing).
Any flooring creates a protective space for rats to eat food scraps and procreate, and planters allow for nesting and birthing pups – to allow these would create an opportunity for further growth of the rat population, which would lead to the more infestation and threat of human disease.
It is critical that the new rules for outdoor dining ensure the elimination of all forms of rat harborage, so we can transition to safer outdoor dining and a better, healthier city.
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Anurag Heda
I am writing in support of S.C.R.A.M., which is committed to mitigating the number of rats in our city.
Outdoor dining was the city’s response to a unique crisis for our city, and it has become a boon for restaurants and street life in general. However, it has also greatly contributed to the population explosion of rats. We are pleased to see that the new rules require walls be filled, since empty walls are a primary source of rat harborage. But we also beg the city to require dining sheds not have FLOORS or PLANTERS (unless lined with wire mesh to prevent burrowing).Any flooring creates a protective space for rats to eat food scraps and procreate, and planters allow for nesting and birthing pups – to allow these would create an opportunity for further growth of the rat population, which would lead to the more infestation and threat of human disease.
It is critical that the new rules for outdoor dining ensure the elimination of all forms of rat harborage, so we can transition to safer outdoor dining and a better, healthier city.
Yours truly,
Anu -
Lynn Ellsworth
Reduce Noise & Hours of Operation
The operating hours in the statute are absurdly long—especially in residential districts—but the proposed DOT rules manage to make the situation even worse. Local Law 121 specifies 10 a.m. to midnight, not 8 a.m. to 1 a.m. on some days. Residents need to sleep. Seventeen hours per day of outdoor dining noise is unprecedented, and unacceptable.
The rules say no amplified sound outdoors. The same prohibition should rule indoors in any restaurant/bar that has its windows or doors open. No noise spilling into the street and into our homes.
It is now a common practice for restaurants to put up “silent” televisions in outdoor sidewalk cafes and sheds and blast the corresponding television sound through the open doors and windows of the restaurant itself. Close this loophole, or make restaurants close their windows and doors.
Clarify Design, Siting & Other Roadway Rules
The proposed rules say that there must be a minimum 15-foot lane on any street to give emergency vehicles access to our streets and homes. But the rules allow for exceptions and waivers. There can be no waivers and exceptions for public safety.
The rules ought to clearly state that all roadway cafe structures must be removed from December through March so that our streets can be swept at least 4 months a year. Instead, the language of both Local Law 121 and the proposed rules fail to specify that “readily removable furniture” must ever actually be removed. Make it clear that restaurants are not to store their setups in the streets in the off-season.
Calling structures “open” is too vague. Although a proposed design drawing shows no roofs on roadway sheds, this is not specifically stated in the rules. And guidelines now allow for “vertical screenings” which sound a lot like a “wall.” So, proposed rules must explicitly prohibit all roofs and walls. Structures must be readily removable in the event of an emergency. If a forklift or backhoe is required for removal, it’s not a removable structure.
The rules do not yet expressly limit a restaurant’s outdoor dining setups to the frontage of that restaurant. As a result, there is nothing that prevents a restaurant with 12 feet of frontage from taking up to 40 feet of roadway. This means that sheds could operate in front of neighboring businesses and ground-floor residences. Stop the shed sprawl!
Restore the Pedestrian Right of Way
Although the proposed rules say that a sidewalk cafe cannot cover a sidewalk subway grate, it does not say that a sidewalk grate cannot be included in the measurement of a pedestrian clearpath. This rule would force pedestrians – some with walkers, canes or pushing strollers – to walk on the subway grate. The porous, open, often wet and slippery or damaged grate is not a “clear” path!
Bring back the 3-foot service aisle for wait staff serving customers in the sidewalk cafe. That service aisle was the sensible standard in the pre-pandemic sidewalk café program, mandating that the restaurant not use the public pedestrian clearpath for private business purposes. Make the clearpath truly clear for the use of pedestrians only!
Outdoor Heating in a Climate Emergency?!? Seriously? No.
In France, home to sidewalk cafés and outdoor dining terraces, all heaters in outdoor cafés were banned April 1, 2022. We must do the same.
Eliminate Extraordinary Powers Afforded to the DOT Commissioner
The language of the proposed rules gives the Commissioner the power “to waive these rules, in the interest of public safety and convenience.” This language affords the Commissioner extraordinary personal power that is an invitation to corruption and trivializes the rule of law. We don’t need outdoor dining fiefdoms in New York City.
Ensure Community Input, Agency Accountability & Transparency
Under Local Law 121, community boards review periods are cut back to 40 days — and input on roadway dining will only be considered “to the extent practicable” as determined by the DOT. At a minimum, the DOT should specify that outdoor dining applications received in late May through August will only be considered in September to avoid a period when community boards are often not in session — and therefore unable to solicit community comment. These rules are useless without a real process for community input.
The proposed rules provide multiple ways for the restaurant owner to appeal licensing, revocable consent, and violation decisions by the DOT – frequently allowing for long delays in the owner’s favor. But there is no corresponding mechanism provided for how neighboring businesses and residents can respond to restaurant rules violations. 311 is where citizen reports of violations go to die. Give the neighboring businesses and residents a dedicated NYC-DOT portal where outdoor dining problems can be reported – with quick responses from the agency.
Transparency should be the basis of all NYC programs. Make the portal data on outdoor applications, licenses, revocable consents, OATH violations, fines, and complaints received from the public available through one portal. We need to know in measurable data how this program is affecting our communities.
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Jay Z
There needs to be a 15 ft traffic lane for emergency vehicles. No exceptions.
There needs to be a eight foot clear path on the sidewalk, both for restaurants to service customers and those who walk with strollers, walkers,
and holding the hands of young children.
I do not see a procedure for residents to complain and receive confirmation of complaints.
Restaurants should be required to clean around all sides of their sheds not just their sidewalk entrances. -
Jack
Clarify Design, Siting & Other Roadway Rules
The proposed rules say that there must be a minimum 15-foot lane on any street to give emergency vehicles access to our streets and homes. But the rules allow for exceptions and waivers. There can be no waivers and exceptions for public safety.
The rules ought to clearly state that all roadway cafe structures must be removed from December through March so that our streets can be swept at least 4 months a year. Instead, the language of both Local Law 121 and the proposed rules fail to specify that “readily removable furniture” must ever actually be removed. Make it clear that restaurants are not to store their setups in the streets in the off-season.
Calling structures “open” is too vague. Although a proposed design drawing shows no roofs on roadway sheds, this is not specifically stated in the rules. And guidelines now allow for “vertical screenings” which sound a lot like a “wall.” So, proposed rules must explicitly prohibit all roofs and walls. Structures must be readily removable in the event of an emergency. If a forklift or backhoe is required for removal, it’s not a removable structure.
The rules do not yet expressly limit a restaurant’s outdoor dining setups to the frontage of that restaurant. As a result, there is nothing that prevents a restaurant with 12 feet of frontage from taking up to 40 feet of roadway. This means that sheds could operate in front of neighboring businesses and ground-floor residences. Stop the shed sprawl!
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Disabled and Disgusted
The proposed rules say that a sidewalk cafe must allow an 8′ clear path-The rule would force pedestrians – some with walkers, canes, wheelchairs or pushing strollers – to navigate what is rarely a ‘clear path’. There is not only a disingenuous claim to equity and the ‘public interest’-there seems to be yet another ADA lawsuit in the offing.
Consider that…
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John
Outdoor Heating in a Climate Emergency?!? Seriously? No.
In France, home to sidewalk cafés and outdoor dining terraces, all heaters in outdoor cafés were banned April 1, 2022. We must do the same.
Eliminate Extraordinary Powers Afforded to the DOT Commissioner
The language of the proposed rules gives the Commissioner the power “to waive these rules, in the interest of public safety and convenience.” This language affords the Commissioner extraordinary personal power that is an invitation to corruption and trivializes the rule of law. We don’t need outdoor dining fiefdoms in New York City.Ensure Community Input, Agency Accountability & Transparency
Under Local Law 121, community boards review periods are cut back to 40 days — and input on roadway dining will only be considered “to the extent practicable” as determined by the DOT. At a minimum, the DOT should specify that outdoor dining applications received in late May through August will only be considered in September to avoid a period when community boards are often not in session — and therefore unable to solicit community comment. These rules are useless without a real process for community input.
The proposed rules provide multiple ways for the restaurant owner to appeal licensing, revocable consent, and violation decisions by the DOT – frequently allowing for long delays in the owner’s favor. But there is no corresponding mechanism provided for how neighboring businesses and residents can respond to restaurant rules violations. 311 is where citizen reports of violations go to die. Give the neighboring businesses and residents a dedicated NYC-DOT portal where outdoor dining problems can be reported – with quick responses from the agency.
Transparency should be the basis of all NYC programs. Make the portal data on outdoor applications, licenses, revocable consents, OATH violations, fines, and complaints received from the public available through one portal. We need to know in measurable data how this program is affecting our communities.
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Kathy Arntzen
Streets must be cleaned everyday. Restaurants must clear the street every night so this can happen.
Must have a 15 foot emergency vehicle lane. No exceptions.
Need 3 foot service lane in addition to 8 foot clear path.
Sheds not eligible to exist in No Parking zone.
Sheds must come down entirely during winter season…language too vague.
No heating in sheds… we are in a climate emergency!
No shed within 20 feet of crosswalk …no exception.
Quality of life issues have gotten worse during this program. We need an environmental impact statement to see the damage that is being done to vulnerable communities. There are many other uses for our streets besides sheds and outdoor dining.
What kind of city do we want? Our non restaurant small businesses are suffering. Our neighborhoods are being transformed in a negative way.
Where is the soul of New York? -
Stuart Waldman
1. A climate emergency was declared by New York City in 2019. France has also declared a climate emergency. But that country, which gave to sidewalk cafés and outdoor dining, all heaters in outdoor cafés were banned April 1, 2022 because of their sever negative effect on the climate. We must do the same.
2. The rule that declares a 15 foot lane is necessary for emergency vehicles allows for exceptions and waivers. Either a 15 foot lane is necessary or it isn’t. No exceptions or waivers
3. At the hearing for intro 31, in February 2022, the DOT showed its vision of sheds in the permanent Open Restaurants program. This illustration was made public immediately after the statute was passed to who what sheds would look like in a permanent program. But in the rules the sheds are only described as being open with vertical screening. Open is vague and can mean anything and v ertical screening can mean walls. Unless those rules were a bait and switch tactic, the rules should clearly state that sheds cannot have roofs or walls as was promised to the public
4. Similarly, the sheds were promised again and again to be limited to the frontage of the restaurant. The rules, however, only limited to a maximum of 40 feet which in my neighborhood would be two restaurants wide. The sheds must be limited to the frontage of the establishment as was promised to the publci -
SANTISTEBAN
Help us to survive!!!
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BOMBARDED BY SHED/OPEN DOOR AMPLIFIED MUSIC NOISE!
As a veteran born & raised NYer, I get the ambient noise thing which comes with the urban territory. This ain’t that!
This Open-Restaurant-anything-goes (notwithstanding ‘Rules’ you purport to enshrine) insults the intelligence. When the Rules say no amplified sound outdoors I ask you: why not a prohibition which should also rule indoors in any restaurant/bar that has its windows or doors open? No noise spilling into the street and into our homes-damaging our quality of life-but worse-our health as noted in abundant scientific and medical reports! What are you thinking?
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Randy Karr
These sheds have gotten totally out of hand and become additional buildings and havens for rats. They block street cleaning, snow removal, and other necessary street construction. Many have fallen into disrepair and remain as eyesores and unfit shelters for homeless people.
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Jennifer Wachue
The DOT and the restaurant industry have steamrolled any community thought on this takeover of public space. People are sick and tired of the tables, the waiters, the chalkboard/sandwich board signs and everything else that has taken over the sidewalks with zero regulations. The restaurants that have multiple setups both on the sidewalk and in the street, the ones that built extensions off their buildings and also have structures in the street. There has been zero regulation and people are tired of it.
I would also like to note that the shutting down of streets for “open streets” with no community input is out of control. For example, on Canal Street, a couple of NEW businesses and one old bar are allowed to completely shut down a Main Street in our neighborhood for a large part of the year so that our neighborhood has become a street party. There has been no community input on this or way to stop it. They literally changed the parking signs so that these NEW bars/restaurants can just take over public space. It’s not right and they should be restricted majorly.
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Mick
I have lived in the East Village since the 1980s. During the pandemic I supported restaurants and bars and the use of roadway sheds as a temporary program. However, I do not support the permanent Open Restaurants program because it is in conflict with residents’ right to a reasonable standard of living. Previous laws and rules and local community boards were established and honed for decades, established for good reasons. However, since the City Council approved the permanent Open Restaurants Program, I submit the following comments on the NYC-DOT Proposed Rules. I beg DOT to prioritize the residents’ comments and incorporate their suggested changes to the proposed rules since it is us, the residents, that will have our lives negatively impacted PERMANENTLY.
Reduce Noise and Hours of Operation
Local law 121 says outdoor service is allowed 10 am to midnight, not 8 am to 1 am. My neighbors and I need our sleep, our kids need sleep to function in school. We need some peace and quiet in our own homes. Please restrict the hours 7 days a week to 10 am to midnight at the very minimum. It would be better if the hours were 10 am to 10 pm. These businesses can continue to serve customers inside after 10 pm after the usual peak restaurant time. Also, the rules should state that all set up and end of night clean up must be completed by the cut off times. The racket of dragging tables and chairs, staff chatter, and service set up should not be allowed outside of the cut off times.The rules say no amplified sound outdoors. The language should specify that no amplified sound devises can be positioned indoors for the benefit of outdoor listening. In other words, restaurants/bars cannot open their windows and/or doors and blast music so that patrons can hear it outdoors as a way of bypassing the rule about no outdoor amplified sound. Also, the no amplified sound rule should specific that restaurants/bars not allow patrons to create their own amplified sound during outdoor dining/drinking.
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Sue
Since the City Council approved the permanent Open Restaurants Program (which I opposed), I submit the following comments on the NYC-DOT Proposed Rules. I ask DOT to prioritize the true residents’ comments (not the hospitality industry trolls) and incorporate their suggested changes to the proposed rules since it is us, the residents, that will have our lives negatively impacted PERMANENTLY.
Reduce Noise and Hours of Operation
Local law 121 says outdoor service is allowed 10 am to midnight, not 8 am to 1 am. My neighbors and I need our sleep, our kids need sleep to function in school. We need some peace and quiet in our own homes. Please restrict the hours 7 days a week to 10 am to midnight at the very minimum. It would be better if the hours were 10 am to 10 pm. These businesses can continue to serve customers inside after 10 pm after the usual peak restaurant time. Also, the rules should state that all set up and end of night clean up must be completed by the cut off times. The racket of dragging tables and chairs, staff chatter, and service set up should not be allowed outside of the cut off times.The rules say no amplified sound outdoors. The language should specify that no amplified sound devises can be positioned indoors for the benefit of outdoor listening. In other words, restaurants/bars cannot open their windows and/or doors and blast music so that patrons can hear it outdoors as a way of bypassing the rule about no outdoor amplified sound. Also, the no amplified sound rule should specific that restaurants/bars not allow patrons to create their own amplified sound during outdoor dining/drinking.
Also, the rules should specifically ban restaurants and bars from putting up “silent” TVs but use amplified sound of an inside TV or speaker to loudly be heard outside. No TVs or flat screen monitors should be allowed outside for sidewalk dining/drinking or roadbed dining/drinking. -
Debbie Farley
I do not support the permanent Open Restaurants program because it directly conflicts with residents’ quality of life. The DOT should prioritize and consider the complaints and comments of residents living in close proximity to multiple dining sheds. I reside in Sunnyside, Queens, less than 40 feet from two dining sheds that also have sidewalk dining and one has backyard seating. Both restaurants are crowded, and I cannot escape the noise. Lives are adversely affected by the crowds, garbage, rats, and NOISE generated by dining sheds.
The operating hours in the statute are ridiculously long, especially in residential neighborhoods. The proposed DOT rules make the situation even worse. Local Law 121 specifies 10 a.m. to midnight, not 8 a.m. to 1 a.m. on some days. Residents are entitled to a good, restful sleep. Seventeen hours a day of outdoor dining noise is unprecedented and unacceptable. Reduce the noise and hours of operation.
The rules say no amplified sound outdoors. The same restriction should apply indoors in any restaurant/bar with open windows or doors. No noise leaking out into the streets and into our homes. Many restaurants have “silent” televisions in outdoor sidewalk cafes and sheds and blast the corresponding television sound through the open doors and windows of the restaurant. This loophole needs to be closed.
Local law 121 says outdoor service is allowed from 10 a.m. to midnight, not 8 a.m. to 1 a.m. Restrict the hours 7 days a week from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. It would more reasonable if the hours were 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Businesses can continue to serve customers inside after 10 p.m. The rules should further state that all set-up and end-of-night clean-up must be completed by the cut-off times. The removal of tables and chairs, staff chatter, and service setup should not be allowed outside the cut-off times.
The rules say no amplified sound outdoors. The language should specify that no amplified sound devices can be positioned indoors for outdoor listening. Restaurants/bars cannot open their windows and doors and blast music so that patrons can hear it outdoors to bypass the rule about no outdoor amplified sound. The no amplified sound rule should stipulate that restaurants/bars should not allow patrons to create their amplified sound during outdoor dining/drinking.
The level of noise generated by the two dining establishments in close proximity to my apartment have forced me to keep my windows permanently closed for almost three years and purchase sound deafening curtains.
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Dale Goodson
To All Concerned,
PLEASE TAKE RESIDENTS’ QUALITY OF LIFE INTO ACCOUNT.
I live on the corner of 12th St and Avenue A in the East Village. There are 8 licensed establishments (bars, restaurants) with outdoor seating between 12th and 14th Streets. The noise from patrons (shouting, singing, talking) has ruined my quality of life. On nice days and nights I now have to keep my windows closed to shut out the noise. I’ve talked to the owners and they say even if they wanted to quiet the noise from patrons (which they say they don’t) they don’t have the staff to do so. Making Open Restaurants may be a boon for these establishments but the noise has hijacked my quality of life. The shouts of “chug, chug, chug” from the bars rolls up and down the street. This program needs much more thorough thought and consideration in order to be made permanent.
PLEASE TAKE RESIDENTS’ QUALITY OF LIFE INTO ACCOUNT. As it stands we have been completely left out of the equation. Certainly DOT can do better and make the program more responsive to our needs as well. We want the bars and restaurants to survive but not at our expense.
Sincerely,
Dale Goodson -
Donna Wingate
The restaurant industry has effectively privatized our sidewalks and streets, our public spaces—the commons: the cultural and natural resources accessible to all members of a society.
This has greatly reduced visibility for pedestrians, bicyclists, and drivers. Sidewalks have been clogged, pushing pedestrians into the streets.
Further, NYC failed to perform an environmental review, and excluded the public from the decision-making process. While restaurant sheds disproportionately benefit restaurant owners, residents are suffering from excessive noise, garbage piled up next to the sheds, and an explosion of the rat population. All of these amount to a grave health hazard to residents, families, and children.
Sidewalks are for the movement of pedestrians—the public—not extra seating for restaurants and free real estate for private enterprise.
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James P. Power
Comment added November 15, 2023 4:22pm -
James P. Power
Comment added November 15, 2023 4:25pm -
James P. Power
Comment added November 15, 2023 4:25pm -
James P. Power
Comment added November 15, 2023 4:26pm -
C.M.
Because this is such a quality of life issue for many of NYC residents, I feel that I MUST put in another plea for you to understand exactly why we don’t want outdoor dining to continue.
The attached pdf may illustrate some of the problems.Additionally, since this is a DOT issue, I feel you must address alllllllllll the delivery trucks that stop in streets, bike lanes, in front of hydrants, etc., in order to bring food to the restaurants and bars and clubs. This was supposed to be taken care of by loading zones. But such is not the case. By allowing dining sheds and outdoor dining, more and more of the idling trucks will continue. I think fining the restaurants AND the trucking companies should be included in your rules.
Comment attachment
2023-11-15-outdoor-dining-3rd-comment-with-pics.pdf -
Elissa
I’ve really enjoyed the transformation of the streetscape based on outdoor dining – it’s been so nice to walk around the city and see people enjoying the fantastic restaurant scene it has to offer, and I feel significantly safer as a young woman walking through the city when people are out & about. I’m really disappointed to read the strict regulations in regards to the outdoor structures. In particular, restaurants should be allowed to maintain enclosed spaces, and they should be allowed to have them year-round. New York City is for all people to enjoy; its not for the small percentage of those who have cars to park (which they can do in garages if they’re really concerned about the limited street parking). The street-scape shouldn’t be dominated by parked cars. Please reconsider the current proposed rules to include those changes.
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Edward Dinoski
I do not support the permanent Outdoor Dining Program. The continuation of this program is a threat to our environment by contributing to the climate crisis, endangering public safety, negatively impacting revenues of other business, and is being deceptively presented to the public.
Threatening Our Environment: New York City declared a climate emergency in 2019. It’s 2023, and we’re still in a climate crisis. Yet, restaurants are running outdoor heaters to warm the cold winter air. This assault on our environment must be stopped immediately.
Endangering Public Safety: Emergency vehicles require a 15-foot lane to navigate safely and efficiently. The rule that declares a 15-foot lane is necessary for emergency vehicles allows for exceptions and waivers. Either a 15-foot lane is necessary, or it isn’t. There should be NO exceptions or waivers, peoples’ safety and lives are being compromised.
Intruding on the Property of Other Businesses: The rule: The maximum length of a roadway cafe shall be 40 feet. Sheds were repeatedly promised to be limited to the frontage of the restaurant. Many restaurants have sheds that extend past their frontage and onto the property of other businesses negatively impacting their revenues. Dining sheds must be limited to the frontage of the dining establishment.
No Bait & Switch: in February 2022, there was a specific vision for sheds in the Permanent Open Restaurants Program presented at a hearing for Intro 31. But now, in the rules ,the sheds are described as being “open with vertical screening.” The term “open’ is vague and could mean anything. ”Vertical screening” does that mean walls? The vision for dining sheds from 2022 and the vague description in new rules feels like a “bait and switch” tactic. The rules should clearly state that sheds cannot have roofs or walls as was previously promised to the public.
Edward Dinoski
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Mary Evancho
It’s against the law to hang lights in trees and over sidewalk pathways – per photos. It is imperative that these conditions are noted in DOT guidelines, specifically so establishments are informed, but further so our Forestry Department can concentrate on taking care of our trees, and not outdoor dining violators.
Comment attachment
LIGHTING-IN-TREES-AND-OVER-SIDEWALKS.pdf -
Mary Evancho
The hours of operation DOES NOT take into consideration the noise involved in the setting up and breaking down of furniture in roadway cafes.
Furniture set ups and breakdowns must happen “within the hours of operation” – not before or after operating hours.
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Mary Evancho
SITE PLANS & DRAWINGS
Drawings must include the designated area “within a restaurant’s frontage” where they will place garbage for pickups.
Garbage CANNOT be placed in front of neighboring buildings.
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Charlotta Janssen
I am the owner of Chez Oskar, 310 Malcolm X Blvd, Brooklyn, NY. Please stop by our outdoor dining solution especially in bad weather.
I AM PAINFULLY AWARE THAT DOT IS DOING AWAY WITH CANOPIES WHEN CANOPIES HAVE SAVED OUR BUSINESSES. WE ALL DREAD THE SCHEMATICS THAT ONLY SEEM CONSIDER FAIR WEATHER. I FEEL LIKE WE ARE BEING ERASED. PLEASE RECONSIDER AND CONTINUE TO ALLOW CANOPIES WHILE CURBING BAD ACTORS.
I intend on testifying next week with the DOT for steel and clear canopies because of their numerous benefits:
1. B1 fire rating of clear and steel
2. Lightweight and Strong Structures: The steel and clear covers provide a durable and secure shelter for outdoor dining areas. They are also customizable and can easily adapt to accommodate obstacles such as tree pits and bike stands.
3. Minimal Waste and Customization: These covers require less material and construction waste compared to other options like fabric awnings and umbrellas or wood. They can be easily customized to fit the specific needs of each space.
4. Greening the City: The clear covers allow light to pass through, creating a bright and inviting atmosphere. Additionally, they provide an excellent space for growing plants, contributing to a greener city environment.
5. Sound Barrier: Compared to fabric and umbrellas, the steel and clear covers offer better sound barriers, creating a quieter and more enjoyable dining experience for customers as well as tenants above them.
6. Safety and Sightlines: The covers enhance safety on the streets by providing better sightlines and attracting more people to the area. This increased foot traffic benefits local businesses and contributes to a safer community.
7. Protection from Extreme Weather & Steady Jobs in spite of it: The covers protect diners from extreme weather conditions, allowing them to enjoy outdoor dining even in the wind, rain & snow. This transforms a potentially miserable experience into a beautiful and enjoyable one and provides New Yorkers with steady jobs.
8. Unique and Aesthetic Design: The design of the steel and clear covers pays homage to the early industrial age, complementing the architectural style of the neighborhood. These covers add character and charm to the streetscape, making them more visually appealing.
9. Greater Visibility for Small Businesses: Illuminated outdoor dining spaces increase the visibility of small businesses, especially those located in the middle of blocks. This increased visibility attracts more customers and supports the growth of local establishments.
10. Inclusive Dining: The steel and clear covers provide better insulation, allowing individuals who are immunocompromised to participate in the dining culture without compromising their health. We urge you to expand the materials allowed for outdoor dining to include steel and clear lightweight plastic.I will also address the elephants in the Room:
Comment attachment
1) Umbrellas and Fabric Awnings are a NIGHTMARE and a huge liability.
They cause accidents and don’t protect well in extreme weather, often getting damaged by weather or disruptive individuals. Reverting back to these options would erase the progress we have made.
2) Rodent Control
Additionally, we would like to address the issue of rodent control. While restaurants are often blamed for rodent problems, the reality is that these pests primarily inhabit the empty and decaying storefronts that now dot our avenues and do not respect property lines. We have invested in the Burrow RX, a highly effective rodent control program, and are willing to share it with fellow restaurants. Embracing innovative solutions like this can help address the rodent issue while supporting the outdoor dining program
3) Making Permitting for Existing Structures Impossible and Unaffordable
We also request that you consider grandfathering in the best solutions developed during the pandemic as a way to memorialize the challenges we have overcome. Our covers, along with those built for Zaca Cafe, Anmwey, Secret Garden, DSK, and La Nacional, have proven to be successful in sustaining our businesses. Removing the option for hard plastic covers would erase the positive impact we have made. Furthermore, we emphasize the importance of protecting all users of the sidewalks, including diners, pedestrians, and restaurant staff. Making waiters, bussers, runners, and managers carry heavy objects in and out daily, and exposing them to rain and snow without proper covering, creates a miserable work environment. It is crucial to develop rules that incorporate their well-being.
4) Keep Outdoor Dining as the Permanent Lifeline – Don’t make it a Bandaid
To ensure that outdoor dining remains a viable option year-round, we propose the inclusion of lightweight (not just fabric) canopies. While dining on the sidewalk has been possible, the absence of partially enclosed rigid covers makes it challenging during the winter and summer months. Our industry operates on thin profit margins, and the inconsistency in capacity affects job security, taxable revenue, and the overall dining experience.
PLEASE-KEEP-CANOPIES-IN-OUTDOOR-DINING-RULES-GIVE-EXISTING-ONES-A-CHANCE-TO-LEGALIZE-.pdf -
Mary Evancho
FLOORING @ ROADWAY DINING
No flooring should be permitted at roadway dining, with the exception of an ADA ramp. It is “within the floors” of these sheds where rats breed and feast – but further, having flooring over roadway does not allow for proper cleaning, 8 months out of the year.
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Mike Trapanese
I am writing in support of S.C.R.A.M., which is committed to mitigating the number of rats in our city.
Outdoor dining was the city’s response to a unique crisis for our city, and it has become a boon for restaurants and street life in general. However, it has also greatly contributed to the population explosion of rats. We are pleased to see that the new rules require walls be filled, since empty walls are a primary source of rat harborage. But we also ask the city to require dining sheds not have FLOORS or PLANTERS (unless lined with wire mesh to prevent burrowing).
Any flooring creates a protective space for rats to eat food scraps and procreate, and planters allow for nesting and birthing pups – to allow these would create an opportunity for further growth of the rat population, which would lead to the more infestation and threat of human disease.
It is critical that the new rules for outdoor dining ensure the elimination of all forms of rat harborage, so we can transition to safer outdoor dining and a better, healthier city.
Yours truly,
Mike -
Alex Ma
The proposed changes should allow an addendum for permitted food establishments under the DOA filing and not just Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. The reason being, there are many food establishments that fall under DOA jurisdiction that are being restricted from this category simply due to definitions defined in New York Code that would be no fault of their own. A couple of examples would be any sort of “marketplace” that sells retail goods but also has a dine in cafe, or even a coffee roastery falls under DOA, but is mainly a coffee shop.
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Michael Sutherland
Open Plans writes today in regard to new proposed rules on the Outdoor Dining program. We believe that it is essential that the DOT work hard to craft rules that lead to the success of this program. To that point, we remain concerned on a number of fronts including the lack of a year-round option for restaurants, excessive Community Board involvement, and potential design issues in the event of poor weather. More details comments on these points and others are below:
Fight for a year-round option. We firmly believe that the program should allow for a year-round option for restaurants both on the sidewalk and in the roadway. As structured, we remain concerned not having a year-round option will limit participation and result in less investment in structures for restaurants that do participate. We recognize that this likely cannot be done during the rule-making process, but DOT should make it a priority for this to be remedied through legislation in the City Council.
Extend the hours of operations. We believe there is no logical reason why dining outside on Sundays should be limited to beginning at 10 AM. Coffee shops, among other businesses, thrive on weekends and this section should be updated to match the 8:00 AM start time of every other day of the week.
Craft design rules that allow the program to flourish. Design is an essential part of ensuring that the new outdoor dining program can succeed. Aspects of design like quality and secure roofing that allows dining to happen in the rain and barriers that ensure safety for diners within the structure and those using the roadway are particularly important. We recommend DOT consider carefully recommendations made by organizations like AIA New York to create world-class dining structures that are both beautiful and functional.
Ensure Community Boards cannot kill Open Restaurants. We are concerned about the overall level of Community Board involvement in individual applications. There should be no role for Community Boards to review individual applications a la liquor licenses. Community Boards should receive notice rather than be able to submit a recommendation against an individual restaurant. We predict that, in certain neighborhoods, this will limit outdoor dining participation and be detrimental to the overall program. We especially predict bottlenecks leading up to the beginning of the outdoor dining season that would negatively impact restaurants’ bottom line by delaying their ability to set up in time to maximize their use as well as over the summer when many Community Boards do not meet. We recommend scaling back Community Board involvement.
Monitor the role of the Landmarks Preservation Commission. We are skeptical about the overarching role of the Landmarks Preservation Commission given past history of how opponents of public space projects and community boards have weaponized historic districts and preservation generally. DOT should remain vigilant (as will Open Plans) to ensure the Commission stays within its mandate and is not used as a tool to limit outdoor dining.
Continue to focus on accessibility on our streets and sidewalks. We appreciate the DOT and administration’s attention to ensuring the proposed rules will mandate that each structure is ADA-compliant and designed to be inclusive. Further, we likewise appreciate DOT’s clear articulation of the requirement to have a clear path of sidewalk access. We are concerned about how many structures will be fully ADA-compliant and urge DOT to adequately monitor and remedy potential ADA or accessibility violations.
Provide adequate enforcement. We appreciate the proposed rule’s attention and outlining of the CAR model that will be used. We hope this addresses neighbor concerns while providing restaurants ample opportunity to be in compliance with the rules.
Maintain an equitable and fair fee structure for restaurants. We applaud the DOT and the administration for coming up with an equitable fee model to ensure that all restaurants that would like to participate can afford the program.
Daylight intersections with hardened infrastructure. Daylighting is critical for street safety and we agree that outdoor dining structures should not be allowed within 20 feet of a crosswalk. However, as with daylighting generally, if there is no impediment in place these spaces are almost certain to become de facto parking spaces. We urge DOT to implement hardening at all daylit spots next to outdoor dining structures.
Equitably integrate vendors into the program’s materials. Vendors are noticeably absent from the Dining Out NYC website’s graphic about adjacent use of public space. We strongly recommend including them in future graphics and materials.
Respectfully,
Open PlansSara Lind
Co-Executive Director
[email protected]Jackson Chabot
Director of Advocacy and Organizing
[email protected]Michael Sutherland
Comment attachment
Policy Analyst
[email protected]
11-20-23-Open-Plans-Testimony-on-DOT.pdf -
Rachel Grosso Hodges
1. I am concerned about the overall level of Community Board involvement in individual applications. There should be no role for Community Boards to review individual applications a la liquor licenses. Community Boards should receive notice rather than be able to submit a recommendation against an individual restaurant. I think we should scale back Community Board involvement.
2. I believe that the program should allow for a year-round option both on the sidewalk and in the roadway. As structured, I remain concerned not having a year-round option will limit participation and result in less investment in structures for restaurants that do participate.
3. I am skeptical about the overarching role of the Landmarks Preservation Commission given past history of how opponents of public space projects and community boards have weaponized historic districts and preservation generally.
4. I appreciate the DOT and administration’s attention to ensuring the proposed rules will mandate that each structure is ADA-compliant and designed to be inclusive.
5. I believe there is no logical reason why dining outside on Sundays should be limited to beginning at 10 AM. Coffee shops, among other businesses, thrive on weekends and this section should be updated to match the 8:00 AM start time of every other day of the week.
6. I commend the agency’s clear articulation of the requirement to have a clear path of sidewalk access and we hope this is enforced to ensure compliance.
7. I applaud the DOT and the administration for coming up with an equitable fee model to ensure that all restaurants that would like to participate can afford the program.
8. Daylighting is critical for safety and I agree that outdoor dining structures should not be allowed within 20 feet of a crosswalk. However, as with daylighting generally, if there is no impediment in place these spaces are almost certain to become de facto parking spaces. I urge DOT to implement hardening at all daylit spots next to outdoor dining structures.
9. Design is an essential part of ensuring that the new outdoor dining program can flourish. Aspects of design like quality and secure roofing that allows dining to happen in the rain and barriers that ensure safety for diners within the structure and those using the roadway are particularly important. I recommend DOT consider carefully recommendations made by organizations like AIA New York to create world-class dining structures that are both beautiful and functional.
10. Vendors are noticeably absent from the Dining Out NYC website’s graphic about adjacent use of public space. We strongly recommend including them in future graphics and materials. -
Chris Efthimiou
I’d like to support having outdoor dining options on roadways be instituted year-round. As structured, I remain concerned that not having a year-round option will limit participation and result in less investment in structures for restaurants that do participate.
Thank you.
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Robert T
Outdoor sheds remain a problem .
Often they block the site of someone in a crosswalk on oncoming cars.
The floors of the structures themselves are homes of rats . One shed on Church street is home to giant bugs that run out .Outdoor dining on the sidewalk , year round , no floors are great.
Most the the sheds i see are often empty. Just not worth it . Wanna help restaurants ? Reduce fines and taxes and fees for sidewalk cafe. . -
Yasmina
The flooring and walls meeting pavement of street design are conducive to harboring vermin, overnight encampments, rotting of materials, drainage blocks and retaining of odors.
Please consider designs that DO NOT include floors. Proper 4 x 4 supports are all that is needed for stability – the rest only offers superficial appearance of stability while creating the above mentioned issues.
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Jane Dougherty
LIMIT this if you’re going to pass it. THE MARY LANE’s outdoor dining is OBNOXIOUSLY large on Bank and Greenwich. remove the obnoxious 6 foot wide tree/flowerpots on the corner of Horatio and Greenwich that take up two entire smart car parking spots for literally no reason (outside of the former CHRISTIAN LOUBOUTIN store which was robbed into oblivion). REMOVE the useless boxes of decorative plants and trees and vines that obstruct the sidewalk (CASA LA FEMME, AUTOMATIC SLIMS, WHITE HORSE TAVERN), these plants and sandbags and AC units that take up smart car parking spots are a PAIN, make the sheds only a certain length unless they’re in metered parking areas. people who can’t afford $600 garage spots need to be able to park their tiny smart cars before bed.
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Bebe
Reduce taxes for honest and hardworking NYC residents who need their cars for their jobs. Or provide us with fully-funded parking vouchers so we can pay the $600 garage fees. Or just get rid of them.
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Alisa L
I am a third generation New Yorker – not a member of the restaurant lobby or the bike lobby.
It is unbelievable that the City has prioritized restaurants-bars for wealthy people over liveable neighborhoods for hard-working New Yorkers.
Residents are entitled to sleep! The operating hours must be reduced: 8 am-1am is unacceptable. And no amplified music inside if windows/doors are open.
Per City’s climate emergency actions and fire concerns, the City must forbid heaters for all outdoor seating.
DOT must ensure that pedestrians get priority; restaurants should not be using sidewalks to serve – DOT must ensure minimum 3 foot service space at least.
Restaurants must be restricted to conform to actual restaurant frontage – restaurants should not be allowed any seating that is beyond the restaurant frontage.
Restaurants should not be allowed to block building entrances. People are entitled to have street access in front of their buildings. DOT must ensure this.
Restaurants should not be allowed to block/block visibility of adjoining businesses.
The 15-foot lane on streets must be adhered to so that fire trucks, ambulances have access – no waivers!
Restaurants cannot place their trash beyond their frontage, in space in front of other buildings.
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Alisa L
City DOT needs to end “Open Streets” on streets/avenues with bus routes!
It is outrageous that City DOT has implemented “Open Streets” on avenues with bus routes – which forces buses to be detoured.
People deserve, need and are entitled full access to essential mass transit bus service. And reminder that buses are especially used by women, elderly, disabled, POC and low-income people.
Mass transit must be the priority – not brunch and dog meet-ups for rich people.
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Elizabeth Crawford
I oppose outdoor dining. NYC failed to perform an Environmental Impact Survey (EIS) and excluded the public from hearings and decision-making. It is unfathomable to me that after never completing an EIS, the city council approved a program of this magnitude. All the ills and failings of the temporary outdoor dining program have not been addressed or corrected, and Intro 31C has been approved!
The restaurant industry has effectively privatized public sidewalks and streets. I don’t believe profit-driven private businesses should be allowed to monopolize resources that should be easily accessible to all members of society.
Outdoor dining has reduced visibility for visually impaired pedestrians, bicyclists, and drivers. Streets and sidewalks are clogged with loud, raucous crowds, making it incredibly frustrating for residents with mobility challenges to navigate their neighborhoods safely.
Our neighborhoods’ historical and architectural integrity are depreciated by the look of “roadway shanties.” The streets are lined with dilapidated, abandoned sheds whose only occupants are people experiencing homelessness seeking refuge and nesting vermin.
Roadbed dining sheds exclusively benefit restaurant owners. Restaurants only rent the building space inside; that’s the space they’re entitled to. That space does not extend to the public sidewalks or streets to provide additional seating, resulting in increased profits for restaurant owners.
As a taxpayer and city resident, it’s unacceptable for restaurant owners to expand out onto public spaces to “pad their pockets” with the profits from extra seating at the public’s safety and expense. The residents are suffering from excessive noise levels, sleep deprivation, increased stress, piles of debris, and an explosion of the rat population. All these are grave health hazards to residents, families, and children.
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Debra Henry
The outdoor dining located right under tenant windows need to be torn doen and prohibited. Tenants’ health are being severly affected by the constant ongoing noise of shouting, cheering, singing. By law, tenants have the right to live peacefully in their apts and have quality of life. The restaurant owners dont give a shit b/c they’re making more money. I am a democrat and it’s the last time I’ll ever vote for a democrat council member and mayor. I know a lot more democrats who feel the same way. Those who dont agree are noisy themselves and too young and immature to empathize, which is why democrats need to vote for older, moderate democrats who care about quality of life and the health of tenants.
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Anita Jorgensen
I live in lower manhattan that are filled with narrow as well as winding streets. These restaurant shacks have been a nightmare ever since they arrived for the following reasons:
-Rats! rats are everywhere!!! I walk my dog nightly and I must run away from all of the rats. Talk about a health hazard!! Rats carried the bubonic plague and the city wants to keep these shacks going? Really?
-Garbage! garbage piles mount up beside these shacks. Street cleaners are not able to properly clean the streets attracting even more rats.
-Thunping music! outboard speakers blast thumping lousy hospitality music 24/7. This is horrible for residents. No more peace and quiet…ever.
-Street space gone: they claim our streets rent free. NYC residents didn’t get any real estate perks due to Covid. I run a small design practice. I didn’t get a rent break like the restaurants did via free street space. During Covid my project load / income went down. The city didn’t help my business. Why are the restaurants entitled to these amazing perks but no one else.
-No sidewalk space for pedestrians: the shacks claim our sidewalks. From the facade of a restaurant to the sidewalks to the street. All claimed by restaurants. Residents must suffer by crossing the street to pass by.
-safety problems: when at a corner, pedestrians cannot see around the shacks to check if cars are coming.
No parking: several articles have been written about the lack of parking in NYC. These shacks have claimed residents parking!
Please!! We need to return restaurants to precovid times, thereby resulting in clean streets, rats gone, no more garbage piles, local parking restored.
Covid is over. Let’s get back to a normal more livable city.
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Debra Henry
“The outdoor dining located right under tenant windows need to be torn down and prohibited. Tenants’ health are being severely affected by the constant ongoing noise of shouting, cheering, singing! By law, tenants have the right to live peacefully in their apts and have quality of life. The restaurant owners dont give a shit b/c they’re making more money and do not control the noise. I am a democrat and it’s the last time I’ll ever vote for a democrat council member and mayor. I know a lot more democrats who feel the same way. Those who dont agree are noisy themselves and/or too young and immature to empathize, which is why democrats need to vote for older, moderate democrats who care about quality of life and the health of tenants.”
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Debbie George
No EIS/public hearings: I am alarmed by the Department of Transportation’s proposed Permanent Open Restaurants program rules without completing an Environmental Impact Survey. The ills and the failings of the temporary dining program have not been addressed or corrected, yet the city council passed Intro 31c.
Budget cutbacks to agencies: The mayor recently announced major budget cutbacks to city agencies due to the migrant crisis. Under the previous budget, there was not enough funding or human resources to monitor and enforce the rules/regulations of the temporary open restaurant program. It is unrealistic that the permanent outdoor dining program with all the ambiguously worded rules/regulations will not create even hardships for the city’s residents and be under less scrutiny.
Hours of operation: The hours permitted in the recently enacted outdoor dining law (Intro 31-C/Local Law 121) are already absurdly long; the proposed DOT rules worsen a terrible situation. The statute allows outdoor dining sites to operate 14 hours daily — from 10 a.m. to midnight. Now, the DOT proposes to extend operating hours from 8 a.m. to 1 a.m. on weekends. Seventeen hours per day of outdoor dining noise is unprecedented and unacceptable. When are those who reside near these sheds supposed to sleep? Stick to the hours in the statute; the law already allows more than enough time for outdoor service.
Pedestrian safety: The 3-foot service aisle for wait staff serving customers in sidewalk cafés so staff aren’t serving in pedestrian walkways needs to be brought back. The proposed rules say that a sidewalk cafe cannot cover a sidewalk subway grate. But it should also prohibit sidewalk grates in measuring pedestrian pathways. Without this protection, vulnerable pedestrians, some with walkers, canes, pushing strollers, or walking pets, are forced onto subway grates. These porous, open, and often wet, slippery, and damaged grates are not a “clear” unobstructed path.
Employee safety: Waitstaff serving food and alcohol across bike lanes should NOT be allowed. This pandemic-era practice puts hard-working serving staff, restaurant customers, and cyclists at risk. The greed of restaurant owners to serve a few more tables should not be prioritized over the public’s safety.
EMERGENCY RESPONDERS: There can be no waivers or exceptions for the minimum 15-foot lane on any street to give emergency vehicles access to our streets and homes. Roadways must also be clear for emergency vehicles. The proposed rules call for a minimum 15-foot lane on any street to give emergency vehicles access to our streets and homes. But the rules also allow for exceptions and waivers.
IMBALANCE OF POWER: The proposed DOT rules also allow the DOT Commissioner to waive any of these agency’s regulations — in the interest of whatever the Commissioner deems to be “public safety and convenience.” This language provides the Commissioner with extraordinary personal power, creating an invitation to corruption. We don’t need outdoor dining fiefdoms in New York City.
Environment: Paris banned using heaters in outdoor dining setups on April 1, 2022. We must do the same. NYC declared a climate emergency in 2019; it’s 2023, and that climate crisis still exists. The DOT rules allow for heating outdoors amid our ongoing climate emergency. Why are we not banning the use of heaters? Is the greed of the restaurant industry dictating our environmental policies?
Hours of operations: Please reduce the hours of operation, protect the pedestrian right of way, guarantee emergency vehicle access, eliminate waiver loopholes that undermine public confidence in the agency, and end the practice of heating the outdoors. The future of our residential neighborhoods and our great city depends on commonsense rules for outdoor dining.
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Luther Williams
I am a Crown Heights/Prospect Heights restaurant owner. The outdoor dining has helped to save my business during these continuous difficult times. We are the fabric of our great city, providing a much needed service to our communities. In today’s economic downturn, we are all still struggling to overcome the effects of Covid and the overwhelming increase in the costs of our goods to provide our services, and to continue to pay our wonderful employees their wages. Creating now new guidlines that will put more of a strain on our businesses, will only add to the constant struggle of our survival. We were all expecting there to be some moderate future fee associated with the continued use of outdoor dining. At some point, we understood that the city would of course demand their piece. However, for the city to create a controlled design guideline that involves taking down, storing and reinstalling structures is absurd. The cost to do this will only add to the struggles to survive for our businesses. Most businesses do not have the way with all financially, or the space to accommodate such a request. This will only add to the failure, and additional closesures of our businesses. Year round outdoor accommodations is a must for our survival. Modifications for all structures to provide safe and comfortable accommodations for our patrons is a must. Guidlines to make this possible is what we should be discussing. Anything else will have a domino affect that will be catastrophic in some communities.
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Erica Freudenstein
Subject: Urgent Attention Required: Cleanliness and Safety Concerns at Local Dining Establishments
To Whom It May Concern,
The current state of the outdoor dining structures in our vicinity is beyond disheartening. They resemble shanty shacks, reminiscent of an impoverished town, not a thriving community. These eyesores not only depress but also cast a shadow on the entire neighborhood, hindering our city’s return to normalcy. Clean streets are the foundation of a functional and rejuvenated community, much like maintaining a clean house, ensuring a clean foundation for our lives.
The recent incident at the sushi restaurant on Jones, West 10th, and Bleecker was nothing short of a catastrophe. A vehicle’s impact decapitated the roof, creating a hazardous situation that thankfully did not result in any casualties. This occurrence underscores the urgent need for better safety measures and structural integrity.
Moreover, the conditions observed at Empellum on West 10th and Fourth Street are appalling. The outdoor dining structure often harbors remnants of avocado skins and fish parts, creating an unsanitary and revolting environment. This negligence reflects a lack of consideration for our community’s well-being, especially evident when compared to the proactive involvement of Mary, the owner of Mary’s Fish Camp, who actively participates in the community and responsibly manages her dining space.
It’s evident that these issues persist due to a lack of accountability and care from the respective establishments, impacting the entire neighborhood’s cleanliness and safety. Immediate action is imperative to rectify these concerns and restore the integrity of our community.
Sincerely,
Erica Freudenstein
W. 10th St., Village resident ( Voter ) -
Alisa L
Given the budget cuts – including Sanitation and NYPD – the Mayor just announced, there is no way that the City can administer and enforce street/roadbed restaurant dining – especially the restaurant trash and rat aspect.
And to repeat what another person posted:
“Quality of life issues have gotten worse…non restaurant small businesses are suffering. Our neighborhoods are being transformed in a negative way.”There are already too many restaurants and food places and they are cannibalizing each other.
And it is is wrong and unfair to give preferential treatment to restaurants and bars while small stores and businesses suffer (high rent, ecommerce, crime) and get no help from the City. -
Kristin
I am a Greenwich Village resident. While I welcome the idea of outdoor sidewalk cafes during warmer months, I feel the outdoor dining cabins in the streets are a hazard and make our city congested and cluttered. These cabins served a purpose during COVID but it’s time for them to go. Most cabins look dilapidated and they attract rats, block roads and are unsafe for cyclists and scooters. Cyclists and scooters are forced into traffic or onto sidewalks, making it unsafe for pedestrians. Additionally they attract rats which live under the structures and in the plantings. Rats carry diseases and are a health hazard to people and pets. Our city looks cluttered with no rhyme or reason for these structures. Streets should be free and clear for cars to drive safely. The cabins completely ruin the beauty of our city. They are an eye sore, unattractive and make our once beautiful city look like a junk yard. Please only consider sidewalk cafes and eliminate outdoor dining cabins in our streets. Thank you!
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Rafael Gomez
I am Hells kitchen resident and I am opposed to having restaurant sheds out in the streets all year round. Outdoors dining should be kept as before covid, dining tables on the sidewalk in the warmer months. Sheds out in the streets are not outdoor dining, they’re just restaurants taking out vital parking spaces from communities and preventing patrons from visiting local businesses due to lack of parking spaces. Those sheds are just another location for vermin to hide under, do we need more rats in NYC? Also on that topic, this is NYC do we really want all these unsightly sheds on our streets forever? I would like them to be done away with and the system for outdoor dining to go back to the pre-covid system we had.
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Eric J. Feldman
Outdoor dining is OK, but too many restaurants have taken advantage by taking up most of the sidewalk space. There has to be clear unobstructed pathways for people to get by. I like the idea of no enclosures–outdoor dining is not meant to be a year round thing.
Also outdoor music should be banned and restaurants need to close outdoor dining early. For those that live near these restaurants it is unpleasant and the city needs to keep in my mind the quality of life for people who live here, not just tourists. Most importantly, the rules need to be enforced! -
Wren Arthur
Close down the outdoor dining pleaee.
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Liam McCarthy
Covid is now assumed to be a seasonal virus, affecting Americans mostly during the winter: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9994397/#:~:text=Our%20study%20suggests%20that%20COVID,continual%20transmission%20throughout%20the%20year.
As such I don’t think it makes particular sense to disband outdoor dining arrangements during the exact time that Covid will be causing the most harm, and it sounds like a terrible burden for businesses to erect and dismantle their outdoor dining structures every year. Just mandate enclosing the structures at night and schedule inspections for cleanliness – they are outside, so easy as it comes to inspect.
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Jessie Guy
The proposed outdoor dining rules are a transparent effort to prioritize cars and parking over local restaurants, particularly smaller businesses, and the citizens who patronize them, especially those with health concerns. The rules will propose onerous costs related to bringing structures into compliance and annually tearing down and rebuilding structures that will make outdoor dining unfeasible for a great number of restaurants in the city, most heavily impacting smaller restaurants that likely were able to expand their capacity (and revenues) meaningfully by creating additional space for diners.
All that said, I want to highlight a specific aspect of the proposed rules that is particularly insulting and clearly indicative of the priorities at play. While NYC has exempted itself from the state requirement that vehicles park at least 20 feet away from a crosswalk (requiring only eight feet, which is rarely, if ever, enforced), outdoor dining structures will be required to observe the 20-foot limit. As a pedestrian who has watched our sidewalks and streets become increasingly dangerous for those not inside cars, it is an incredible affront to see the City Council and DOT acknowledge this guideline is important for safety by including it in the proposed rule, while neglecting to enforce it for the vehicles that are responsible for the vast majority of injuries and deaths on our streets.
The new requirements will harm our local business community, remove what has become a valuable and vibrant aspect of our city’s culture, and further prioritize vehicles we should be seeking to remove from our streets.
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Louis Ramos
Outdoor dining must provide adequate drainage. Rain water must not be allowed to pond in excess of 3 inches that creates numerous problems for the neighbors who actually live in the neighborhood.
1 – The restaurant or Bakery who erects the dining
structure must be responsible for all of the sanitation around the structure.
2 – Drainage is every important especially in flood prone areas at a minimum the structure should have 36 inches of drainage on both ends of the structure. Falling leaves create blockages where rodents and mosquitoes now nest not to mention the tripping hazard and slick roadway the leaves create while decomposing.
3 – The structure must be erected to come apart with in a few days of a historic rain event or hurricane. Temporary enjoyment of a structure cannot overcome the safety and care of adjacent properties. Most are older homes with bedrock structures not poured cement so water infiltrates the home’s structure.
4 – I have notified my community leader and DOT Brooklyn Commissioner numerous times of this situation and they argue the residents are responsible for providing an engineer to prove their point. That’s a big problem because engineers are expensive and at that point your homes foundation can be compromised.
5 – The outdoor structure must be taken down before hurricane season not during or after look what happened in Park Slope and that was just rain no wind.
6 – NYCDOS MUST enforce sanitation rules around the dining shed. It appears they give the owners of restaurants a pass that also contributes a rodent outbreak.
8 – 2 way streets with barely enough space for cars, buses, scooters, bikes, and pedestrians. Need smaller diameter size for the structure. This clearly isn’t a one size fits all solution.One last point according to the Brooklyn borough DOT commissioner ponding of any size is not a problem! As long as it dissipates within 48 hours!
Tell that to the handicapped person attempting to gain access to the sidewalk or a parent with children who has to now navigate back to the dangerous street to find a dry safe path to the sidewalk or even worse a child getting off a school bus.The outdoor dining program is great for NYC but we must come to the realization weather, sanitation, location are all contributing factors and certain zip codes just aren’t built for these structures.
Regards,
LouisSent from my iPhone
Comment attachment
SR-Closed-311-14314701.pdf -
Elle
Please allow us cafe owners to keep the outdoor and sidewalk structures year-around. I built a well structured, rodent free roadway dining area for my customers and had to remove it due to a water line that had to be repaired in the street. I rebuilt another one on the sidewalk for now, because I have no idea what’s next? Cafe owners like myself, have had to adjust to new rules being enforced for the last 4 years. If I have to remove for a few months during the winter. where am I storing it? For those that craft these to be sound and safe for patrons, these are not easily pop-up, take-down tents. My customers have loved the outdoor dining and I would like to keep ours.
I think they should be licensed and inspected to meet DOT standards.
The outdoor dining program has tremendously helped my businesses.
-Elle
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Lori Brand
I am very opposed to the outdoor dining. The sheds are a danger to our neighborhoods. I live in the Village and I see homeless people and drug dealers using them at night. They take up so much space on the street that cars can hardly see to turn corners. They are a danger to pedestrians. Some sidewalks in the Village below Washington Square Park are in such bad shape that the sheds make it more dangerous and almost impossible to walk on. And worst of all, they’re turning our quiet neighborhood streets into commercial noise machines and rodent attractions. They also take away important street parking places, forcing more people to use expensive garages. They were a good idea for the restaurants in the beginning of the pandemic but they’re past their time. Please do not keep this program open!
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Maria Devitt
The well maintained spaces are wonderful addition to the city’s hospitality offerings and something that I would like my tax dollars to support. Not to mention that our small businesses need all of the help that we can give them in this time of crazy rent hikes and insurance rates. That said, we can all agree that the poorly maintained ones are a trash heap and need to be cleaned up. Instead of making new rules for the size and shapes of structures and sending out inspectors to nitpick or force re-builds of perfectly fine spaces, can we please send the inspectors to just deal with the abandoned sheds that have turned into trash heaps and rat kingdoms? Seems that would be a wiser use of city resources that would satisfy the concerns of most residents.
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Frankie Resendale
I understand there is a proposed rule that the dining sheds must be 20′ from the crosswalk on corners.
Having experienced a near miss because of an overambitious driver pulling around the corner and having a blind spot because of a dining shed right up close to the crosswalk, I wholeheartedly endorse keeping this rule.
NYC is a walking city. The dining sheds, if regulated properly, can be a fantastic addition to the city’s culture, however in their current state they can act as additional hazards to pedestrians and bicyclists both.
I encourage the DOT to prioritize the safety of pedestrians when deciding on the final regulations governing the dining sheds. -
Koula C. Kilaras
I object to these restaurant street extensions for the following reasons: 1.Since the extensions started popping up everywhere, the streets are dirtier, smellier, and the rat population has increased. Some homeless use these extensions. If the owners don’t clean in front of their premises, the structures also block the mechanical brooms from cleaning.
2.Who is overseeing that these extensions were done only for restaurants? In Astoria, I saw an extension in front of a beauty parlor. (???)
3. They take street parking spaces for motorists. This places restaurant owners’ rights above the motorists’ rights.
4. They make walking on the sidewalk very difficult. Some restaurants have an extension on the sidewalk and one in the street, leaving very little space for pedestrians. This places restaurant owners’ rights above pedestrians’ rights.
5.Will the restaurant landlords pay more real estate taxes on the buildings where restaurants have extensions? Restaurants will make more money and the landlord’s will charge restaurants more for rent. If they do not pay higher taxes, the city will be discriminating between landlords with restaurant tenants and landlord who have any kind of business tenants without extensions.
6. Some of these extensions are an eyesore and someone maybe wondering if this is New York or some other far away country.
7. These extensions create additional hazards for pedestrians since they obstruct the view, especially at cross sections.
8. Who will be overseeing that any kind of rules and regulations are enforced? We know very well the success of various New York City departments in enforcing laws.
9. I would never sit in a restaurant street extension fearing for my life. There were more than one cases where motorists slammed into these extensions. -
Dustin Bluck
Less than half of NYers own cars, yet our collectively owned streets are filled to the brim with free parking year-round. This horrendous use of public space is one of the biggest injustices facing our city, yet year after year politicians continue to perpetuate this inequitable system. Now, given the opportunity to use just a tiny fraction of that for actual public use, we have had to fight tooth and tail to keep it, as politicians are again bowing to pressure from a wealthy, vocal minority who scream bloody murder every time they feel they are inconvenienced.
Year-round dining is only the beginning of what should be a total overhaul of how public space is used. But it is a beginning. I support year-round outdoor dining now and forever, and I implore politicians to do the right thing and push back against a loud unhappy few who spend their days complaining that someone somewhere might be having fun.
Thanks,
Dustin Bluck -
Eileen Stukane
I have read through the proposed rules for outdoor dining. Many restaurants in the West Village, where I live, are on the ground floors of residential buildings where people either go to bed early in order to perform for work the next day, or stay up late working remotely, and also in these buildings, families are helping children do homework and get sleep for school the next day. Outdoor restaurants are quite noisy, especially when there are birthday parties or other celebrations, and to make them noisier outdoor musicians come by and play loudly. PLEASE SET A CLOSING TIME FOR OUTDOOR RESTAURANTS AT 11PM SUNDAY THROUGH FRIDAY AND 12AM MIDNIGHT ON SATURDAY into SUNDAY.
Also, with platforms and barriers for roadway cafes, how can our streets ever be fully cleaned. I never saw rats running in West Village streets until the outdoor dining sheds were built. Now I see one or two a week and I watch them run under the dining platforms, which themselves have a noxious odor. A sideway cafe with no flooring is fine but how can you be OK with the unsanitary situation created and according to your “rules” will be continued forever in roadway restaurants/cafes.
Another issue is the fact that a restaurant with a 12′-15′ storefront will now be allowed a 40-foot roadway restaurant spread. This allows one business to cover the storefronts of other businesses. There is more happening in NYC than dining! DO NOT ALLOW RESTAURANTS TO TAKE UP MORE SPACE THAN THEIR STOREFRONT FOOTAGE. After all I have just written, I do not understand why you are dissatisfied with rules for sidewalk cafes and insist upon having the roadway dining that is negatively impacting our quality of life in Manhattan. -
Laura Berry
Hello, and thanks for taking my comments into consideration. I’m writing to urge the DOT to prioritize the health of our friends and neighbors by continuing the outdoor dining program in good faith.
COVID-19 is an ongoing pandemic. DOT’s proposal would further marginalize New Yorkers who are avoiding infection, whether they’re among the millions of Americans newly disabled from COVID, people hoping to avoid disability, or people who have been immunocompromised for decades. Life has become smaller, less joyful, riskier, and more isolated for countless people as the funding and political will to fight the pandemic have dried up. Why not continue a program with established infrastructure and proven profits for local business that also makes our shared home just a little more welcoming and accessible?
Though I disagree that sheds should be removed entirely, I agree there should be rules and regulations for outdoor dining on the basis of accessibility, in addition to the current rule for a clear path: 1) Require sheds have good air flow and ventilation; no fully enclosed structures. 2) Enforce use of sheds; restaurants that have outdoor seating will refuse patrons because they don’t actually use it. 3) Restaurants in the outdoor dining program that take reservations should be required to offer outdoor reservations. Participating in society while disabled often takes more planning and preparation, and it’s disheartening to be turned away from a restaurant with outdoor seating for opaque reasons.
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Steven Mahoney
The timeframe should be limited to May 1 – October 31.
This is a more reasonable time frame and the weather is more seasonal for this type of outdoor activity.
Structures abandoned in front of vacant storefronts should be expeditiously removed by the city.
If a business is located on a corner they should only occupy the roadway that corresponds to their business address. -
Elana Ehrenberg
For the past two years, the Design Trust for Public Space has been working with Regional Plan Association and Tri-State Transportation Campaign as well as restaurant owners, community groups, designers and other public realm stakeholders through the Alfresco NYC coalition. Specifically, we have been working to ensure that the permanent outdoor dining program is accessible to all New Yorkers, beneficial for the local communities, and sustainable in the long term.
The proposed rules are an important blueprint for continuing to celebrate outdoor dining culture and prioritizing community use of sidewalks and curb lanes. One of the biggest issues identified through our research is preserving accessibility and mobility for all sidewalk users.
To ensure that the program is truly equitable and successful, please see our attached comments with recommendations on improving accessibility, the transition to this permanent program and providing technical assistance to businesses as the proposed rules are implemented.
Comment attachment
2023.11.20_Design-Trust-Proposed-Rules-Comments.pdf -
Samir Lavingia
My name is Samir Lavingia and I am a resident of Midtown and a lover of outdoor dining. I strongly believe that this program needs to be updated to be a year-round program. We should not remove our outdoor dining in the winters just so they can go back to being car parking. And that is assuming we get the outdoor dining in the first place! Many restaurants will not be able to invest or put up the outdoor dining in the first place if they know they need to take it down soon after.
I also believe that dining outside on Sundays should NOT BE limited to beginning at 10 AM. I wake up at 7am every day and love to go outside and have a coffee and a pastry. Why should I be allowed to do that at 8am on the other days of the week, but not Sundays? We should update this to be 8am as well!
Please create a program that is viable for restaurants and good for New Yorkers! We need this outdoor dining much more than we need parking for cars!
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Deborah George Farley
I urge the DOT to make the following adjustments to the agency’s rules. These are reasonable modifications to the DOT’s proposed rules. They’re crucial for protecting residential neighborhoods, especially ones with high concentrations of outdoor dining.
Reducing Hours of Operations and Noise Levels
Noise is a public health issue. The newer proposed hours are extended even beyond those in Intro 31-C/Local Law 121). The DOT proposes to extend operating hours from 8 a.m. to 1 a.m. on weekends. Seventeen hours per day of outdoor dining noise is unacceptable. This will worsen noise issues in residential areas and subject residents to hardships.The Open Restaurants zoning changes allow bars and restaurants to operate with open doors, windows, and facades even in residential neighborhoods, there should be “detailed” restrictions on amplified noise from restaurants. Noise is a public health issue, especially challenging for residents living just a few feet from dining sheds.
Situating silent large screen televisions in outdoor setups then blasting the TV audio from the restaurant’s interior through open windows, doors, and facades must end. Either eliminate the loopholes or close the restaurant’s windows, doors, and facades.
Clarify Roadway Setup, Design and Safety Rules
Public safety comes before restaurants’ profits and square footage. Without waivers or exceptions, ensure a consistent minimum 15-foot lane width for emergency vehicle access. Both the statute and the agency rules fail to specify the legislation’s intent: that roadway dining setups must be removed in the off-season to allow street cleaning and maintenance. Clearly mandate the removal of roadway cafe structures seasonally, no exceptions. The set up for outdoor dining sheds cannot start earlier that April 1st and the dismantling of dining sheds must not extend past Nov. 30th.Roofs, walls, and oversized structures that impede “line of sight” to traffic control and parking signs and block the view of neighborhood shops from potential customers and clients must be prohibited.
Increase the space required between roadway sheds. There should be a minimum of three feet between structures. In the event of a fire or an emergency, the elderly and disabled with walkers and wheelchairs require more space for a safe egress. Clearly include language to restrict outdoor dining setups to the restaurant’s actual frontage, NOT a maximum of forty feet.
Prohibit including sidewalk grates in the measurement of “pedestrian pathways.” Grates are difficult for people with canes and walkers to navigate and create challenges for individuals using wheelchairs, pushing strollers, and walking pets. In consideration of waitstaff, reinstate a 3-foot service aisle. They need space safely serve and pedestrians need a clear, defined path.
Ensure Community Involvement and Transparency
Provide and extend community board review periods to facilitate input and eliminate the summer loophole for restaurants that want to evade community review. Establish an effective and accessible one-stop mechanism for residents and businesses to report outdoor dining issues. Create a one-stop public data portal on outdoor dining programs for ease of public access and assessment.Environmental Concerns
Ban outdoor heaters. NYC declared a climate emergency in 2019, how can the use out outdoor heaters be considered in 2023, as out climate crisis is worsening? -
saj rahman
do restaurants pay any fees or higher taxes for using the outdoor space? because we keep hearing there aren’t enough workers. well if you give restaurants 25% more real state to work with but the work force doesn’t go up proportionally then of course you will have issues with labor. 25% more people at your establishment but the same amount of workers you are going to have a shortage of labor for the increased customer base. if the restaurants are not paying extra for the space they should be gone.
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Tony Allicino
Please see my attached letter re. my concerns for the proposed Rules – Outdoor Dining
Comment attachment
DOT-Proposed-Rule-Outdoor-Dining.11.17.2023.pdf -
Melissa Marturano
Outdoor dining has made our city more livable, accessible, and welcoming for all and I support it as a year round, permanent feature of our urban landscape and environment. It allows us to keep safer from pathogens like COVID which spread very easily and widely in indoor, poorly ventilated spaces like restaurants and still enjoy one of the best aspects of the city: it’s world-quality food. It allows people with mobility disabilities and mobility aids like wheelchairs to more easily eat at restaurants when so many will not make those physical accommodations to their spaces. Many people who are trying to keep safe from COVID and those with physical disabilities are already excluded from public space in so many ways but outdoor dining opens up many opportunities for further integration and inclusion. Moreover, outdoor dining allows people to reclaim the city from the unnecessary blight of cars, whose owners use our city streets for free and truly make the city unsafe and hostile. If some residents, as expressed in other comments, are worried about more vermin because of outdoor dining, blame the inadequate funding the sanitation department receives in this city, especially under our cop mayor, who always cuts from all agencies but the NYPD. The proposal as it stands would drastically limit and often even decimate the outdoor dining program for anything but the richest restaurants and restaurant groups in the city and abolishes something truly positive that has come out of this still ongoing pandemic. Please for the sake of public health, for the sake of accessibility, for the sake of the economy, for the sake of the cultivation of third spaces, for the sake of true progress from the pandemic, keep outdoor dining all year round and permanent! Admittedly, the sheds need some regulation (for example, they should be covered but not fully enclosed so ventilation can enter), but any more restrictions create more problems than necessary, which is typical of a city always trying to cater to the interests of those who do not have the welfare of New Yorkers at heart. Outdoor dining engenders so many benefits, so please create regulations that forever honor those goods.
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Leo
Let me preface this that I believe outdoor dining is great, on the sidewalks where and when there is room available. Liberalizing laws to allow this would be great. While the street sheds provided relief during the pandemic for the restaurants and patrons, they’ve outlived their usefulness and have become a blight to the city. We cannot cave to the restaurant lobby who would like extra square footage for little charge. Rent a larger space, there are plenty of empty storefronts in desireable locations.
Sheds are:
A visual blight.
Dirty , underutilized for most of the day and a haven for rodents.
Obscure sightlines for automobiles ,bike lanes and pedestrians, raising safety issues.
Create dark tunnels along the sidewalks with no light getting in and inability to see the other side of the street.
Hinder and obscure businesses, other than restaurants who rely on visibility.
Create traffic issues with combinations of bike lanes , sheds, double parking/deliveries. Avenues often become single lane roadways.Limiting cars is a great idea but clogging vehicular movement causes great damage to the city preventing flow of people, goods and polluting.
The time is right to pull the plug on street based sheds and facilitate other forms of outdoor dining that would benefit all participants in this great city. -
Nora Cole
I live in an old part of the city with very narrow sidewalks and lots of restaurants. The sidewalks are so narrow that you can’t put a sidewalk cafe there, because it doesn’t leave an 8 foot clear pedestrian pathway. So the bar and restaurant owners put their dininl spaces in the roadway. But many, many of the sidewalks are less than 8 feet wide to begin with. And the restaurant staff uses the sidewalk as their service aisle. They don’t just pass across it, they travel along it, the full length of the roadway shed, to serve their patrons. That makes the sidewalk even narrower than it already is. For example, there’s a restaurant near me that has just that type of setup. The sidewalk next to it is only 4 1/2 feet wide at its narrowest point and only 6 1/2 feet at its widest.
We pedestrians should not have to share such a narrow passageway with a bar or restaurant. There are a lot of elderly people here using walkers and who need these sidewalks, and the activities of the restaurant really choke off their travel.
The solution is very simple: the requirement of an 8 foot clear pedestrian pathway should apply to roadway set-ups as well as to sidewalk cafes. Roadbed sheds should be prohibited where the adjacent sidewalk is less than 8 feet wide.
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Susan
Dear DOT:
I have lived in NYC since 1980 and live in the East Village. During the pandemic I supported restaurants and bars and the use of roadway sheds as a temporary program. However, I do not support the permanent Open Restaurants program because it is in conflict with residents’ right to a reasonable standard of living. Previous laws and rules and local community boards were established and honed for decades, established for good reasons. However, since the City Council approved the permanent Open Restaurants Program, I submit the following comments on the NYC-DOT Proposed Rules. I beg DOT to prioritize the residents’ comments and incorporate their suggested changes to the proposed rules since it is us, the residents, that will have our lives negatively impacted PERMANENTLY.Reduce Noise and Hours of Operation
Local law 121 says outdoor service is allowed 10 am to midnight, not 8 am to 1 am. My neighbors and I need our sleep, our kids need sleep to function in school. We need some peace and quiet in our own homes. Please restrict the hours 7 days a week to 10 am to midnight at the very minimum. It would be better if the hours were 10 am to 10 pm. These businesses can continue to serve customers inside after 10 pm after the usual peak restaurant time. Also, the rules should state that all set up and end of night clean up must be completed by the cut off times. The racket of dragging tables and chairs, staff chatter, and service set up should not be allowed outside of the cut off times.
The rules say no amplified sound outdoors. The language should specify that no amplified sound devises can be positioned indoors for the benefit of outdoor listening. In other words, restaurants/bars cannot open their windows and/or doors and blast music so that patrons can hear it outdoors as a way of bypassing the rule about no outdoor amplified sound. Also, the no amplified sound rule should specific that restaurants/bars not allow patrons to create their own amplified sound during outdoor dining/drinking.
Also, the rules should specifically ban restaurants and bars from putting up “silent” TVs but use amplified sound of an inside TV or speaker to loudly be heard outside. No TVs or flat screen monitors should be allowed outside for sidewalk dining/drinking or roadbed dining/drinking.Clarify Design, Siting, and Other Roadway Rules
The rules state that waivers can be allowed for the minimum of 15-foot lane on any street to five emergency vehicles access to our homes and streets. There should be NO WAIVERS of this basic safety rule for any reason. This is a public safety rule that was made for good reason.
The rules should be improved to clearly and directly state that all roadway café structures must be removed from December through March. This is so that our streets can be cleaned and any snow removed for the remaining four months. To that end, the rules should clearly state that any and all furniture, structures, and other set ups must not be stored inside the restaurant/bar or other indoor location and cannot be kept outside on the sidewalk or street during December through March.
The language regarding structures is too vague, especially the term “vertical screenings” which suggest a wall. The rules must clearly prohibit all roofs and walls. Structures must be readily removable in the event of an emergency. If heavy equipment like a forklift is required to remove it, it is not a true removable structure. Also, the rules should state that no structure may be constructed by drilling or digging into the sidewalk or roadbed.
The rules should be improved to limit a restaurant’s outdoor dining setups, both sidewalk and roadbed set ups, to the “FRONTAGE” of that specific restaurant. The setups must be confined to only the exact frontage with no extension of that restaurant’s frontage measurement and no extension to nearby or around the corner locations. Also, the restriction of setups to that specific restaurant’s frontage should prohibit using nearby locations that may belong to another restaurant or business or residential landlord that may negotiate a “deal” with the restaurant to sell them their frontage space.
Also, the rules should specify that bartop tables are not allowed, which could create more density in patrons eating/drinking outside and also lead to spillover of crowds onto pedestrian walkways and streets.Restore the Pedestrian Right of Way
Although the proposed rules say that a sidewalk cafe cannot cover a sidewalk subway grate, it does not say that a sidewalk grate cannot be included in the measurement of a pedestrian clearpath. This rule would force pedestrians – some with walkers, canes or pushing strollers – to walk on the subway grate. The porous, open, often wet and slippery or damaged grate is not a “clear” path!
Bring back the 3-foot service aisle for wait staff serving customers in the sidewalk cafe. That service aisle was the sensible standard in the pre-pandemic sidewalk café program, mandating that the restaurant not use the public pedestrian clearpath for private business purposes. Make the clearpath truly clear for the use of pedestrians only!
No Outdoor Heating in a Climate Emergency
In France, home to sidewalk cafés and outdoor dining terraces, all heaters in outdoor cafés were banned April 1, 2022. The Climate Emergency is an existential crisis. No outdoor heating of any kind should be allowed in the rules of this program. With the sidewalk seating and roadway seating being “open air”, they will have to be cranked to “high” and any heaters will have minimal effect for diners anyway with cool breezes. Also, the heaters are dangerous for both diners and pedestrians, especially children who get too close. So it is a climate issue and a safety issue.
Eliminate Extraordinary Powers Afforded to the DOT Commissioner
The language of the proposed rules gives the Commissioner the power “to waive these rules, in the interest of public safety and convenience.” This language affords the Commissioner extraordinary personal power that is an invitation to corruption and trivializes the rule of law. We don’t need outdoor dining fiefdoms in New York City. At the very least, the word “convenience” must be removed from the language because it is way too easy for a restaurant to say everything they want is due to convenience and the concept is very prone to political pressure and abuse.
Ensure Community Input, Agency Accountability & Transparency
Under Local Law 121, community boards review periods are cut back to 40 days — and input on roadway dining will only be considered “to the extent practicable” as determined by the DOT. At a minimum, the DOT should specify that outdoor dining applications received in late May through August will only be considered in September to avoid a period when community boards are often not in session — and therefore unable to solicit community comment. These rules are useless without a real process for community input. In addition, language should be added that community boards may be granted an extension of 30 days upon request to the DOT in addition to the stated review periods due to hardship (such as the beginning of the program with an initial high volume of applications, or due to unforeseen events such as weather events, terrorist attacks, pandemic shut downs, etc.).
The proposed rules provide multiple ways for the restaurant owner to appeal licensing, revocable consent, and violation decisions by the DOT – frequently allowing for long delays in the owner’s favor. But there is no corresponding mechanism provided for how neighboring businesses and residents can respond to restaurant rules violations. 311 is where citizen reports of violations go to die. Give the neighboring businesses and residents a dedicated NYC-DOT portal where outdoor dining problems can be reported – with quick responses from the agency.
Transparency should be the basis of all NYC programs. Make the portal data on outdoor applications, licenses, revocable consents, OATH violations, fines, and complaints received from the public available through one portal. We need to know in measurable data how this program is affecting our communities.
Dedicate 25% of Program earnings to Enforcement & Data Reporting
Dedicate 25% of gross earnings from all types of income from the Open Restaurants Program to be used solely for DOT enforcement of the rules and data reporting to the public by staff dedicated solely to this function. The rules are meaningless if they are not enforced vigorously right from the beginning, including strict enforcement of the application process. DOT and the city government should not make residents become their front line inspectors and enforcement reporters to 311 or the NYPD for noise complaints. Residents have lives to live and the daily reporting of complaints which are too often ignored causing restaurants to be repeat offenders because it is financially profitable. A rule that codifies a percentage of the city’s profits from this program must be put in the rules. If the program, and profits are supposedly for the benefit of the city’s budget, and the budget is solely for the benefit of the city’s citizens, then why would we allow a program such as this without a dedicated percentage of the profits to be used for enforcement and reporting only, and not redirected to other city expenses. Residents that are having their daily lives very negatively impacted PERMANENTLY deserve no less.
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Nora
DON’T EXPAND THE HOURS of OPERATION
I live in a residential building, on a residential block, in a residential neighborhood. There’s never been any commerce outdoors on this block and the only indoor business is a restaurant whose windows are fixed shut and no sound leaks outside.Now and for the last 2 years, there’s been a 36-seat restaurant in the street on this block, destroying our peace and quiet. The noise it generates is madening. It attracts sizeable “parties” — who are there to celebrate something, or decompress after a stressful workday, or reunioning with friends they don’t see often, or enjoying an afterparty of some sort. This restaurant even promotes such gatherings on its website. When you try to make a reservation, it asks you if you’re there to celebrate something or “just to have a good time.” And the space (which it calls “our patio”) is being enough to take in multiple boisterous parties at the same time. The noise is unpredictable and often prolonged.
Now these proposed rules want to extend the hours of operation beyond what we’ve ever had before and even beyond what the law requires. These rules would let restaurants and bars (and don’t forget that they apply to BARS as well as to restaurants, and bars generate a lot of noise because the lubicate and stoke raucous behavior) operate for as much as 17 hours a day. Seventeen hours!! And until 1 o’clock in the morning on Saturdays and Sundays! That’s more than the rules for the temporary outdoor drinking/dining program (which prohibited operations after 11 p.m. 7 days a week). And it’s more than the law requires (which prohibits operations at midnightn and opening times earlier than 10 a.m.)
We residents have done nothing to deserve this and we don’t deserve it. The operating hours should be limited to what’s in the statute.
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Nora
DON’T TIE COMMUNITY BOARDS’ HANDS so that they’ can’t provide a mechanism for local residents to review and have input on applications to operate outdoors.
These proposed rules wouldn’t give Community Boards enough time to go through all the procedures that have to be carried out in order to hold a public hearing and follow through with transmitting their views to DOT. This is a multi-step processn involving committees and the boards themselvesn which usually only meet once a monthn at pre-set calendar dates that can’t be moved. The proposed deadlines for community and Community Board input are disabling. They should allow at least 45 days for Community Board review.
They should also say that applications that are received from late May through August will only be considered in September to avoid a period when community boards are not often in session and therefore unable to solicit and receive community input.
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Sally
Restaurants were thriving pre-Covid so why is it imperative to their survival that they be allowed to have roadside sheds. I have no issue with a few tables outside on the sidewalk very close to the building facade, space peritting, but not to intrude on pedestrian walkways like it was in the beginning of Covid in some locations where pedestrians were forced to walk single file through an opening between tables, and oncoming pedestrians would have to wait for them to pass before they could go through the small opening. My side street has several sheds, and what was formerly 2 Diplomat parking spaces but has now grown to 6, leaves very little area for a car service, or Access-A-Ride, to pick up a passenger with mobility issues, and no double parking (even for waiting) is doable.
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Robert Camacho
No to outdoor dining what ever happened to the quality of life from the community
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Nora
BIKE LANES: No bike lanes between the sheds and the sidewalk. Bars and restaurants on the “other” side of the bike lane? With a bike lane running between the shed and the sidewalk? What are they thinking? Haven’t they thought about the danger of people on foot having to cross or pass down the bike lane? Haven’t they noticed the surge in electric bikes that whiz up the bike lane silently, giving no warning that they’re coming down on you? Anybody who gets hurt in that setup ought to sue the city for millions of dollars. Don’t spend my tax dollars that way. Prohibit roadway setups that are not directly touching the curb.
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Carol Puttre-Czyz
NYC does NOT need outdoor dining kiosks. Covid is over. Stop pandering to the nightlife and anti-car lobby and think about life-long residents whose lives are made miserable by the outdoor noise (of music and loud voices fueled by alcohol) that drifts into apartments, rats and increased garbage, night time use by vagrants and drug addicts/dealers (I’ve witnessed this on East5th St. Manhattan). In addition FREE SPACE to conduct business while motorists lose more and more parking spaces.
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Nora
CITIZEN ENFORCEMENT!
DOT can’t be everywhere, and it will never have enough enforcement agents to make a dent in the widespread violations of outdoor dining/drinking rules. A City Council member did a study that found that over 90% of outdoor operations were in violation — oftentimes violating more than one rule.
Citizens can be DOT’s eyes and ears. Let them document a violation when they see it (with photos or video or sound recordings), send the documentation to DOT, DOT should review it, and if it is sufficient to make out a violation, DOT should be required to proceed with enforcement actions. DOT then won’t have to send out its own (few) enforcement agents to gather evidence.
The city already has such a program for enforcing the law against trucks idling their motors on city streets for more than a few minutes. It’s been very effective.
We desperately need it. It’s the only way we’ll evet get enfotcement.
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Susan D. Friend
Some of the restaurants leave inadequate space for the pedestrian on the sidewalks and l can provide photos of two egregious examples
There are restaurants that have both roadway sheds and sheds on the sidewalk as well as free standing tables and chairs. I don’t think that a restaurant should be permitted to do have all this and should have just one outside accommodation
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Nora
The service aisle belongs IN the sidewalk cafe, not outside it in what’s supposed to be a clear pedestrian path. All sidewalk cafe operations should have to be conducted WITHIN THEIR LICENSED FOOTPRINT. This is the rule now, and it needs to stay the rule.
A clear pedestrian path isn’t clear if the restaurant is appropriating it to serve its patrons.
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Daniel Cohen
Outdoor dining is good and should be subject to minimal restrictions.
First of all, community boards should not have a veto on outdoor dining because community boards’ authority is illegitimate. Second, LPC should should not have a veto on outdoor dining because LPC’s authority is illegitimate. Third, outdoor dining should be allowed year-round.
Outdoor dining is the best thing that’s happened to NYC in years. We shouldn’t strangle it with pointless restrictions.
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Bart Sherman
Strict rules regarding the matter are necessary. In less fancy neighborhoods like mine (East Village) were outdoor dining is just plywood sheds, often used as a storage or restrooms for night visitors situation is rather dire. The vermin is visible on the streets lined with sheds in early morning hours. The smells are offensive and pile of garbage seems always the be present as if it was part of decorum. Some restaurants in the city have adopted European style with chairs, umbrellas and heaters that are removed for the night. Simple solution but it requires regulations. Perhaps unwelcome here as the restaurant owners don’t like to be told what to do. There is also a question of how the restaurants that take paid parking spots contribute to the city revenue that is experiencing massive budget issues.
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Victor Arranz
I don’t think that floor on the sheds for dinning is favorable because makes access impossible for cleaning and controlling pest activity. The same with planters which are perfect habitat for rats.
Thank you for your work about maintaining our boroughs clean. -
John Rozmus
I do not support this program. The open restaurant dining have made the rat issues worse and loud music gets constantly blasted throughout the night.
The sheds have become an eyesore throughout the city. Most are empty and rotting away.
The streets are also not able to be paved properly as the sheds are in the way.
I support the classic outdoor dining program that took place before the pandemic, and I would like to see that version returned with the DCWP in charge.
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Brigit Holmes
Outdoor dining is essential to the success of NYC restaurants and also to COVID mitigation. Restaurants are able to service more diners, and provide outdoor seating to anyone not comfortable with dining inside. Additionally, during good weather, NYC loves to be outside!
Lastly, just this week our family had COVID and being able to order food outside and eat safely away from other diners was incredibly helpful.
The seating should remain open year round! -
Mary K. Doris
In determining rules, please give maximum thought to the need for the following:
• Operating hours must be restricted to 10am to midnight in the interest of neighbors’ rights;
• No outdoor dining operation can be permitted to exceed the frontage measurement of its accompanying indoor establishment;
• All outdoor structures must be closed, with all furniture removed and no street storage permitted, from December through March each year;
• No amplified sound must be permitted, either indoor or outdoor;
• No outdoor heating should be permitted to exacerbate our climate-change issues;
• Applications received after May 1 should not be heard until Community Boards return to full operation in September.In my area of downtown, the outdoor-shed program already causes dramatic issues of vehicle access through streets, pedestrian rights and quality-of-life deterioration for residential neighbors. Please ensure that the rights this program gives operators are balanced by stringent
and enforced regulations for the benefit of all. -
Laura Schooler
While my preference would be to do away with street sheds entirely and only keep sidewalk dining, my plan B would be to strictly limit the size of all sheds, and the “types” of establishments that can have them at all. For example, there’s a plant store near me that serves coffee and Danish and has a shed that takes up over half the block and is used for storage as much as anything. That’s not a restaurant– it’s a plant store. Let them set up a few tables on the sidewalk (they also have indoor seating). Also, there needs to be a method by which shed usage is tracked. There are plenty of sheds in my neighborhood in which I’ve rarely seen anyone sitting. Usually fast food / take out places or restaurants that also have sidewalk seating. If 2 people are using these sheds a day to eat…is this really a good use of public space? I realize the bike lobby would say it’s better than a parked car, but in the reasonable world, it’s not.
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Allie M
These guidelines need to consider the quality of life of people who live here. I walk out of my apartment into a bar. I run the AC more frequently because I can’t have windows open unless I want to hear the bar or smell whatever the patrons are smoking. I’d consider moving apartments, but there is no place to park a moving truck because of the roadside dining structures (which aren’t open during the day anyway).
The hours of operation for outside dining should end before midnight — or — there should be special hours for when alcohol can be served as part of outdoor dining – ideally cap this at 9/10pm. Existing noise curfew rules should be enforced and we should not change the hours to let outdoor dining operate longer.
The proposed guidelines should include detailed instructions on sidewalk cafe situations for restaurants at street corners or where sidewalks include tree wells if they wish to partake in outdoor dining.
What happens if a property owner withdraws their consent? Does that invalidate the original 4 year license for a restaurant? What is the process for a property owner to withdraw their consent?
What obligations do restaurants have to maintain their designated outdoor dining areas whether or not they are in operation? (i.e., snow clearing or de-icing sidewalks, keeping drains clear, beautifying tree wells?) As restaurants are effectively claiming public space, they should be responsible for maintaining it.
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Mary Taylor
The proposed rules give hours of operation that are too long and give no consideration to residents.
No amplified sound should come through open windows or door.
The 15’ rule should have no exceptions. Others lives or property could be at stake.
Make clear that “readily removable furniture” must really be removed December through March.
Are “vertical screenings” a wall? Rules must be specific. Prohibit all roofs and walls.
Rules must limit set-ups to the frontage of the restaurant. NO exceptions.
A clear path for pedestrians must not include the subway grate.
Bring back the 3’ service aisle for wait staff. This was a part of the pre-pandemic sidewalk cafe program that was sensible.
NO OUTDOOR HEATING. This is harmful to the environment. (I understand that France has banned this to protect the environment.)
The rules give the Commissioner “power to waive these rules…..”. This is an invitation to corruption and mocks the rule of law. We live in a democracy. The Commissioner must not have such power.
Return community input. Do not shorten the time for Community Boards to deliberate or the citizens to comment.
Local businesses and residents must have a dedicated NYC-DOT portal to report outdoor dining problems and they deserve a quick response from DOT.
I was someone who cheered when the city offered restaurants a way to stay open in the early part of the pandemic but I became quickly disillusioned as I watched many restaurants completely ignore the rules, grab more of our streets and sidewalks then allowed, be callous regarding the noise that adversely affected residents of the area. These proposed rules should be tightened and adhered to so that we all can live in harmony. -
Mary Ann Pizza-Dennis
Thank you for taking the time to read through my concerns with the new proposed outdoor dining rules. I would bet that most of the people who are in favor of these sheds and who think that the new rules are too restrictive are either restaurant owners, restaurant workers OR they do not have sheds where they live and sleep.
– Reduce Noise & Hours of Operation
The current hours of operation are too long as it is because while the sheds have customers we might as well have the customers in our living room, that is how loud it is. The proposed operating hours in the statute are absurdly long—especially in residential districts—but the proposed DOT rules manage to make the situation even worse. Local Law 121 specifies 10 a.m. to midnight, not 8 a.m. to 1 a.m. on some days. Residents need to sleep. Seventeen hours per day of outdoor dining noise is unprecedented, and unacceptable. The rules say no amplified sound outdoors. The customers in the sheds are amplified enough that is why the sheds should be gone. Restaurant doors and windows should remain closed as stated in the stipulations for them to have a liquor license. RESIDENTS FIRST
– Clarify Design, Siting & Other Roadway Rules
The proposed rules say that there must be a minimum 15-foot lane on any street to give emergency vehicles access to our streets and homes. But the rules allow for exceptions and waivers. There can be no waivers and exceptions for public safety. THE CLEARANCE ON OUR BLOCK IS BARELY, 10’ SEE ATTACHED PICTURE – I could not attach picture. RESIDENTS FIRST
– Restore the Pedestrian Right of Way
The restaurants on our block do not have 8’ feet of sidewalk to begin with, but somehow, they were allowed to be there because there was and is no enforcement. Attached please see a picture (I could not attach Picture) of the restaurant next to me. The sidewalk is less than 8’, the door remains open, there is a large lamppost and they leave the basement hatch open throughout service. RESIDENTS FIRST
– Outdoor Heating in a Climate Emergency?!?
In France, home to sidewalk cafés and outdoor dining terraces, all heaters in outdoor cafés were banned April 1, 2022. We must do the same.
– Eliminate Extraordinary Powers Afforded to the DOT Commissioner. RESIDENTS FIRST
– Ensure Community Input, Agency Accountability & Transparency
Under Local Law 121, community boards review periods are cut back to 40 days — and input on roadway dining will only be considered “to the extent practicable” as determined by the DOT. At a minimum, the DOT should specify that outdoor dining applications received in late May through August will only be considered in September to avoid a period when community boards are often not in session — and therefore unable to solicit community comment. These rules are useless without a real process for community input. The proposed rules provide multiple ways for the restaurant owner to appeal licensing, revocable consent, and violation decisions by the DOT – frequently allowing for long delays in the owner’s favor. But there is no corresponding mechanism provided for how neighboring businesses and residents can respond to restaurant rules violations. 311 is where citizen reports of violations go to die. Give the neighboring businesses and residents a dedicated NYC-DOT portal where outdoor dining problems can be reported – with quick responses from the agency. RESIDENTS FIRSTOUTDOOR SHEDS = NOISE, RATS, (THE RATS EVEN LIVE UNDER THE SHEDS WHERE THERE ARE FLOORS) GARBAGE, NO STREET SWEEPING AND DIMINISHED QUALITLY OF LIFE
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Eva Lansberry
The pandemic brought about a much-needed change in the outdoor dining landscape, opening up opportunities for businesses that were previously excluded due to outdated commercial zoning regulations. The revised rules for outdoor dining were a lifeline for many restaurants, providing them with a safe and accessible way to continue operating during a time of crisis.
The New Rules: A Step Backward?
However, the new rules for outdoor dining seem to be taking a step backward by quietly eliminating the use of existing canopy structures. Canopies are essential for creating a stable business foundation, providing protection from the elements and creating a more comfortable dining environment. Awnings and umbrellas alone are not enough to withstand the unpredictable New York City weather.
Disregarding Industry Input
During meetings with the NYC Design Review Board for outdoor dining, the input of the local restaurant industry was disregarded. The designs presented were unrealistic, disengaged concepts that were costly, ineffective for restaurants to utilize, and required additional costly storage. To establish progressive rules that truly support the restaurant industry, it is crucial to involve restaurant owners and operators in the decision-making process, as well as the public.
Grandfathering in Existing Canopies
I urge you to reconsider this decision and consider grandfathering in the establishments with community support, while phasing out sheds. This would allow restaurants that have already invested in canopy structures to continue using them, while providing a transition period for others to adjust to the new regulations.
Canopies: A Foundation for Success
Canopies are more than just a way to protect diners from the elements; they are an integral part of a restaurant’s identity and brand. They create a welcoming and inviting atmosphere, and they can be used to extend the dining season. In a city like New York, where the weather can change at the drop of a hat, canopies are essential for restaurants to survive and thrive.
Involving the Restaurant Industry
The restaurant industry is a vital part of the New York City economy, and it is important to its success that its voice is heard in the decision-making process. By involving restaurant owners and operators in the development of outdoor dining rules, we can ensure that these rules are fair, practical, and supportive of the industry.
I hope that this frank review of outdoor dining will help to inform the decision-making process and lead to the establishment of progressive rules that truly support the restaurant industry. Canopies are essential for restaurants to succeed, and they should not be quietly eliminated. Thank you for your attention to this matter.
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Terri Howell
I agree with ALL the objections, which have been expressed. Another negative aspect of the sheds in the Village, is attracting the emotionally disturbed and/or drug addicts. In my 35 years here, there were never homeless West of 7th Ave S, as there were too few sidewalk cafes for them to beg from. Now it is easy to walk down the street and sidewalk to demand money.
Harassment and intimidation are common. Last night, I witnessed an EDP addict smash glasses because patrons refused to give him anything. Could have been worse. -
Leslie Clark
In my comments, I am principally concerned with maintaining as much of the public sidewalk and public roadway as possible for use by the public – and not by private business. Therefore, my first concern is that the old 3’ service aisle has apparently been eliminated in these rules. This service aisle ensured that the restaurant [a private, profit-making business] did not use the public pedestrian clearpath as a place from which their private wait staff served their private customers. Please return this rule to the sidewalk café rules. It should be made clear to restaurant operators – in the rules, in enforcement and, if need be, with fines – that the sidewalk is meant for the pedestrian first and foremost.
I am equally concerned with the public use of the public roadway. Way too much of our public roadway is going to be “rented” at a ridiculously low rate to private businesses. In order to reduce the damage done by this misguided policy, it is not enough for the rules to say that roadway “setups” can only be placed where parking had previously been allowed on roadway. The exact meaning of this rule should be spelled out explicitly in the rules. Therefore, the rules should explicitly state that there can be no roadway set-ups in lanes marked “no parking any time” and no roadway set-ups in ”loading zones” [whether all day, or part of the day], etc., to include all types of loading zones [and name each one of them], bus stops and special lanes designed for the use of the public and the use of other businesses.
I am also deeply concerned with the rule that “a 15-foot emergency travel lane shall be maintained on every roadway.” Fifteen feet is not enough for the largest fire department equipment. Nor does this measurement take into account the amount of roadway needed for fire department personnel and for properly laying out fire hose. Therefore, the minimum should be 18 [eighteen] feet and not 15 feet and there should be no exceptions to this rule. Currently the rule allows the Fire Department to exempt some streets from this rule. This means that restaurant owners and politicians will be putting pressure on the fire department to compromise the safety of New York City residents for the profit of one industry. Therefore such exemptions should be unacceptable.
And I cannot conclude my comments without noting the utter absurdity of heating the outdoors in winter [and presumably air-conditioning the outdoors in summer] for the comfort of customers who are choosing to eat in the cold [or heat] of outdoors. New York City has declared a climate emergency. Nowhere written in that declaration was there an exception for the comfort and convenience of those who can afford $18 margaritas and $20 ceviche salads. -
Andrea Meyer
Comments – on NYC-DOT’s Proposed rules for the Permanent Open Restaurants Program
1. The rules should (must ) limit the a restaurant’s outdoor dining setup of any kind to the FRONTAGE of that RESTAURANT ONLY. This should be added and stated clearly.
2. 3 FOOT SERVICE AISLE – Included in the rules should be the inclusion of the 3 foot service aisle for wait staff serving customers in the sidewalk cafe.
3.OUTDOOR HEATING – The rules should state there is no outdoor heating.
There is no pandemic anymore. Folks can eat inside when cold.
4.OUTDOOR STRUCTURES – The rules should (must) specifically state that
roofs and walls are not allowed.
5. OUTDOOR FURNITURE – The rules should explicitly state that all outdoor furniture must be removable and stored OFF SITE in the
off season – NO storage on the street or sidewalk.
6.SUBWAY GRATES – The rules should state that sidewalk grates must not be included in the measurement of a pedestrian clear path. Without this
inclusion, pedestrians – those of us with infirmed legs, older people, people with strollers, canes, and walkers are forced to walk on the subway grate. I’m not sure, but wouldn’t the exclusion of such a rule violate ADA rules?
7. The rules should shorten the hours of outdoor dining. 8am to last serve at 10 pm is very long, and workable for restaurants. -
Jen S
Dear DOT,
I am a lifelong New Yorker.
The City was wrong to make outdoor dining permanent especially as the vast majority of residents had no idea about the legislation and no ability to weigh in.Further, the City has prioritized the restaurant industry while doing nothing for neighborhood retail and non-food businesses. There have been massive job losses in NYC retail, but the City has ignored that.
Restaurants-food places are oversaturated in many places (take a look at Fulton Steet by DOT in Manhattan). Not everything can be a restaurant. Dining outside is not an “entitlement”. And “all” restaurants destroys neighborhoods.Regarding the DOT rules:
Ensure That Residents Can Live – DOT needs to prioritize residents and a minimum livable life. Residents are entitled to sleep, not be overwhelmed by trash and rats.
No Amplified Music-Noise and Reduce Hours – The proposed hours (longer than Local Law 121) are unacceptable and must be reduced. Amplified music /TVs etc should NOT be allowed outside and windows/doors must be closed. My friend lives in the East Village. Her family including kids GET NO SLEEP!
Address Trash and Rats – Restaurants should not be allowed to move their trash next door or block the sidewalk. DOHMH should be inspecting outdoor dining structures for rodents etc.
No Outdoor Heaters and No Air Conditioners – The City keeps enacting rules to conserve energy and address climate change. Unacceptable to allow heat/air conditioning in outside dining.
Ensure Safety and Emergency Vehicles – DOT must ensure minimum 15-foot lane width for ambulances, FDNY – no exceptions. DOT must also mandate space between sheds – at least 4 feet – to ensure emergency access.
Ensure Sidewalk for Pedestrians – This includes ensuring there is a 3 foot service aisle.
No Set-Up Beyond Frontage, No Blocking Building Entrances, No Blocking Adjoining Business/Neighborhood Business – DOT must forbid restaurants to extend frontage and block residential building entrance and must forbid structures that hamper sightlines/block view of neighborhood shops.
Won’t name names but countless restaurants have taken advantage of outdoor street dining. Just a few examples:
1) My friend’s building is blocked by an expensive restaurant that has a very long shed and which goes beyond the restaurant frontage. My friend has a disability and can no longer get a vehicle by his building because the restaurant blocked the entrance.
2) In my neighborhood, there are blocks which are completely full with restaurant sheds. Not only do they go beyond their frontage but they also block visibility of adjoining retail shops. Completely unfair!DOT Must Ensure Communication With Residents and Ability to Complain – As mentioned above, it was unacceptable that the City Council did not notify residents about the legislation and did not seek resident opinion. City DOT’s mechanism for including resident voice and for addressing complaints is also unacceptable. The comment process is an example – the wealth restaurant lobby and bicycle lobby are aware and have paid staff to write comments. But regular NYC residents don’t even know this is happening. And only people who have access to a computer can truly comment. Even a phone isn’t manageable for commenting. That leaves out many New Yorkers . Unfair.
Similarly the DOT website for restaurant complaints is very hard to navigate.
No Special Waiver Power for DOT Commissioner – This is supposed to be a democracy. It is shameful that the City developed legislation based on restaurant lobby and the bike lobby wishes. The restaurant lobby and bike lobby doesn’t speak for residents. The DOT Commissioner should not have any ability to allow waivers!
Thank you.
Jen S
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Michael
Outdoor dining has been an amazing addition to the city; however, rules are needed. I believe this is an excellent first step.
The main issues are:
– Homeless people and others using outdoor dining sheds to hang out/loiter when restaurants are closed.
– Often, when restaurants are either closed or not using their outdoor dining sheds, they occupy a quarter to half of the sidewalk for equipment storage. In many parts of the city, sidewalk space is a pressing issue, exacerbating the situation.
– There should be a per capita or some other metric used to limit the number of restaurants that can have outdoor dining sheds/sidewalk cafes. There is simply not enough space for every restaurant to use sidewalk space while leaving enough room for people to walk, including those who use strollers and wheelchairs. The proliferation of sidewalk cafes has significantly complicated the lives of those using strollers and wheelchairs. -
Peter Lopez
Outdoor dining should stay, but the following needs to be addressed:
Sidewalk congestion: There is not enough sidewalk space for everyone. Restaurants are taking over sidewalks and not leaving enough space for people to walk.
Noise: Restaurants should not be allowed to blast music with their outdoor dining sheds.
If restaurants are going to take up sidewalk space, they should actually use the sidewalk and not just use it for storage, especially during rush hour.
Restaurants need to take in their equipment when they are not using it. Leaving it outside leads to people hanging out after hours, idle structures, and random individuals using them to hang out, smoke, drink their own alcohol, and blast music at all hours.Abandoned structures need to come down.
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Dave
Outdoor dining needs to restrict how much sidewalk space is used and any structure in the road needs to be elevated enough to allow water to flow freely to storm drains for rain.
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C.M.
I am extremely angry. I walked home from a community board meeting last Thursday night. It was a 15 block or so walk and, weather-wise, invigorating.
However, from 11th Street and Sixth Avenue to Prince and MacDougal Streets, I had to plow through all the pedestrians blocking the sidewalks. First in front of the Waverly Theater. I listened to one of the theater employees screaming into the crowd to move over to the side and allow pedestrians to pass. They weren’t moving anywhere as I stormed through.Then getting onto MacDougal at Houston Street, I decided to just press on. Plowing through the diners/drinkers hanging outside several of the restaurants, between the sheds and the storefronts. I nearly knocked some of those people over. I am tired of saying “Excuse me” to no avail. So I just kept my head down and moved forward. Of course I heard some indignant comments….. I’m getting immune to them.
And today, on Bleecker Street near Carmine, I was walking behind an elderly couple, one person using a cane, as we tried to pass the crowd congregating outside a small restaurant. So I yelled out, “This is a sidewalk — move over,” to which some of them did. But not without comments.
You can expect a lot more angry people resulting in possible pushing and shoving incidents unless you institute and enforce strong rules for clearance.
And I will hold the DOT, The City Council, the NYC Administration and the involved restaurant(s) responsible if there are any flareups due to non-compliance.
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Y. (Lonnie) Hardy
Hi,
Please consider maintaining the option of dining al fresco. It is one of the NYC pleasures. So many of the restaurants have themes and are decorative adding to the beauty and cultural experiences only found in NYC. I feel safer dining al fresco rather than indoors especially since the increase of COVID related illnesses are rising. We hope that more outdoor dining can be added in the Bronx. -
David Joerg
My wife has had Long Covid for nearly two years now, and it’s significantly impacted her life and activities. Catching Covid again could make it much worse.
To avoid catching it, we haven’t dined indoors for two years. Open-air dining is our only option for meeting friends and socializing. This proposed rule change would greatly reduce the open-air dining options. Please revise the rules so that restaurants can have year-round open-air dining that works economically for the restaurants.
Thank you!
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Michelle French
Outdoor dining, while a boon for restaurants and street life, has also greatly contributed to the population explosion of rats. We are pleased to see that the new rules require walls be filled, since empty walls are a primary place where rats take shelter. Please also mandate that dining sheds not have FLOORS (that rats can scurry and shelter under) or PLANTERS (unless lined with wire mesh to prevent burrowing).
Any flooring creates a protective space for rats to eat food scraps and procreate, and planters allow for nesting and birthing pups – to allow these would create an opportunity for further growth of the rat population, which would lead to the more infestation and threat of human disease.
It is critical that the new rules for outdoor dining ensure the elimination of all forms of rat harborage, so we can transition to safer outdoor dining and a better, healthier city.
Yours truly,
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Matt D
Restaurant owner in Brooklyn here.
We understand that some restaurants were not using their dining structures in the winter months. These, of course, should come down so they do not become decrepit. But many of us have been using them 12 months of the year. The weather is unpredictable. We need the option to serve customers who prefer to dine outside whenever they/we feel like it is possible given the temperature. Covid is not gone, and many people still will only frequent outdoor restaurants. Additionally, the cost of building, dismantling, storing…building dismantling, storing…every year will certainly be prohibitive for all but but the most flush and expensive restaurants.
On April 16, 2021, then Mayor De Blasio said this on WNYC Radio:
“Open Restaurants as is… is permanent. You know, you can invest in whatever you want to do for the outdoor element under Open Restaurants with the assurance it will be permanent year after year…”
We took the Mayor, speaking in his official capacity, at his word.
Many of us received SBA Economic Injury Disaster Loans during the pandemic. We used a lot of these funds to build outdoor dining structures. Construction was expensive, lumber prices were at an all time high. Sure, some people threw up sheds, but may of us built structures that were safe, beautiful, sturdy. That added aesthetic value to the streetscape and to our restaurants. These cost tens and tens of thousands of dollars, money that we will be paying back to the SBA, with interest, for 30 years. How much more money will it cost to tear down and remove these structures? and to purchase supplies to build new ones? To take them down again every year? To store them? Where are businesses supposed to get this money? And why should they be forced to if they have perfectly good structures in place already? Does it make any sense to tear down suitable structures and dump them in the landfill?
PLEASE PROVIDE A YEAR-ROUND OPTION
A carveout option for permanent year-round structures would be a lifesaver. We would happily pay a higher fee to keep our structure up. This would weed out anyone who was not actually planning to use their structures in the winter. The fee could then help facilitate inspections that would ensure that the structures were safe, kept in good order, and were following all necessary sanitation guidelines.
The combination of soaring inflation and labor shortages in our industry has drastically changed the feasibility of running a restaurant in NYC. Labor costs have increased drastically, kitchen wages have risen over 50% in 3 years. This is good for the overall health of our industry, workers deserve fair compensation, but restaurants won’t be able to pay these wages if they lose seats. Lost seats = lost sales. If we lay people off in the winter they will get other jobs and restaurants won’t have the staff they need when the outdoor dining returns on the spring.
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Charles Guthrie
Please provide an option for restaurants to provide year-round dining. As a diner, I have enjoyed eating out at restaurants in the winter in addition to the summer. I have spoken to restaurant owners operating on razor-thin margins, and they need all the space they can get. It is needlessly expensive for them to set up, take down, and store temporary seating every year. Please provide building standards for them to meet and allow them to provide year-round seating. And above all, DON’T let this space go back to free parking! Our city needs to think beyond car storage for our valuable curb space.
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Arielle - Sunset Park
Many of us need to remain covid-cautious and the year-round outdoor dining option has enabled us to remain a part of our communities and connected to our loved ones. These new rules will make it economically unsustainable for small businesses to set up outdoor dining during the approved months. They won’t do it. Where would they store their equipment and how would they pay for it? They sure can’t rebuild every year. And, where will we gather and dine with loved ones over the winter months? We won’t. We’ll be further isolated as this city continues to lose sight of the most vulnerable.
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J Derow
Allowing restaurants to build sheds in the street is an unacceptable private taking of public property. This policy was an understandable accommodation for restaurant owners during the pandemic, but it is a gift that should be rescinded immediately.
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Jen A.
These rules do not distinguish between structures or assess the financial devastation they will cause. There is a vast difference in the cost and integrity of outdoor structures. Some were very carefully constructed at great cost to small businesses that went out on a limb to make it happen. They were built with every consideration, including ventilation for safety, and meant to serve the public all year, meant to last. These businesses were told they could invest in building something permanent, that outdoor dining was to be permanent. Many businesses borrowed to make it happen and owners went without pay. New employees were hired. Now these businesses must hastily downsize, demo, potentially let go of staff, figure out a far less functional, manageable solution entailing repeated construction/installation, storage, change of staff etc. All of this must suddenly be figured out and self funded.
It seems that both an assessment of structures and financial hardship should be made before any rules can be enforced. I don’t see that these considerations have been thoroughly addressed.
Sturdy, thoughtful, safe outdoor structures are to be destroyed. Many workers will lose their jobs. Small business owners will be left scrambling to sort out this guidance and figure out a solution that doesn’t destroy what they’ve built.
Please heed those of us who urge more thought be put into this.
Thank you,
Jen -
Karen Myrie MD
PLEASE better regulate the siting of these outdoor restaurants.
-Unused outdoor dining spaces need to be removed, to restore walking & parking space.
-The amount of diminished parking is untenable.
-On very narrow streets, it is dangerous for drivers and diners alike, especially during the winter with build-ups of snow & ice. -
C.C.M.
When the pandemic really hit us in March 2020 and life seemed to shut down everywhere, one fear was businesses going bankrupt, resulting in permanent damage to our city. We all did our best to support local businesses. Restaurants and bars offered some relief for us particularly because we could be outside while we supported them. Outdoor seating quickly became popular and to ensure these places stayed in business, residents endured the “temporary inconveniences” of tables and chairs pretty much anywhere a bar/restaurant wanted to provide outside seating even if we lived with overcrowded sidewalks and messy streetscapes. We were proud to be hale and hearty New Yorkers sitting outside on freezing days and nights eating hot meals, drinking and supporting our local eateries. We believed this chaotic mess would only be temporary since the onslaught of rats, bottlenecked sidewalks, garbage everywhere, and the constant loud noises of music, and patrons (trying to be heard over the music), would never become a permanent part of our lives. But here we are. If the pandemic had not happened, we wouldn’t be dealing with the prospect of this hellish chaos becoming our permanent reality!
Our experience is that trying to work directly with offending bar/restaurant owners, calling 311, contacting our local city council district office, and conversations with our local police precinct have produced no lasting results in alleviating sidewalk overcrowding that encroached on our residential doorways; that made walking on the sidewalk nearly impossible; enduring excessively loud music and voices; drunken arguments especially late at night right outside our homes; huge water bugs; and rats, rats, rats. Numerous testimonials at the Oct. 16 City Council meeting echo these complaints.
Presenting our complaints to the local community boards and local city council district offices have produced no changes to bar/restaurant bad behaviour. These agencies listened our complaints, but informed us they have no authority to change the behaviour of the bad actor restaurant/bar owners.
If you look at liquor license applications presented to local community boards, many state they will only have low “ambient” or “background” or “acoustic” music – nothing loud, and no live bands. These applicants have lawyers; they know exactly how to word their applications to win approval. What are the consequences for lying on these applications? What are the consequences for promising to close their doors and windows by 10PM and stop outside service and not doing so? What should we make of an applicant claiming to want to open a family restaurant on a residential block — that stays open until 2AM every night?
An example is a bar/restaurant owner who chose an historic residential block to open a bar. During the pandemic, this operator took advantage of the city’s lack of oversight and lack of rules enforcement to hire live bands to play outside on the sidewalk; they were loud enough to hear over a block away and around the corner. Even now live bands play just inside the bar’s open door/window, and sometimes singers perform – microphone in hand. There have been no consequences for years now, or if this bar operator is fined it’s just the minor cost of doing business. This bar operator has taken over part of a city block. No consequences. For residents and pedestrians, this owner makes us feel like we are trespassers on his property! No consequences. Another bar/restaurant owner, taking advantage of the pandemic, has tables/chairs lined up against the building facade, also at the curb, and also a roadbed shed. Since this is a fairly standard practice for them, particularly on week ends, it’s clear – no city/state oversight, no consequences. Instead, the rules (rules they don’t follow anyway) may be loosened by the DOT’s decisions after the Nov. 20 meeting. In a high-end lifestyle magazine interview, one of the bar owners said he opened his business on that charming, quiet block because it’s in a spot that’s stable and hasn’t been gentrified (the rent was cheaper than the more expensive nearby neighborhoods) yet.
Residents are being betrayed and trampled on for helping these businesses thrive during the pandemic.
As discussed at the City Council meeting, two individuals were identified as having made the majority of frivolous and excessive noise complaints against bars/restaurants to the DEP. They caused even non-offending establishments to lose time and money. The City Council’s response is to take away the 311 noise complaint practice. There is no profit motive behind 311 noise complaints. The DOT’s MEND NYC proposal will prevent people from lodging legitimate complaints about offending bar owners. Residents will be vulnerable to retaliation from bar owners and their landlords who will also profit from the proposed cheap square footage give-away.
The three bar/restaurant industry lobbyists at the Oct. 16 City Council meeting stated that operators struggle to make ends meet. With the lax guidelines for the past 3+ years re: free outdoor square footage (that often doubles an operator’s overall space) and loud music to draw in customers, if a bar isn’t profitable yet, they’re doing something wrong. Do you know who IS struggling? The people who just want to walk on the sidewalk; residents paying rent and mortgages and are denied the right to have peace in our homes.
In your deliberations after the Nov. 20 meeting, will you consider that in older parts of the city, many blocks are short and streets/sidewalks are narrow? Some blocks are only 600 feet or less. On some of these short blocks there are already 7, 8 or more existing restaurant/bars, with hundreds of apartments above and around them. A 600 foot long city block where 8 liquor licenses have been approved – with the potential for total of 10 licenses on this one small block! Are you going to allow every bar/restaurant to play loud music, with patrons yelling over it, doors and windows open until midnight/1 AM, seven nights a week? Will each bar/restaurant be permitted to claim already narrow sidewalk space as well as roadbed space? Are you going to allow connecting roadbed structures on these small streets? Please keep in mind, many residential doorways are interspersed between these bars. In their efforts to maximize outdoor seating, some bar owners lengthen roadbed sheds and connect them creating a barricade, barring emergency service access to apartment buildings. Many old, walk-up buildings do not have fire escapes. We see this on our block every day. No city agencies have intervened to protect residential doorways blocked by sheds that abut one another.
The proposal does not address sound emanating from within bars/restaurants to outside seating. Some bar owners at the Oct. 16 City Council meeting said they played music extra loudly so their outside dining patrons could “benefit” from the music they were missing by not sitting inside. Loud noises of any kind — music, patrons, etc must stay inside the premises. If it’s audible on the street, it’s audible in people’s homes. This is a non-starter.
New York is famous for being a vibrant city. But it’s chaos you’re proposing, not vibrancy. We say NO to roadbed sheds. Bar/restaurant applications will still keep pouring in. You’re selling out the residents of this city. Please don’t do this.
NO to after hours type bars/restaurants on residential blocks. Restaurants on residential blocks need to close by 9 or 10PM – and all noises (day/night; voices/music/etc) must stay inside the premises. The pandemic is over; the city is back.
There has been a false choice being put forth that “no” to roadbed sheds means “yes” to cars. Not so. No roadbed sheds and far fewer cars, means more room on our streets — and just maybe far fewer deaths of pedestrians and cyclists.
Please don’t cave to the bar/restaurant lobby. It’s the residents who need protection now.
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Lorry Wall
It is my hope that people in power, people that makes laws and guidelines, think of the residents which will be effected by those laws.
Our South Village neighborhood is now restaurant / bar saturated. Especially Prince St, Sullivan, St, MacDougal St. The businesses don’t care about the disruption to our lives, the noise, the rats, the crowds. Nor our safety. I’m aware of restaurants with empty safety bumpers and many, many that block an open and free access to residential bldgs. Shouldn’t this be illegal? They extend the shed down the street until they get to another restaurant where they are forced end their outdoor dining. Shouldn’t this be restricted and limit them to the store front length only.
Attached is a small, incomplete list of restaurants and bars that block main doors into residences. Links are pictures taken from the residence door facing the street showing the dining shed blocks free and open access.
Please. Please consider restrictions that includes attention to the residents of NYC and the ones that have to endure living above, beside, surrounded by these establishments.
thank you for reading.
Comment attachment
Blocking-residentail-door-to-bldgs.doc -
Janet Heath
It is a shame that there was no community input solicited for formulation of these rules for the residents most affected by this program. Given that your proposed rules continue to permit roadside sheds on residential streets, change the closing time to 9 PM instead of 12 PM. People who live adjacent to or above these sheds should be entitled to a minimal level of quality of life. In neighborhoods where these sheds have proliferated, they have negatively impacted QOL for years now.
Requiring sheds to have a floor will create nesting areas for rats. Did you solicit input from city departments responsible for rodent control or from commercial rodent control services on this? Anyone who thinks these sheds do not encourage proliferation of rats has never watched as rats scurry out whenever a shed is taken down.
Where are the requirements to enable street cleaning? Many streets in downtown Manhattan have now gone for years without cleaning. Exactly how will a structure that “has a fully built interior wall and
bottom to hold water or such other filler” be removable to allow street cleaning, road repair, and snow removal. And if these structures are not removable, what is your plan for street cleaning?Vertical screening creates problems for pedestrians and for any businesses other than the restaurant located on streets with roadway sheds.
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Anna Pakman
As a disabled New Yorker who is at high risk for complications from COVID-19, and an avid foodie, outdoor dining has been a lifeline for me throughout the very much still ongoing pandemic. Without year-round outdoor dining, I would be unable to celebrate my best friend’s birthday in December, meet up with friends and colleagues on mild winter days (of which there are now many), or catch up with family and friends in from out of town.
In addition to pandemic-related health concerns, outdoor dining has opened up a whole new world of restaurants to me as a wheelchair user. Gone is the worry that I will be met with one or more steps that my powered chair cannot climb, or that I will have to make my way through busy kitchens and too-tight dining rooms, when outdoors it’s been easier than ever to just pull up to a table.
The program rules as they are written are needlessly restrictive to restaurants and the patrons who rely on outdoor dining availability. Additionally, while I applaud the inclusion of ADA accessibility, most business owners have no idea what that means and the guidelines need to spell that out more clearly. Here are recommended changes to make the program more equitable and accessible to disabled New Yorkers like me:
1) Allow restaurants who wish to keep outdoor dining running throughout the year to apply for additional December-March licenses. Anyone who does not actively sign up for and use their dining setup should have to remove their roadway setup but those restaurants who have come up with creative solutions should be allowed to continue operating year-round without the near impossible demand to breakdown and store outdoor dining structures for several months.
2) Allow weather-proofing, but ban fully enclosed structures. A fully-enclosed structure is not truly outdoor dining and I agree with it not being allowed as these structures fail to provide a COVID-safer environment. Outdoor structures should allow up to three sides and a solid roof that can hold up to precipitation and wind. One side of outdoor dining structures should always be open-air.
3) Restaurant distance from the crosswalk should match the ongoing 8 foot distance that has been in place since 2020. There has been no impact on accessibility nor traffic incidents from this guidelines. On the other hand, cars would regularly otherwise park or stand in this space, which would mean that instead of many New Yorkers benefiting from a restaurant in that space, the change would only provide limited benefit to one private car owner at a time.
4) As I mentioned above, accessibility guidelines need to be more specific and should meet the moment, which means going above and beyond the ADA. It should be made clear how wide of a pathway is needed to allow free movement along adjoining sidewalks, access to tables, table types (i.e. the high-top trend is completely inaccessible and abhorrent), etc.
Let’s build on the success of the program in the past 3.5 years to create more accessibility and equity for disabled New Yorkers, while positively impacting the restaurant industry and job creation.
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John V
First and foremost, this is not a ‘re-imagining of public space’, it is a shameless, blatant land grab and theft of public space for the sole purpose of private commercial enterprise.
Sidewalk and on-street dining, in all previous iterations and seemingly from the newly proposed policy/rules, has been a major detriment to the health and well-being of New York City residents that live near participating restaurants and bars. Nothing else that I have experienced living in NYC has caused anywhere near the decrease in quality of life as a resident.
Regarding the proposed rules:
The entire proposal lacks any sort of specificity that makes it believable that it could be adhered to by businesses, and enforced by the city, even if each made an honest effort. “Lighting – cannot be overly bright” means next to nothing. “Furnishings: lightweight and removable”, does that mean they are expected to be moved/removed as part of a daily operation of the business? It will be a huge loss for everyone involved if any of this is approved without more diligence and detail throughout the entire proposal. Additionally, the proposal should include specifics about the expectation of how the businesses must operate. What can they leave out versus what must they store away on a daily basis? How and where must it be stored? Where should patrons wait for a table to avoid blocking the pedestrian path? What are servers allowed or not allowed to use the pedestrian path for? A lot of the disturbance to everyday life and blight of the neighborhoods is a result of how the establishments operate on a daily basis and what they do (or do not) do outside of their operating hours.
There is an existing noise code, the proposed policy should not supersede that. Related, outdoor dining should close well in advance of the noise curfew since restaurants will be unlikely, unable, or unwilling to kick patrons out right at the noise curfew and since it is likely to be difficult or cost prohibitive for the city to enforce on nights and weekends – recommend 8pm to give reasonable time for tables to close out.
There is an existing act regarding smoking, the proposed policy should not supersede or inhibit that. Smokers have become less considerate in where they choose to smoke after sidewalk and on-street dining. Additionally, the structures that are part of sidewalk and on-street dining seem to encourage more people to disregard courtesy or rules and smoke immediately outside residences (including outside of a restaurant or bar’s operating hours where the restaurant or bar is unable to aid in enforcement). Since the sidewalk and on-street areas are now effectively parts of the restaurant, the Smoke-Free Air Act should not have become weaker than prior to sidewalk and on-street dining.
Bars and restaurants are not the same and should not be treated as such. Establishments with a liquor license, period, are not the same as other establishments and should not be treated as such. Restrictions on operating hours and allowable space on sidewalks and streets should be much more limited for establishments holding a liquor license as their patrons are likely to be louder and linger longer, by the nature of the establishment.
Access to sidewalks and residential entrances to buildings should be much larger, extend all the way to the street (and sidewalks) and be enforced more rigorously. Said another way, there should be ample, clear pedestrian paths in either direction on the sidewalk and all the way to the street (should the resident be using a vehicle for a service or transportation). 8′ minimum is a good starting point, but what are the caveats or exceptions that will ultimately be made? And how is it possible for the city to enforce this on a daily basis with easily movable furnishings? These dining structures now impede places that city residents live, take their kids out, bring items back from the store, etc. Not many of us enjoy walking out the front door into a bar when we’re going out for a run, or carrying in groceries/a mega sized pack of Charmin/our IKEA haul/luggage returning from the holidays/etc through a restaurant on the way home. In many places, on-street dining specifically has blocked or made it impossible to access residential ‘loading/unloading zones’, regardless of your mode of transportation to or from home.
The associated fees that restaurants will be required to pay are hilariously, embarrassingly low for what any establishment stands to gain financially. If we’re going to convert public space to private space, it should at least be worth it and we shouldn’t be giving it away. Recommend increasing all fees by at least 8 times the current proposal. The current amounts are a very small fraction of what it costs to rent an apartment, storefront, or parking space in NYC. Again, if we’re going to sell our space, we should at least make it market rate.
Enforcement of current rules appears to be nonexistent, recommend before the proposal is approved that the enforcement policy have specifics of who will inspect and enforce (what is the role – will they be a newly established role or will it fall to an existing role in DOT, etc), how frequently, how will budget be adequately allocated to ensure there are actually individuals to enforce, etc.
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Ann
Heaters should be prohibited. Heating an uninsulated space is the height of irresponsibility from an environmental standpoint. It’s also completely incompatible with the concept of “outdoor” dining. It’s not “outdoor” if you’re trying to replicate the conditions of an indoor dining room. “Outdoor” has to mean outdoors, not a shack on the sidewalk that’s enclosed on all sides with a roof on top. Restaurants and bars are already on notice that the nature’s weather will sometimes make it uncomfortable for people to stay outside to drink and eat. If restaurants not willing to live with that inevitable eventuality, they shouldn’t set up an installation outdoors.
when you choose to have an outdoor setup. Restaurants and bars have have no
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Augustine Hope
Proponents of NYC’s outdoor dining program love to use Paris as the gold standard. Let’s follow their rules then (translated from original French):
> Close at 10:00 PM EVERY NIGHT.
> Furniture must be put away after hours of operation.
> No electrical installation (lighting, heating, etc).
> No advertising.
> No opaque elements.
> Covering prohibited — no wood/metal/plastic/fabric roofing or siding, no closed volume construction (i.e. it must be genuinely “outdoor” dining).
> No music outdoors, no amplified music coming out from indoors.
> Protective barriers around roadway installations must be no higher than 1.30 m (4 ft 3 in), of sober coloring and perforated (i.e. railings only) so as not to obscure visibility.
> The white line delimiting the parking area must remain visible to motorists.
> Ducting or open space at curb of at least 25 cm (10 in) to allow for for water drainage along the gutter.
> Cleaning around installation must be done by merchant.
> Complete disassembly of the installation at the end of the season.
> A progressive scale of sanctions ranging from a simple warning to a fine, progressive restrictions on operating hours, temporary loss of permit, permanent loss of permit for up to 3 years, and ultimately administrative closure of the institution.The most telling stipulation is:
> The respect of public peace and quiet and the life of the neighborhood is an essential commitment to guarantee the functioning of the program. -
Leslie Breeding
I am in favor of no permanent outdoor restaurants in the road, and a reduction in the current sidewalk seating for restaurants, until there is a serious study balancing the profit needs of one industry, and the psychological, and health and safety needs of the residents in impacted neighborhoods. I live in one of these neighborhoods. The creation of so many plywood shanties and haphazard sidewalk settings sprang up rapidly and unregulated, and the City has utterly failed to catch up with the consequences or to complete any of the improvements it promised.
After such a study has been done, and if the residents of the impacted New York neighborhoods wish to allow limited road and sidewalk settings, our experience has shown restaurants need to take stronger measures to prevent vermin infestations. Including not using flooring in the street, which contributes to vermin habitat, including mice, rats and roaches, all of which are seen particularly in street sheds built with skimpy materials, and with plywood planks, and permanent flooring designed for home interiors. If patrons saw what we see during restaurant-closed hours, they’d be as nauseated as we are. The surfaces they eat on, sit on, lean on, lay their arms across, have all been crawling with vermin, or smeared with human waste, before they sat down. Rats, mice, cockroaches, fetid pools of standing water, garbage, odors – ugly abandoned shanties—these are what assail us as we walk through our home.
The City regulates buildings in numerous ways, but has allowed whole stand-alone buildings enclosed on 4 sides, with roof and doors to go up unchecked. These are sheds and shanties – a land grab of public space by private business, unregulated, disgusting inside and an eyesore outside.
Some streets, because there are so many abandoned and in-use restaurant sheds, haven’t been swept by Sanitation in a year. They smell like sewers and landfills. Rats and mice are so numerous and bold they are visible in broad daylight. If restaurants use planters they should have wire screening at the top of the soil to prevent rat burrows. Emergency vehicles are slowed down by these structures.
Regarding the DOT proposed rules – any proposed rules- such as moving the floors and other materials at certain times of the year, restaurants have shown they are not likely to comply with rules. We’ve seen restaurants taking advantage of public land, and doing exactly as each desires. Or when required to move equipment, they will do what they do now —with extra chairs and tables —stack it up on public sidewalk space using it as free storage and creating another eyesore. All equipment, tables, chairs, ramps, need to be stored inside the business.
Accessible ramps if used need to be designed to prevent mice and rats living in them and under them. These structures are eyesores and visual pollution, and eat up public space – and the equipment they require are also eyesores.Vertical Screens proposed for more than 42 inches high would block the view of traffic for pedestrians – especially fast moving, quiet e-bikes. Vertical screens should be prohibited or undecorated and see-through. Nothing about sidewalk and street sheds have added to pedestrian safety- only subtracted.
The timing for outdoor restaurant operation should not be November to March. It is unrealistic – and makes no effort at compromise for those who oppose these outdoor businesses. Instead, the time should be May to October, like the dates currently used by other City outdoor activities, such as the Jefferson Market Community Garden which closes on this schedule when it’s too cold for outdoor sitting.
To preserve the peace of neighborhoods where families live cheek by jowl with businesses, outdoor dining should end by 9:30pm, and all staff cleanup should end by 10 pm.
Not long ago, block associations and buildings would be consulted regarding the impact of noise from just one establishment’s proposed outdoor dining, and every inch of public space was respected by City leaders as belonging to the public and accruing to the benefit of the public. This conservative approach provided a modicum of open space, places to stop and commune with their fellows in the community, for children to play, to allow some rest for the eyes among the overload of advertising pollution and noise pollution. In some streets, every bit of public space is being consumed by private interests for private profit. What made our small historic neighborhoods a contribution to the greatness of New York City, has now been reduced to a profit-making center for one industry to the detriment of residents. Quiet, beautiful streets where once a family could live a reasonably peaceful life in the middle of the City, now are places where loud music and loud talking, odors, garbage and vermin are a constant outside our windows at night.
Notwithstanding taxes collected from this industry, money cannot buy open space, room to walk comfortably and safely, room to stop and talk to neighbors, a nights sleep and joy of enjoying one’s surroundings, instead of being rushed along between tables and chairs, planters and garbage, amid many customers who care little that they are both in the City, and, next to people’s homes. Any claim to healthful social distancing disappears when crowds try to pass each other through bottlenecks on shortened sidewalks.
Regarding storm water runoff, there have been several examples in the last five years of extreme rainfall, even in the absence of wind storms, that have surprised and overwhelmed storm water systems in several large cities. The storm water runoff in such a weather event here, would be blocked from its normal path to drains, and diverted by the restaurant structures built up against curbs and sewer grates – in such a storm, runoff would force water into buildings’ basement homes and first floors.
Any rules established must have enforcement teeth. On our Greenwich Village block, a building owner was fined $35,000 for violations regarding a scaffold left up for 20 years, and for 20 years the Dept. of Buildings was unable to collect the fine or enforce its rules. Many NY businesses have shown themselves willing to ignore thousands in fines, and the City unwilling or unable to enforce its regulations. Building owners therefore must be held responsible along with their tenant restaurants, and fined for noncompliance committed by their tenant restaurants. Owners must be given short time periods for removing abandoned structures and fixing violations, and heavily fined, or if that fails, criminally charged for ignoring fines.
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Sivan Baron & Abdel Ouedraogo
We are writing as the owners of four restaurants /bars in Harlem- Silvana, Shrine World Music Venue, Yatenga French Bistro and Ouaga Sports Bar. When we reviewed the new rules for the outdoor dining program, we were shocked and extremely dismayed. For years, since the Covid epidemic, the city has been reassuring restaurant owners that the outdoor dining program would remain permanent. We were then surprised that many of the features that made the outdoor dining program unique from the old sidewalk program, have not been retained in the new plan. We have spent thousands and thousands over the year improving the outdoor dining structures at three of our locations. We imagined that with the new rules, we might have to make some adjustments to our existing structures, but the new rules render them virtually useless. One of the most helpful aspects of the outdoor dining setups over the past few years for us has been the ability to have heated outdoor seating in the slow winter months. Now that the outdoor seating cannot be enclosed, these set-ups will be virtually useless during the coldest months. This has been a huge boost in revenue for us, to be able to have extended eating in the winter. Besides just having expanded seating, the outdoor structures have allowed us to use the space in creative ways. At one of our locations, Silvana, we showcase different local artists each month on the walls of what we call The Studio (our enclosed outdoor area). We also have artwork from a local and international artist on the outside of our space. In all three of our locations with enclosed outdoor areas, we have been able to rent out the space for private events, without having to close for our regular clientele. Without walls, any heating in the outdoor area, would be a waste of energy. We don’t anticipate that our customers will choose to sit in them in extremely cold, rainy or windy weather. All of our outdoor dining structures are beautiful (see attached pictures), not in the way of the public and extremely valuable to us as business owners, as well as to our staff, who depend on the tips that an extended service area brings. We implore you to adjust the guidelines to allow the spaces to be enclosed, which is a benefit to consumers and business owners alike.
Comment attachment
outdoor.pdf -
Lisa
Two comments :
1. Residents need to be able to sleep. The operating hours for outdoor dining should be reduced.2. Outdoor dining shacks limit and reduce public space for pedestrians.
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S Farriss
Section § 5-11(a)(1)(i)
These minimum clear path requirements should be mandatory, without any waivers. More trips in New York City are made by walking than any other transportation mode. DOT rules for outdoor dining must prioritize pedestrian safety, mobility, and accessibility for people using sidewalks to move through the city.Some challenges pedestrians face when large swaths of sidewalks are dedicated for the exclusive use of dining patrons include narrow or cluttered sidewalks, a lack of places to cross streets, a lack of places to sit and rest, and conflicts with turning vehicles as a result of inadequate daylighting at intersections. Sidewalks must conform to ADA requirements for a minimum clear-path width and provision of spaces where wheelchair users can pass one another or turn around.
A minimum 3-foot wait service aisle, missing from these proposed rules, should be required in all sidewalk cafés. The aisle is necessary to ensure that there is no conflict between pedestrians moving within the clear path and employees servicing a café’s clientele. It also makes sure that the café is disabled-accessible, as required by the Americans with Disabilities Act.
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Emily Davis
We still exclusively dine outdoors, even through the winter. All the experts say that dining indoors is one of the riskiest activities we can do in terms of our COVID risk so we eat outside. My feeling is that until my immunocompromised friends can be assured that their risk in a restaurant is minimal, I want to continue to be safe this way. The outdoor dining sheds have been disappearing and our options for eating out get fewer and fewer. Those of us who are still COVID cautious need places to eat! Please make it so that we can continue enjoy the food and culture of our city outdoors. Our restaurants have been through so much. To lose their businesses now, after these three years, would be tragic.
I know car owners are chomping at the bit for the spaces that the sheds occupy but humans need those spaces more. Are we going to privilege cars or people? I hope it’s people. We have yielded too much to cars already.
Also – I know everyone always says the sheds are rat traps and believe me, I am incredibly terrified of rats so I sympathize with that argument but a lot of folks have worked very hard to keep their sheds rodent free. And even a rat phobic person like me would rather have a place to eat outdoors than tear down these incredibly useful structures. People say they’re worried about rats but then put out their garbage without a bin so…I’m pretty sure it’s the car people who are most zealous about losing the street seating. Please, please let the restaurants that have street seating and sheds keep their places. They are an important cultural element of our city. -
Jess Johnson
I am a East Village resident and am opposed to the following outdoor dining rules:
– Closing time should be NO LATER than 10p on weekdays and 11p on weekends. Last call for seatings should be one hour prior to allow ample time to wrap up the tables. 12a and 1am is way TOO LATE due to noise, loud talking, and drunk patrons. Sundays should not open before 10a. Patrons can eat or drink indoors outside of those times.
– The 20 foot clearance at crosswalks is a MUST for pedestrian safety.
– Roadside set ups should NOT have any flooring so that the asphalt can be washed/cleaned nightly and not harbor rats in the floorboards.
– Roadside set ups should NOT exceed the storefront width. I think 40 feet is still way TOO large even if the storefront width permits.
– Roadside set up MUST be wrapped up be the latest from November 30 to April 1. The restaurant owners and lobby will push that it is not feasible for them to set up and breakdown the set ups. OUR PUBLIC streets need to be properly maintained and it give the set ups time to be repaired and maintained as well. NON NEGOTIABLE.
– Roadside set ups should NOT be allowed adjacent to a bike lane. It is not safe for employees to deliver food and drink across busy bike lanes. It is a huge safety hazard for staff, patrons or bike riders to have to cross a bike lane with speeding bikes going in both directions.
– Sidewalk set up MUST allow for 8 feet of clearance. It is not safe or fair for residents to have to navigate these “outdoor dining rooms”. Please keep set ups against the restaurant exterior wall on one side of the sidewalk.
– This is a GIFT of public space to the restaurant industry being charged at a rate 80-90% less that the current retail rates. Rates are TOO LOW for the impact that it makes to residents. Please remember that the kitchens square footage has not increased to accommodate the additional seating. This is NOT fair or equitable to the (mostly low income) staff that works in the back and front of house.
– 311 needs to have better options to report violations. Currently the selections of issues are LIMITED when reporting it on the website. Selections are needed to report not maintaining 8′ clearance lane, excessive noise, drug use overnight, not properly maintained, blighted or covered in graffiti, etc. These are all real issues I encounter daily.
PLEASE hear the concern of residents and DO NOT give further concessions to the restaurant industry. The quicker we get get the rules in effect the better.
I can not afford to eat in any of the restaurants so I would rather see a bench and a tree planted in the spaces that the parking spaces roadside set ups now take up. Thank you!
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Ross Levin
Please allow for year round outdoor dining in the street and on the sidewalk. I remain cautious about COVID and other respiratory diseases, for personal health reasons and to protect family members who are immunosuppressed. Outdoor dining, even during the winter, has allowed me to socialize, enjoy the city, and dine at restaurants even while protecting myself and others. Many New Yorkers face the same concerns and strongly prefer having outdoor dining options year round.
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F. Motola
Reduce Noise & Hours of Operation
The operating hours in the statute are absurdly long—especially in residential districts—but the proposed DOT rules manage to make the situation even worse. Local Law 121 specifies 10 a.m. to midnight, not 8 a.m. to 1 a.m. on some days. Residents need to sleep. Seventeen hours per day of outdoor dining noise is unprecedented, and unacceptable.
The rules say no amplified sound outdoors. The same prohibition should rule indoors in any restaurant/bar that has its windows or doors open. No noise spilling into the street and into our homes.
It is now a common practice for restaurants to put up “silent” televisions in outdoor sidewalk cafes and sheds and blast the corresponding television sound through the open doors and windows of the restaurant itself. Close this loophole, or make restaurants close their windows and doors.
Clarify Design, Siting & Other Roadway Rules
The proposed rules say that there must be a minimum 15-foot lane on any street to give emergency vehicles access to our streets and homes. But the rules allow for exceptions and waivers. There can be no waivers and exceptions for public safety.
The rules ought to clearly state that all roadway cafe structures must be removed from December through March so that our streets can be swept at least 4 months a year. Instead, the language of both Local Law 121 and the proposed rules fail to specify that “readily removable furniture” must ever actually be removed. Make it clear that restaurants are not to store their setups in the streets in the off-season.
Calling structures “open” is too vague. Although a proposed design drawing shows no roofs on roadway sheds, this is not specifically stated in the rules. And guidelines now allow for “vertical screenings” which sound a lot like a “wall.” So, proposed rules must explicitly prohibit all roofs and walls. Structures must be readily removable in the event of an emergency. If a forklift or backhoe is required for removal, it’s not a removable structure.
The rules do not yet expressly limit a restaurant’s outdoor dining setups to the frontage of that restaurant. As a result, there is nothing that prevents a restaurant with 12 feet of frontage from taking up to 40 feet of roadway. This means that sheds could operate in front of neighboring businesses and ground-floor residences. Stop the shed sprawl!
Restore the Pedestrian Right of Way
Although the proposed rules say that a sidewalk cafe cannot cover a sidewalk subway grate, it does not say that a sidewalk grate cannot be included in the measurement of a pedestrian clearpath. This rule would force pedestrians – some with walkers, canes or pushing strollers – to walk on the subway grate. The porous, open, often wet and slippery or damaged grate is not a “clear” path!
Bring back the 3-foot service aisle for wait staff serving customers in the sidewalk cafe. That service aisle was the sensible standard in the pre-pandemic sidewalk café program, mandating that the restaurant not use the public pedestrian clearpath for private business purposes. Make the clearpath truly clear for the use of pedestrians only!
Outdoor Heating in a Climate Emergency?!? Seriously? No.
In France, home to sidewalk cafés and outdoor dining terraces, all heaters in outdoor cafés were banned April 1, 2022. We must do the same.
Eliminate Extraordinary Powers Afforded to the DOT Commissioner
The language of the proposed rules gives the Commissioner the power “to waive these rules, in the interest of public safety and convenience.” This language affords the Commissioner extraordinary personal power that is an invitation to corruption and trivializes the rule of law. We don’t need outdoor dining fiefdoms in New York City.
Ensure Community Input, Agency Accountability & Transparency
Under Local Law 121, community boards review periods are cut back to 40 days — and input on roadway dining will only be considered “to the extent practicable” as determined by the DOT. At a minimum, the DOT should specify that outdoor dining applications received in late May through August will only be considered in September to avoid a period when community boards are often not in session — and therefore unable to solicit community comment. These rules are useless without a real process for community input.
The proposed rules provide multiple ways for the restaurant owner to appeal licensing, revocable consent, and violation decisions by the DOT – frequently allowing for long delays in the owner’s favor. But there is no corresponding mechanism provided for how neighboring businesses and residents can respond to restaurant rules violations. 311 is where citizen reports of violations go to die. Give the neighboring businesses and residents a dedicated NYC-DOT portal where outdoor dining problems can be reported – with quick responses from the agency.
Transparency should be the basis of all NYC programs. Make the portal data on outdoor applications, licenses, revocable consents, OATH violations, fines, and complaints received from the public available through one portal. We need to know in measurable data how this program is affecting our communities.
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Leslie Clark
There is a provision in § 5-02 General Requirements that would allow the NYC-DOT Commissioner to waive any of these rules “in the interest of public safety and convenience.” This is extraordinary power to give to ONE PERSON ALONE. And with such extraordinary power, this ONE INDIVIDUAL will be under enormous pressure to give special favors to the powerful and influential. This is a recipe for corruption and should be stricken from these rules.
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Inna Lokshina
I love outdoor dining. COVID is still dangerous for many people so it is the only way to eat out safely. Please make the outdoor dining heated and available year-round. In other countries, this has existed even before the pandemic. Do not allow fully enclosed structures but do allow creative designs so restaurants who invested in some of the beautiful structures that have gone up in the last three years are not penalized for their innovation and contribution to our neighborhoods. I have lived in Hells Kitchen almost 20 years. We have a high number of outdoor dining structures and it has only been positive for the neighborhood.
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louis puccio
there should be no temporary sheds due to no roof. debris and other stuff could fall causing danger. therefore no outdoor dining at all should be permitted
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Mike
I’m from Forest Hill’s , I agree if they are not being used they should be removed , but in situation where it’s being used all the time they have been great additions . Especially the one one on continental ave “ Forest Hill’s Station House “ the neighborhood uses it all year round it’s in the perfect location, it has wide sidewalks , it’s heated in the winter, you can tell the customers love it. It creates a great community feel .
Also the place can’t fit enough people inside. The idea of removing tables chairs barriers, banning roofs is a a ridiculous idea and another huge expense for a business , especially after some of these businesses put a ton of money into the design and maintenance of these structure. Parking hasn’t been an issue on that street for the past three years especially if the neighborhood is trying to have greener streets, which is being proposed all over the city .you cannot treat all locations equal, the legalistics are different in every neighborhood. Please keep an open mind and take each neighborhood in consideration. -
Samara Karasyk
I am submitting the attached written testimony on behalf of the Hudson Square Business Improvement District.
Comment attachment
HSBID-DOT-Proposed-Dining-Out-Comments-11-20-23.pdf -
Amy Clark
Please allow outdoor dining to continue all throughout the year. Eating outside is crucial to my and my household’s covid risk reduction practices. Allowing outdoor dining also fosters a sense of public community and camaraderie which would be destroyed if the street area used for outdoor dining is reverted back to 1-2 parking spaces for oversized SUVs. Requiring restaurants to remove their structures for any part of the year is both logistically and financially impossible for most small business owners. Please allow them to remain up all year.
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Samantha Lowe
Can there is a distinction between restaurants and bars with loud music. The patrons at bars are usually drink by 11pm and extremely loud and this will be taken outside where it disturbs residences including children that need proper sleep. The 1am is way too late for loud noise.
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Suzanne Reisman
Hello,
As a person who is high risk for serious consequences from a covid infection, a variety of outdoor dining options is essential to my ability to continue to eat at restaurants with friends and family, and reduce my isolation as well as support NYC’s economy and jobs. Removing covered dining sheds prohibits me and others from dining at restaurants year round, regardless of weather. These sheds have been a lifeline for me, and I use them frequently, year round, even in cold weather. The new rules are tantamount to taking away wheelchair ramps. People like me will no longer be able to dine with friends and family year round if these horrendous changes are implemented.
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Jerry Torrens
Hello,
I would like roadway seating areas to remain in place 365 days a year. Asking all businesses to dismantle them depending on the season places an undue burden on the smaller businesses that cannot afford to pay to disassemble the structures, and then store them.
I have often chosen a place to eat in boroughs including Manhattan, Queens, and the Bronx, specifically because it had roadway seating areas.
Thank you.
Jerry Torrens
Bronx, NY -
Katie Chandler
Hello, I’m writing to comment to keep the roadway cafes all year round. The establishments that provide this type of environment benefit greatly from the extra seating, contribute to better quality pedestrian experience, and even provide heated options in the colder months. Many of these establishments cannot afford to store or rebuild these structures, making it impossible to maintain the seasonal rule, and effectively eliminating them. Allowing the cafes to remain benefits the quality of life and promotes participation in local communities. Thank you.
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Evan Sachs
Outdoor dining – especially proper, non-enclosed outdoor dining – is so important for accessibility, both in the long run and in the current ongoing pandemic. I know it’s unpopular to acknowledge that the pandemic is still happening, but it is, and providing relatively Covid-safe spaces for people to eat is a matter of health and life for many people.
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S
Leave the outdoor dining as is! The city ordered restaurants to add sands in the structure, which made it impossible to remove without costing poor restaurateurs lots of money to hire contractors. Restaurants operate on low margins, please don’t add anymore unnecessary costs by making it seasonal permit or taking it down each winter.
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Justin Olsen
Section 5-11 (a)(2)(i) Perimeter Demarcation
This appears to indicate that barriers will be required where DCA-licensed Unenclosed Sidewalk Cafes could previously operate without barriers(e.g. tables on a sidewalk) prior to Covid. If so this restriction is more onerous and will prevent many businesses- like my own — from operating a sidewalk cafe where we had once been able to do so under the old licensing system. We will lose some if not all of our sidewalk seating — which we submitted drawings for and recieved all relevant public, community and government institutional approvals, successfully operating for nearly ten years prior to Open Streets / Open Restaurants.
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Samantha clarke
1am is way too late. How do families and children get enough sleep. Outdoor dining should be closed by 10pm
Bars should definitely be closed by 10pm
The noise pollution in out home, on a residential street goes through the early hours from drunk patrons and the outdoor sheds facilitates this. New York families and children must be considered. We need to sleep -
Manhattan Community Board 3
Please see attachment for Manhattan Community Board 3’s resolution on Open Dining Proposed Rules, passed at its October 2023 Full Board Meeting.
Comment attachment
CB3-Reso-Comments-of-Open-Dining-Proposed-Rules.pdf -
C Trotta
Do not allow outdoor dining structures. They should not be heated and they must not have walls since anything else would be INDOORS.
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Natalia
Under Local Law 121, community boards review periods are cut back to 40 days — and input on roadway dining will only be considered “to the extent practicable’ as determined by the DOT. At a minimum, the Dot should specify that outdoor dining applications received in late May through August will only be considered in September to avoid a period when community boards are often not in session – and therefore unable to solicit community comment. These rules are useless unless they include a real process for community input.
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Burak Karacam
Final rules should allow for a sidewalk flooring/platform (as long as it meets the 8 foot Clear Path rule) as NYC sidewalks are not always level (some have significant slopes) and sloped sidewalks cannot provide equal access to many users, including those with ADA access requirements.
Existing sidewalk flooring/platforms built during Covid to make the sidewalk level and ADA-accessible, and meeting the 8 foot Clear Path rule, should be grandfathered into the Dining Out NYC program.
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Denise
The dining sheds are taking up sidewalk space making it extremely difficult to navigate sidewalks , leaving no room for pedestrians, the elderly and people with strollers. The street sheds are making it very difficult for peseta safely cross the street, and taking up curb space for private businesses. The noise that is generated from people dining outside is unfair to residents who live above these- there is no longer any quiet inside peoples homes
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N Trotta
No enclosed structures period. Commenters that want to keep enclosed dining structures due to covid are special interest groups pretending to be people. Heated dining sheds are indoor dining and a giveaway of public space to private business most people cannot even afford to patronize.
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Lucy K
The NYC was fine without the street sheds. The outdoor dining has made NYC look like a shanty town and destroyed the quality of life for the residents who deserve to have a quiet clean environment. Most of these sheds sit empty most of the time. The sheds have made it difficult for emergency vehicles and sanitation to clean our streets. The city should not belong to powerful lobbyiests but to the residents who pay the taxes and high rents. It is not fair to allow one business to have streets to themselves. Remove all the sheds and let NYC return to a place where all people can live without the noise, garbage and rats.
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Bruce Torrey
Reduce Noise & Hours of Operation
Stick to the hours designated in the Local Law 121. Operating hours from 10AM to midnight are already bad enough. The operating hours in the statute are absurdly long—especially in residential districts—but the proposed DOT rules manage to make the situation even worse. Local Law 121 specifies 10 a.m. to midnight, but the DOT stretches that out to 8 a.m. to 1 a.m. on some days. Residents need to sleep. Seventeen hours per day of outdoor dining noise is unprecedented, and unacceptable in residential areas.
Ensure that neighborhoods are not swamped with restaurant noise. The rules say no amplified sound outdoors. The same prohibition should rule indoors in any restaurant/bar that has its windows or doors open. No noise spilling into the street and into our homes. It is now a common practice for restaurants to put up “silent” televisions in outdoor sidewalk cafes and sheds and blast the corresponding television sound through the open doors and windows of the restaurant itself. Close this loophole, or make restaurants close their windows and doors.
Clarify Design, Siting & Other Roadway Rules
No waivers to any rules that impact public safety. The proposed rules say that there must be a minimum 15-foot lane on any street to give emergency vehicles access to our streets and homes. But the DOT rules allow for exceptions and waivers. There can be no waivers and exceptions for public safety.
The rules ought to clearly state that all roadway cafe structures must be removed from December through March so that our streets can be swept at least 4 months a year. Some streets haven’t been swept in three years. Instead, the language of both Local Law 121 and the proposed rules fail to specify that required “readily removable furniture” must ever actually be removed. Make it clear that restaurants are not to store their setups in the streets in the off-season.
Calling structures “open” is too vague. Although a proposed design drawing shows no roofs on roadway sheds, this is not specifically stated in the rules. And guidelines now allow for “vertical screenings” which sound a lot like a “wall.” So, proposed rules must explicitly prohibit all roofs and walls. Structures must be readily removable in the event of an emergency. If a forklift or backhoe is required for removal, it’s not a removable structure.
The rules must expressly limit a restaurant’s outdoor dining setups to the frontage of that restaurant. As a result, there is nothing that prevents a restaurant with 12 feet of frontage from taking up to 40 feet of roadway. This means that sheds could operate in front of neighboring businesses and ground-floor residences. Stop the shed sprawl! Limit sheds to the restaurant frontage, and allow for clear sightlines to traffic devices as well as other small businesses.
Restore the Pedestrian Right of Way
Make a real clear path for pedestrians, especially for the mobility-impaired. Although the proposed rules say that a sidewalk cafe cannot cover a sidewalk subway grate, it does not say that a sidewalk grate cannot be included in the measurement of a pedestrian clearpath. This rule would force pedestrians – some with walkers, canes or pushing strollers – to walk on the subway grate. The porous, open, often wet and slippery or damaged grate is not a “clear” path! Subway grates and other uneven sidewalk surfaces should not be considered part of the clear path.
Bring back the 3-foot service aisle for wait staff serving customers in the sidewalk cafe. That service aisle was the sensible standard in the pre-pandemic sidewalk café program, mandating that the restaurant not use the public pedestrian clearpath for private business purposes. Make the clearpath truly clear for the use of pedestrians only!
Serving Across Active Bike Lanes? Seriously? No.
Ban the practice of waitstaff serving food and alcohol across active bike lanes. The DOT’s proposed rules allows this pandemic-era practice to continue, putting hard-working serving staff, restaurant customers, and cyclists at risk — simply so restaurateurs can turn a few more tables. Where’s the cyclists’ lobby on this issue? MIA.
Outdoor Heating in a Climate Emergency?!? C’est incroyable!
No heating the outdoors. In France, longtime home to sidewalk cafés and outdoor dining terraces, all heaters in outdoor cafés were banned April 1, 2022. We must do the same.
Eliminate Extraordinary Powers Afforded to the DOT Commissioner
Beware of creating fiefdoms. The language of the proposed rules gives the Commissioner the power “to waive these rules, in the interest of public safety and convenience.” Giving one person extraordinary power is an invitation to corruption — and trivializes the rule of law. New York City doesn’t need an outdoor dining czar to go with our rat czar. We need democracy. Eliminate individual waivers and exceptions, or set up a transparent, representative process that includes Community Board input.
Ensure Community Input, Agency Accountability & Transparency
Community input matters. Under Local Law 121, community boards review periods are cut back to 40 days — and input on roadway dining will only be considered “to the extent practicable” as determined by the DOT. At a minimum, the DOT should specify that outdoor dining applications received in late May through August will only be considered in September to avoid a period when community boards are often not in session — and therefore unable to solicit community comment. These rules are useless unless they include a real process for community input.
Provide a dedicated community portal for responses to outdoor dining issues. The proposed rules provide multiple ways for the restaurant owner to appeal licensing, revocable consent, and violation decisions by the DOT – frequently allowing for long delays in the owner’s favor. But there is no corresponding mechanism provided for how neighboring businesses and residents can respond to restaurant rules violations. 311 is where citizen reports of violations go to die. Give the neighboring businesses and residents a dedicated NYC-DOT portal where outdoor dining problems can be reported – with quick responses from the agency.
Transparency should be the basis of all NYC programs. Make the portal data on outdoor applications, licenses, revocable consents, OATH violations, fines, and complaints received from the public available through one portal. We need to know in measurable data how this program is affecting our communities.
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Anne Wenniger
I live above Clandestino and Le Dive on Dimes Square. The amount of noise and the amount of people who drin and dine in front and to the side of our building amounts to about 100 people a night. The sound is so bad that all the residents have to sleep with noise machines. Wading through the crowds to get in and out of our building at night is terrible. NO AGENCY gave us the residents an opportunity to weigh in on how these outdoor dining rules would affect our lives. It’s so horrible you can’t even imagine it and until you live through it, you have no idea how bad it is. Then there is all the garbage and street garbage left after each
Night. Clandestino now serves so many people outdoors that they have tripled at least the capacity of their bar. They have made so much
More money than they lost in the pandemic. Le Dive on the corner of Canal and Ludlow did not exist until after the pandemic. They have just reaped all the rewards with no pain ever from this outdoor dining and drinking. They don’t care at all about our quality of life and refuse to deal with sound issues under our windows. It’s all terrible and it feels to us residents that the city and the DOT make decisions without regard to the residents quality of life. It truest feels like they don’t care at all about us. By the way, there is no where near or in front of these bars where a fire truck could pull up if there were a fire on our corner. -
Evan Sachs
As an addendum to my previous comment, outdoor dining should be both open on four sides (while a roof may protect from the elements, enclosing sheds on the sides defeats the purpose of pandemic safety to diners – and again, the pandemic is not over, despite popular sentiment) and year-round, both for accessibility to diners and to make the logistics feasible for the businesses themselves. Outdoor dining accessibility needs aren’t seasonal, and it’s not reasonable to expect restaurants to take down and rebuild their structures every single year.
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ORHUN A
The main reason why NYC streets are even more infested with rats is the decision makers’ cluelessness. If you require restaurants and bars build their barrier with sand bags on their roadside dining area, that’d automatically be the perfect nesting area for rats. Stop blaming restaurants and bars for such problem because they leave their garbage disposal on the streets without bins and stuff. It’s all the city’s fault.
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Carina Kaufman-Gutierrez
Testimony on behalf of the Street Vendor Project, a membership-based organization of over 2,900, mostly immigrant, street vendors who work in NYC’s public spaces selling food and merchandise. We organize vendors to have their voices heard as well as provide legal and small business assistance.
SVP supports the open dining program allowing use of the roadway as well as the area directly adjacent to the restaurant on the sidewalk. However, it is critical that existing street vendor locations not be displaced due to restaurant’s expansion into public space.
First, the rules should clearly state that no outdoor dining establishment shall be granted for a location that includes space where a food vendor is currently operating, similar to how citibike stations, newsstands and other elements are required to be noted. I am sure that every restaurant that applies for a permit knows whether or not there is a food vendor usually operating within their proposed footprint, and they should have to certify this on their permit application. The actual permit should also state that food vendors must be accommodated in the public space, to avoid any inequality should a conflict arise.
Other ideas to ensure there is no loss of vending spaces should be to relegate restaurant dining to the streets as much as possible so the sidewalks are free for pedestrians and vendors. If sidewalks are used for restaurant dining, then five feet of space, the width of the largest vending cart, should be preserved from the curb, for food vendors. This could be done by allowing restaurants to use the space usually designated for sidewalk cafes, with additional space depending on the sidewalk width.
While we know that street vendors and restaurants have existed alongside each other for more than a century, we have seen during the temporary outdoor dining program that public space can be shared. In the past vendors have not had the same opportunities and legitimacy as brick-and-mortar businesses and we hope that this program can change this history, making it clear that restaurant expansion into the sidewalk space should not come at the expense of vendors’ livelihood. The reality is, the open dining program truly lays bare the inequity in enforcement and opportunity – food vendors are enforced by sanitation police with guns, while open dining enforced by civilian DOT inspectors.
We recognize that the City must do more to support all small businesses including restaurants and street vendors. Allowing restaurant dining on streets and plazas should be part of the plan, but more support for street vendors including the bare minimum of making sure they are not displaced is critical as the City to ensure equity for all small businesses. Thank you for the opportunity to testify today.
Comment attachment
11.20.23_Street-Vendor-Project_Open-Dining-Rulemaking-Testimony.pdf -
Tess Coval
To whom it may concern,
We are asking for schedule clarification regarding structures. If the proposed rules are finalized in January 2024 and we have 3 months to apply, that will bring us to March 2024. Does this mean we have to take down our structures THIS November 2024 or the following?
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Chris Yamamoto
How do restaurants that operate on a street with an incline get approved for outdoor dining? We would require decking to create a level surface for service. Please provide a response on how the city will provide equity for establishments with this specific criteria. Thank you.
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Ellen Lubell
Outdoor dining continues to add dining options for many New Yorkers still not comfortable with indoor dining, helps local restaurants thrive, and is a festive addition to many New York City streets. In addition, it’s generally a fun way to experience a particular restaurant. Please keep outdoor dining an option year-round!
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Debbie Farley
I’m Debbie Farley, a member of CUEUP-NY, residing in Sunnyside, Queens. I do not support the permanent Open Restaurants program because it directly conflicts with residents’ quality of life. The DOT should prioritize and consider the complaints and comments of residents living in close proximity to multiple dining sheds. The crowds, garbage, rats, and NOISE generated by dining sheds most adversely affect our lives.
I urge the DOT to make the following adjustments to the agency’s rules. These are reasonable modifications to the DOT’s proposed rules. They’re crucial for protecting residential neighborhoods, especially ones with high concentrations of outdoor dining.
Reducing Hours of Operations and Noise Levels
Noise is a public health issue. The statute allows outdoor dining sites to operate 14 hours daily (from 10 a.m. to midnight.) Now, the DOT proposes to extend operating hours from 8 a.m. to 1 a.m. on weekends. Seventeen hours per day of outdoor dining noise is unprecedented and unacceptable. This will worsen noise issues in residential areas and subject residents to hardships.The Open Restaurants zoning changes allow bars and restaurants to operate with open doors, windows, and facades; even in residential neighborhoods, there should be “detailed” restrictions on amplified noise from restaurants. Noise is a public health issue that is incredibly challenging for residents just a few feet from dining sheds. Either eliminate the loopholes or close the restaurant’s windows, doors, and facades.
Without waivers or exceptions, ensure a consistent minimum 15-foot lane width for emergency vehicle access. Public safety comes before restaurants’ profits and square footage.Clarify Roadway Setup Design: Both the statute and the agency rules fail to specify the legislation’s intent: that roadway dining setups must be removed in the off-season to allow street cleaning and maintenance. Mandate the removal of roadway cafe structures seasonally, with no exceptions.
The setup for outdoor dining sheds cannot start earlier than April 1, and the dismantling of dining sheds must not extend past November 30. Roofs, walls, and oversized structures that impede “line of sight” to traffic control and parking signs and block the view of neighborhood shops from potential customers and clients must be modified or removed.
Include language to restrict outdoor dining setups to the restaurant’s frontage, NOT a maximum of forty feet. Increase the space required between roadway sheds. There should be a minimum of three feet between structures. In the event of a fire or an emergency, the elderly and disabled with walkers and wheelchairs require more space for safe egress.Environmental & Safety Concerns
Ban outdoor heaters. NYC declared a climate emergency in 2019; how can the use of outdoor heaters be considered in 2023, as our climate crisis is worsening?Prohibit including sidewalk grates in the measurement of “pedestrian pathways.” Grates are difficult for people with canes and walkers to navigate, creating challenges for individuals using wheelchairs, pushing strollers, and walking pets. In consideration of waitstaff, reinstate a 3-foot service aisle. They need space to serve safely, and pedestrians need a clear, defined path.
Ensure Community Involvement and Transparency
With projected budget cuts for many city agencies, there are serious concerns about how the permanent outdoor
dining program will be monitored for violations and how violations will be quickly and effectively addressed.Provide and extend community board review periods to facilitate input and eliminate the summer loophole for restaurants that want to evade community review. Establish a practical and accessible one-stop mechanism for residents and businesses to report outdoor dining issues. Create a one-stop public data portal on outdoor dining programs for ease of public access and assessment.
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Chad Horner
Hi – I signed up to speak during the live session but had to leave before I was called on. I am a resident of Fort Greene and I am not speaking on behalf of any particular organization, just as a New Yorker.
I unambiguously support the ongoing existence of the Outdoor Dining program, and I urge DOT to reconsider the seasonal aspect of the roadway dining setups. It is a tremendous burden on restaurants to ask them to deconstruct the dining setups, pay to store them for 4-5 months, and then reconstruct them. Certainly restaurants should not be allowed to keep the structures up if they are not actually using them, but it is not clear to me why the structures should not exist year-round as long as there is demand for them and they are in use, which I imagine is the case for a meaningful number of them during those winter months.
I fear that forcing restaurants to remove their roadway structures in the winter will lead to the decline and possible death of that aspect of the program, and that is a total shame. At the cost of 2, 3, maybe 4 parking spots, a restaurant can serve dozens more people a night and justify having a couple more additional employees. This is a huge win for the quality of life of the city as a whole and a clear boost to the city’s economy. Please do not let us lose one of the silver linings that came out of the pandemic.
Thank you for your consideration.
Chad Horner
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Annon
Please consider making sidewalk setups subject to the corner quadrant rule. Sidewalk setups will encroach on this space if not strictly prohibited, making it particularly difficult for pedestrians to access corner pedestrian ramps for crossings. This will end up being an ADA issue.
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Ken Coughlin
Decisions by the City Council and now by the DOT in these proposed regulations seem to be setting the outdoor dining program up for failure.
First, the City Council greatly compromised the program’s viability by making it seasonal.
Now, the DOT’s proposed structural requirements could complete the poison pill, guaranteeing that in the months that roadway cafes are allowed, diners will be completely at the mercy of the elements.
New York City just experienced the wettest September in 140 years.
If the new rules had been in effect then, outdoor dining would have been impossible during much of the month.
Under normal conditions, there’s an average 30% chance of rain between April and November in the city.
The flimsy structures being proposed won’t just affect restaurants’ bottom lines.
They will impact the thousands of New Yorkers like me who are at high-risk if they contract Covid or who are in close contact with loved ones at risk.
For these people, the pandemic is not over.
Outdoor dining has been a lifeline for those of us who strive to be Covid-safe, allowing us to have a semblance of a normal social life.
These proposed regulations threaten that lifeline, and to what end?
At the very least, roadway cafes should be allowed to maintain a roof and walls as long as one side is open to the sidewalk.
This allows for ventilation, helps retain heat and protects from wind and rain.And, as one final note, if daylighting is going to be mandated for intersections with roadway cafes, shouldn’t it be required at all intersections?
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Freddy Castiblanco
Dear Esteemed New York City Officials,
I am writing to express my deep concern regarding the proposed stringent regulations that could significantly affect the vibrant and diverse musical landscape of New York City. Known for its cultural richness, our city has always been a melting pot of artistic expression, especially in music. The streets and outdoor spaces of New York City come alive with the performances of incredibly talented musicians who beautifully represent our diversity.
Live music is an essential part of our city’s soul and should be allowed to flourish without undue restrictions. It represents more than mere entertainment; it is a celebration of our collective heritage and a bridge connecting different cultures. The unique character of our city owes much to these spontaneous and lively musical experiences that can be encountered on any street or corner.
I urge you to consider the significance of these musical expressions. For example, there are places in NYC that offer a journey through diverse musical worlds, from Moroccan and Indian traditional tunes to Andalusian flamenco. These venues feature a wide array of genres such as New Orleans Jazz, Afro-Cuban rumba, Son Jarocho from Veracruz, Afro-Colombian Cumbia & Currulao, Venezuelan and Brazilian Jazz, Afro-Peruvian music, Argentine folk, and even fusions of Latin jazz, tap dance, and jazz. This diversity is not just entertaining; it provides educational experiences and celebrates the human spirit.
Moreover, music has the power to transform environments and perceptions. Consider Roosevelt Avenue, an area facing numerous challenges. The presence of spaces offering live music can significantly contribute to its revitalization, transforming it into a more welcoming and vibrant area.
Encountering a street stage where music from India, North Africa, Cuba, Veracruz, Colombia, Peru, Brazil, Argentina, and New York City’s own jazz scene converge is a priceless experience. It allows us to appreciate the richness of our city’s cultural diversity and the human connections it fosters.
It is vital to consider places like Terraza 7, located on the border of Jackson Heights and Elmhurst, not just as entertainment venues but as cultural landmarks. Failing to recognize and protect such spaces could result in a significant loss to our city and humanity, particularly in our ongoing fight against racial supremacy and division.In conclusion, I implore you to reconsider the proposed regulations and recognize the invaluable role that these musical expressions play in the cultural and social fabric of New York City. They are more than performances; they are the heartbeat of our diverse community, and their preservation is crucial for the enrichment and unity of our society.
Sincerely,
Freddy Castiblanco
Terraza 7 / Funder-Curator
Queens New York -
Noah Masur
I am in support of permanent outdoor dining and dining sheds. They improve the vibrancy and community of the city, while increasing restaurant capacity. Enforcing shed restrictions and seasonal downtime will effectively destroy this option in practicality for most restaurants. As someone who enjoys eating outside, I think full enclosures are much more comfortable than cutting out roofs and walls. Considering that street-side sheds actually limit car traffic and increase the pedestrians’ use of the streets, I would argue that it actually reduces noise and improves quality of life for most residents. We should give this space to restaurants and the many patrons who frequent them than to subsidized parking for one or two drivers. Those concerned about rats should be looking into garbage collection practices instead of dining sheds, and those concerned about noise should consider the noise pollution of vehicles that would be taking up these lanes.
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Ned S.
NOISE:
– No music for outdoor dining set-ups, including music directed from inside towards outside patrons.TIMING:
– 9pm cut-off for being seating at outdoor set-ups.
– 10pm cut-off for outdoor dining (restaurant patrons must either finish their meals/ drinks by 10pm or migrate inside the establishment).
– Midnight is too late and unfair to local residents, who wish to go to sleep by 10pm.LIGHTING:
– Current electric connections for outdoor set-ups are widely jerry-rigged and, therefore, dangerous. Conduits crossing sidewalks are tripping hazards. Existing street lighting should suffice.SET-UPS:
– No permanent structures. Only moveable tables & chairs, so as to allow weekly street cleaning (this is the post-pandemic, permanent outdoor dining norm in Paris). This would also prevent rats from making homes beneath the structures.ENFORCEMENT:
– Add a selection on 311 website for making noise complaints specifically about outdoor dining.
– Add a selection on 311 for outdoor dining set-ups out of compliance with layout rules (including accessibility, # of tables/ seats, etc.).
– Increase the fine amounts for frequently-violating restaurants. Current fines are so low that they hardly amount to a slap on the wrist. -
sandy ley
The Dining Out NYC program has been disastrous for quality of life!
We need laws that shut down outdoor dining by 10pm in residential neighborhoods. Nobody should have to live with a party of 20 outside their window singing happy birthday on a Tuesday night.
We need sidewalks that are not congested by tables and chairs! Our disabled, elderly, and children in strollers are constantly inconvenienced by folk indulging in food and drink. CLEAR THE SIDEWALKS!!
We need laws that protect cyclists and servers. No table service over bike lanes!!! DUH
We need laws that enforce cleanliness and sanitation! Restaurants MUST be responsible for cleaning and remove their structures regularly for cleaning!
We need laws that protect us from fire hazards! No outdoor heating in shoddy, hastily built wooden sheds – they are a deathtrap waiting to happen!
We need laws that limit the amount of sheds in one area. We need to reclaim our storefronts and sight lines, ensuring safety for pedestrians and the ability to maintain the livable charm of our neighborhoods! Dining sheds are an eyesore and obscure traffic from even the most vigilant of pedestrians!
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Assembly Member Harvey Epstein
My name is Harvey Epstein and I am the Assemblymember representing New York’s 74th Assembly District, which includes the neighborhoods of the Lower East Side, East Village, Stuyvesant Town/Peter Cooper Village, Flatiron, Murray Hill, Tudor City, and the United Nations.
Thank you for the opportunity to comment on the Dining Out NYC program proposed rule.
This issue greatly affects the communities I represent, who want to be able to enjoy outdoor dining and support local businesses while maintaining clean and quiet streets.Outdoor dining sheds,sidewalk, and roadway cafes offer a creative solution to addressing overcrowding in restaurants and allow patrons a variety of seating options, including those who do not feel comfortable dining indoors due to health concerns. However, there must be measures in place to prevent these sheds from interfering with traffic or disrupting the surrounding neighborhood’s residents. A careful balancing of these interests must occur.
Neither live music nor TVs should be allowed in these spaces, as they pose a significant disruption to the surrounding area.
Furthermore, to reduce noise in the surrounding area, the shed should no longer be in use by 10:00 PM.
Dining sheds should not be allowed across a bike lane because it endangers the server, patrons, and passing cyclists.
If dining sheds continue to be located across bike lanes, stricter enforcement is needed to ensure that alcohol is not permitted in sheds located across bike lanes, which violates Chapter 165 of 2022. New York law allows licensees to serve alcoholic beverages in auxiliary premises (dining sheds), that are either directly contiguous to the licensed premises or in “non-contiguous municipal public spaces,” which are defined as “separated from the licensed premises only by a pedestrian thoroughfare.” See Ch. 165 2022). Bicycle lanes are not “pedestrian thoroughfares.” Therefore, if the city allows sheds that require service across a bike lane, serving alcohol there will violate state law. The city must be explicit to applicants that it is illegal and licensees can have their licenses revoked for trying to sell alcohol in those locations.
Applicants should be required to go before the community board to ensure that neighbors have a voice in these decisions.I hope DOT will consider these comments and arrive at a final rule that establishes a safe program that respects the communities in which it operates and supports the needs of small business owners and patrons.
Comment attachment
Outdoor-Dining-Public-Comment.pdf -
Freddy Castiblanco
In addition to my previous comments about the value of live street music, I want to address the extremely high cost of constructing a space on the street for my business. Currently, I have not yet finished paying the costs I have incurred to build it. Given the current difficult economic circumstances, with our local salaries having very low purchasing power, dismantling my street space would make my business unviable. Please consider on a case-by-case basis the positive cultural impact of each location and the beautiful state of maintenance and care of each space before ordering their dismantlement.
Sincerely,
Freddy Castiblanco
Terraza 7 / Founder-Curator
Queens, New York -
J. Weisberg
During Covid the outdoor spaces gave nyc residents a place to go.
However post-Covid, most of the establishments have become a nuisance; the roadway outdoor dining sheds prohibit good traffic flow and limit parking spaces, as well accumulate dirt and grime around them; have seen many mice/rats late at night near billionaire’s row congregate around them; also the outdoor sidewalk cafes in many areas are so prolific you can’t walk down the block, such as 32nd street between bdway and 5th ave, most of them are empty of customers both winter and summer. The majority outdoor sheds have became run down eyesores at this point, they are NOT quaint, charming, clean, dining spaces, and look more like forgotten shacks.Another issue, the number of food carts in the city, 6th ave reeks of food smells, it’s terrible! One solution could be to have the food carts in one area/park such as Austin has done, with outdoor seating areas/picnic tables!
NYC has become an ugly, stinky city, expensive city, and many tourists who used to visit claim the Big Apple has lost its luster.
City management, please clean up our city–crime wise & cleanliness wise, etc. so those who live in the city can again be proud New Yorkers and tourists can say the Big Apple truly shines!
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Charlotta Janssen
COMMENTS BY CHARLOTTA JANSSEN owner of CHEZ OSKAR:
Please watch this video link as part of my testimony:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1onBK6mLP0ZKAfiOMjbiWh4ylVm–N_hS/view?usp=drivesdkThis is Chez Oskar at 310 Malcolm X Blvd in Brooklyn on June 25th, 2022. Buckets of rain. Business continues smoothly despite the weather. Pedestrians seek shelter. 24 minutes later, the sun comes out, business continues. Canopies make this possible. Without them, it is miserable. Canopies protect customers, staff, pedestrians, and those on wheels, making wind, rain, and snow even enjoyable, They also make for consistent capacity and reliable jobs year round.
At Oskar, we put a lot of thought and EIDL into them, considering factors such as cost, durability, sight lines, noise reduction for tenants above, maneuvering around obstacles like tree pits, rainwater runoff, and aesthetics. We also have successfully built 5 canopies for neighbors: Anmwey Eatery, Secret Garden, Zaca Cafe, DSK and La Nacional: all of which have stood the test of time: and remain open today. Please watch the videos showcasing real-life events that we face daily in my extended written testimony. Traditional awnings and umbrellas depicted in DOT schematics won’t work when it comes to rain, wind or snow.
2022 we experienced 129 rainy days, accounting for approximately one-third of the year, April was the windiest it has ever been and we can expect more extreme weather in years to come. During these events, we still have rent, utilities, vendors, staff, and ourselves to support and right now inflation is killing us all. Relying on flimsy awnings and umbrellas will make operating consistently impossible. Removing our setups without considering their efficacy will ultimately kill the progress made by this program and punish those of us who stepped up.
Since 2020, the program rules have undergone numerous changes, and most make sense. But the proposed rules for permanent sidewalk dining are not only detrimental to jobs and revenue, but also unsafe. We all agree: curbing bad actors and removing dilapidated sheds are key, but don’t kill the whole program over it. Most of us are compliant and 10% of New Yorkers rely on jobs in our industry. We need consistent capacity.
DOT – I know you worked hard for this program. Please include canopies and clear covers in final regulations because they work and have worked through all your storm warnings since 2021. If you ever worked in restaurants, you know: umbrellas get knocked down, and awnings tear up. Canopies with light clear covers, on the other hand, offer a reliable solution. Please allow for community board reviews for compliant outdoor dining that want to grandfather their setups. Many canopies have been thoughtfully designed with their communities in mind and deserve the opportunity to continue serving their purpose.
Canopies canopies canopies please! Please make the roadway affordable too by allowing all year round structures. We are dying in Bed Stuy.
Thank you for your efforts and hard work in making this program happen.
Charlotta Janssen
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Layne Hudes
I am deeply concerned about the rules that the DOT has proposed for the permanent outdoor dining program. I urge the DOT to make the following commonsense adjustments to the agency’s rules:
Reduce Operating Hours to Permit Sleep
The proposed hours are extended even beyond those in Local Law 121 and will exacerbate noise issues in residential areas. Noise is a public health issue.
Amplified sound should be restricted indoors. Now that the Open Restaurants zoning changes allow bars and restaurants to operate with open doors, windows, and facades even in residential neighborhoods, there should be detailed restrictions on amplified noise from restaurants.
Practices like placing ‘silent’ TVs in outdoor setups and blasting the TV audio from the restaurant’s interior through open windows, doors, and facades must end. Either close the loopholes or close the windows, doors, and facades.Clarify Roadway Setup Design and Safety Rules
Ensure a consistent minimum 15-foot lane width for emergency vehicle access — without waivers or exceptions. Public safety comes before restaurant square footage.
Explicitly mandate the removal of roadway cafe structures seasonally. Both the statute and the agency rules fail to specify the legislation’s intent: that roadway dining setups must be removed in the off-season to allow street cleaning and maintenance.
Expressly prohibit roofs, walls, and oversized structures that impede sightlines to traffic control and parking signs, and block the view of neighborhood shops from potential customers and clients.
Clearly include language to restrict outdoor dining setups to the restaurant’s frontage. Increase the space required between roadway sheds; three feet between structures is not enough egress from the sidewalk to the street in the event of an emergency and is particularly challenging for elders and the disabled.Restore Pedestrian Rights
Prohibit including sidewalk grates in the measurement of pedestrian pathways. Grates are difficult for people with canes and walkers to navigate and create challenges for individuals using wheelchairs, pushing strollers, and walking pets.
Reinstate a 3-foot service aisle for waitstaff. They need space to work and pedestrians need a bonafide clear path.Limit the Commissioner’s Powers
Delete the language granting the Commissioner the power to issue waivers for whatever he deems to be public convenience. Prevent the potential misuse of power and eliminate the perception of corruption.Ensure Community Involvement and Transparency
Extend community board review periods to facilitate input and eliminate the summer loophole for restaurants that want to evade community review.
Establish a robust one-stop mechanism for residents and businesses to report outdoor dining issues.
Create a one-stop public data portal on outdoor dining programs for ease of public access and assessment.Heating the outdoors in a climate emergency? You’re kidding, right?
Paris banned outdoor heaters in sidewalk cafés and terraces back in April 2021. We must do the same. Anything else is madness.
These are reasonable modifications to the DOT’s proposed rules. And they are crucial for protecting residential neighborhoods that have high concentrations of restaurants and bars with outdoor dining.
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Kate Conroy
DATE:
November 20, 2023RE:
OUTDOOR (not fully-enclosed) DINING:
Park (outdoor space and forestry programs) and DOTFrom:
Kate Conroy, east village resident since 1990
107 St. Mark’s Place, #6B
New York, NY 10009
[email protected]STATEMENT:
I am in support of retaining outdoor dining as a public health benefit to the alternative of dining indoors in crowded and stuffy dining areas. Further, I would like improvement to the shed aesthetics; residential quality of life; vehicular, pedestrian, worker, and bicycle safety.Revenue, fee structure
p. 7
(d) License fees
Should be seasonal/annual and more $$ for Roadway cafes, which would otherwise be generating parking revenue.Aesthetics and quality of life
p. 8
Both Roadway and Sidewalk
(3) Photographs
Should approve design of all sides. Street facing side must be as important as all other aesthetics as it is the “front” to residents and business across the street. Site plan must address curb appeal from both sides of the street, all four sides of the structure.Pest control, public health
p. 8
Both Roadway and Sidewalk
(5) Pest control
Pest control must be included in design and building materials of flooring/and gutter drainage. Current designs and materials are condominiums for ratsSanitation
p. 13
5-10 Operation and maintenance
(a) Maintenance
1½’ distance on sides
1½’ distance is insufficient to make up for area at curb/side that is inaccessible to street sweeper service
Operators must clean the street on sweeper days in the area that the street sweeper cannot access.Quality of Life
p. 13
5-10 (b) Hours of Operation
Should be 10pm or earlier on Sun-Thurs and up to 11pm on Fri/Sat.
Safety and traffic flow
p. 16
p. 18
p. 26Element or Object
Add driveways. Clearance is necessary for sight distance and turning radius needs of cars exiting parking lots or other driveways.Safety traffic flow
p. 18, (i)
Permitted Locations (A)Area created for parking should not be filled with sheds that are wider than SUVs or passenger trucks (~7’)
Safety
p. 18,
(iii) Dimensions
(A) 40 feet,Length of structures should not cover the curb area in front of a main building entrance. EMS/Fire need access through the front door. Need width for gurney and gear.
Safety, traffic pedestrian, bike flow
p. 18,
(iii) Dimensions
(B) wide (side wall length)
I suggest a max 7’ wide shed limit including barriers. This is the widest car/SUV width.Current dimensions create hazardous sight distant issues when pulling into and out of parking spots and slows the flow of traffic for parallel parking that takes more time than a space between cars.
Should not exceed width of parking spaces
p. 19
(vii) Floating Parking LanesLegal parking spaces should not exceed 7’ (SUV) width.
Public health Pest control
Rat control
p. 20
(B) Barriers with plantings
If planters, they are burrowing attractions for rats
18” barriers should be specified within the overall width of structure, not in addition to. (not specified in current guidelines.)Public health rat control
p. 20
(ii) Flooring
(4.) channel for drainage
Must be screened to prohibit rat access.
Public health, mosquitosIf water filled rather than planter filled, precautions for mosquito breeding should be taken into consideration.
Overall
p. 27
Vertical screenings, coverings, umbrellas
(iv) ( C) (iii)
18” width must be included in the overall width from curb to street.Revenue
p. 27
Sect: 6. F
Penalties are modest and not a deterrent to violate rules. Roadway sheds occupy otherwise revenue-producing parking spaces. Charge higher fees for roadway sheds (not sidewalk).Seasonal
unspecified
Features of adjustments to seasonal weather
Expansion and contraction is great, like when the block is closed, more table in the street. Same for winter months. Snow removal and snow banks are already trash heaps, the sheds contribute to trash and poor drainage of melting snow. They become an eyesore. Seasonal sheds will be a welcome sign of spring after the cold winters.
Coordinate: DOT, Parks, and Public Health/Food SafetyGeneral note
Possible municipal coordinations
With ever-expanding populations, our neighborhood parks are over-crowded. Dining outdoors helps support outdoor recreation; perhaps parks should have some contribution to aesthetics and enforcement. Food safety should also be considered with the appropriate jurisdiction of food handlers and health safety inspection for cleanliness or other health hazards.(same information is attached as a PDF. Thank you.)
Comment attachment
2023-OUTDOOR-DINING-Kate-Conroy.pdf -
NRT
Outdoor dining rules need to be structured in such a way that it’s EASY for restaurant owners to comply, not harder. While I applaud the requirements around accessibility, daylighting and air flow (fully enclosed structures make NO sense and never have) other requirements don’t make sense. In particular, it doesn’t make sense to require structures to be removed from November through March, especially given the milder falls and winters we have been having. Not to mention, years of outdoor dining have demonstrated that people very much still want outdoor options even during colder weather. It’s also especially important in order to mitigate the spread of COVID. Please consider that if and when cases tick up, many people won’t want to dine indoors. And that could negatively impact businesses if they don’t have an outdoor option to offer.
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Steve
On the Lower East Side, the owners of sheds on Ludlow St have basically privatized a stretch of the sidewalk, holding ‘events’ with crowds that unite the storefronts and sheds, blocking the sidewalk for normal pedestrian traffic.
The privatization of sidewalk space increases the property/rental value for individual building owners – this is an unfair system. The shed operators benefit by doubling or tripling their seating capacity and profits. If allowed to exist, they need to pay considerably more taxes/fees to continue. -
Ryan
I am a high-risk person who relies on outdoor dining. During winter, immunocompromised people are at very high risk as respiratory illnesses spread – not just covid, but even diseases like the flu and RSV can all be severe or even deadly to the immunocompromised. Honestly, if you’ve been immunocompromised for any reason, whether that’s having to be on immunosuppressants for things like being an organ transplant recipient or autoimmune disease, having an immunosuppressive condition like AIDS, or even just being elderly, then you’ve basically been left to your own devices for navigating winter without putting yourself at significant risk for decades. This isn’t a new issue; it’s just been largely ignored until covid raised more awareness, and providing spaces that accommodate people with immunocompromised conditions or elevated risk profiles should be seen as a basic disability accommodation. Outdoor dining can be a godsend for people with elevated risk profiles in winter, and it should remain so that immunocompromised people aren’t pushed to the periphery of society every single winter. Thank you.
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Andrew Coamey
• Stick to the hours outlined in Local Law 121. 10am to 12 midnight is certainly long enough for those of us who live above or near these proposed outdoor dining locations;
Comment attachment
• While the statute restricts amplified sound outdoors it does not prohibit when doors and windows are open. Many restaurants flaunt the existing rule and the remainder just pump music out of their open facades, something they should not be permitted to do;
• No waivers to any rules that impact public safety including the 15 foot lane for emergency vehicles;
• The rules must clearly state that all roadway structures be moved and not stored in the street during December thru March when the program is not permitted. Many of our streets have not been cleaned in years and roadway paving is now forced to happen around the sheds;
• The rules must clearly limit the roadway seating structures to only the frontage of the restaurant, not locations that are not leased by the restaurant. There are many sheds now that take up multiple storefronts and residential footprints. In these cases the outdoor space is bigger than the restaurant;
• Structures being open is too vague of a design guildine. We learned from the pandemic that businesses will fully enclose their sheds, which is not the intent of the program. The roadway structures must be easily removable in the even of an emergency and not require construction or heavy equipment to move them; and
• Restore the 8’ clearance and 3’ service aisle that have always been required for outdoor seating structures.
Outdoor-Dining-Comments-to-DEP-11-20-23.pdf -
Liza Smith
Outdoor dining should not be allowed at all. Period. I have sent complaints about 4 structures on Lexington, and 2 were actually removed. The problems I will describe I see listed on other emails below, and far outweigh all of the positive comments because THE PROBLEMS POSE A DANGER TO THE PUBLIC. These outdoor structures are far and away unsightly and unclean. (rats, filth, odors, etc.) They cause traffic problems, not only causing double parking and triple parking congestion, but I have seen emergency vehicles delayed because of the congestion. Sidewalk congestion is also a problem. And sightlines are decreased which affects safety, a huge issue for all of us. I could go on, but bottom line: There is NO REASON to have ANY.
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Anna
Outdoor dining is just too broad and undefined. And as it is right now, it has only created more rats, impossible to clean roads, stench from garbage piled to the side of the shacks, open air free bathrooms, to name a few. On smaller residential streets, like in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, emergency vehicles can barely go through. And ambulances cannot stop in front of a building doorway like the one I live in.
The restaurant below us has taken twice the frontage of its own place, stretching right over our doorway entrance to the building, making it very hard for anyone with difficulties walking to be dropped off or picked up.
This is not about more parking spaces (though one could argue that at least cars would pay to park, therefore generating revenue for the city), rather use of city space by its citizens, not businesses alone.
These sheds are totally out of control. Some are completely enclosed, making the immuno-compromised argument hard to back up – why would anyone sit in a box when a proper restaurant should have a better air system in place?
If outdoor dining is here to stay, then it really should be regulated and be agreed upon by those who live in the city, not just the businesses.– Application system should allow for a review case by case, just like any other license. And a license should be visible.
– Dining should not extend to bars.
– Hours should be suited to dining. Close by 10 pm, to allow for cleaning by 11pm.
– No outdoor music, nor TVs.
– Rat proof design, whether it means no floor.
– if the concern is Covid, then open design – we always refer to European cities and most of them have no structure at all, rather small tables and chairs.
– Size matters: no more than the frontage of the establishment and to include secured garbage receptacles.
– If there is a doorway to a building, allow for a space for cars to pull in, just like it is allowed for hotels, churches and other establishments, so that emergency vehicles and cabs can drop off people.
– Allow for enough room for garbage trucks and fire trucks to clearly drive through.
– Always allow for a clear and regulated path for pedestrians. -
John N Bigolski
To Whom It May Concern,
I write today about the on-going concerns many of us have with the permanent emplacement of roadway sheds and the changes to restaurant rules. While emergency measures during the pandemic seemed appropriate given the state of emergency, quality of life issues at present and into the future do not justify the proposed rules. The following concerns should be advised against in light of persistent issues.
-Loud outdoor dining noise at late hours
Operating hours in the statute are absurdly long–especially in residential districts–but the proposed DOT rules manage to make the situation even worse. Local Law 121 specifies 10 AM to midnight (12 PM), but the lengthening of the hours form 8 AM to 1 AM is ridiculous. It is already bad enough that music and loud, intoxicated behavior is becoming the norm for restaurants within residential neighborhoods, which include side streets with single-family homes and rentals, many of which have people that are civil servants that work at early morning hours, or 9 – 5 jobs. Extending the hours all the way to 1 AM is a disservice and an insult to those that work day shifts, for the city especially. RESIDENTS NEED TO SLEEP; seventeen hours of potential outdoor noise is unacceptable.SUGGESTION: windows and doors should be closed by 10 PM
-Ensure that neighborhoods are not swamped with constant restaurant noise.
The rules say no amplified sound outdoors, which should also extend indoors if establishments are going to operate with windows and/or doors open. No not allow establishments to blast television sound through open doors and windows.-No waivers for any rules that impact public safety
In the years since outdoor roadway sheds, many unsafe conditions have been created for motorists, cyclists, and pedestrians alike. Views are commonly obstructed of cross-street traffic and single and all way stop signs. Traffic accidents are a daily occurrence for many corners that have views blocked by tall sheds. Many sheds are simply much taller than vehicles parked and this is increase accidents at such corners.
Emergency must have 15-foot lane clearance WITHOUT EXCEPTION. There should be NO WAIVERS when it comes to public safety. Heaven forbid an emergency that jeopardizes life and limb but for the special interest of private businesses that cater to many people that are not members of the community.-Seasonal structures that are easily moved.
The presence of sheds have lead to a negative impact of sanitation: there are blocks that are barely swpet by street sweepers, some blocks not being swept in THREE YEARS! This is regressive from modern sanitation efforts, especially when it concerns areas serving food. Sanitaiton is among the most important modern developments in urban areas, and these new rules and waivers would fly in the face of basic sanitary conditions in PUBLIC SPACES. Unfortunately, the language of the Local Law 121 and the proposed rules DO NOT specify any requirement regarding “readily removeable furniture.” The sheds should not be used for storage in a permanent set-up. They should be moved during off-season months. Cities like Montreal have been doing this for years.SUGGESTION: no waivers or exemptions. Only have seasonal set-ups so that any structures can be removed from December to March. Focus on implementing sidewalk café set-ups in it allows for proper egress by law.
-The rules should limit outdoor dining to the front of that restaurant ONLY. Do not have vague rules that permit the sprawling of sheds outside of the immediate front of the establishment.
-The rules should not allow any structure that requires heavy machinery to move; a forklift or backhoe should not be needed for removal. That is NOT a removable structure.
-Make a clear path for pedestrians, especially for elderly and mobility-impaired, and allow amble room for servers and wait staff.
The rules are too vague when it comes to egress, and should allow for pedestrians to walk. Pedestrians should not be forced to walk over subway grates, since elderly or any person with a cane, walker, or stroller, will be at harm.
The sensible standard of a 3-fopot service aisle should return, as was the case in pre-pandemic times.SUGGESTION: Subway grates and other uneven sidewalk suefaces should not be considered part of the clear path.
SUGGESTION: 8-foot clearance and 3-foor service aisle.
-No service across bike lanes.
Too many sheds are built where people must cross over a bike lane. This is incredibly unsafe for all! The proposed rules allow this practice to continue, which puts cyclists, servers, wait staff, and clientele at risk of serious injury, and even death! Being hit by a bicycle can cause someone to get violent forced onto the ground, cracking their head, and dying. Why allow a gauntlet for people who want to enjoy a meal? THIS IS NOT THE HUNGER GAMES! Shame on the cyclist lobbies for ignoring this!SUGGESTION: NO SERVING ACROSS BIKE LANES!!!!!!
-No heating the outdoors.
The heating of any and all outdoor set-ups should not be allowed, especially given the risks of fire, weaponizing propane-heaters, and the current energy and climate crisis.-Eliminate the extraordinary powers afforded to the DOT commissioner.
The language of the proposed rules gives the DOT commissioner czar-like powers to implement anything without being vetted by a democratic process. This is an invitation for corruption and trivializes any rules afforded to the community and their input. Simply, we need to preserve our democracy within the community.SUGGESTION: NO absolute authority to the DOT. Have more time for community review via local boards with a transparent and open process. There should be e.g. dedicated portal for outdoor dining complaints, OATH violations and fines, and DOT response time.
The above are only SOME of the pertinent suggestions that allow for more equitable participation of community members. I thank you for reading and implore common courtesy, dignity, and respect for community members who have built the wonderful atmosphere of the city for generations.
Sincerely and noblely,
John N. Bigolski, 4th generation resident of Williamsburg, Brooklyn. -
Mike T.
Outdoor dining is great but it needs to be enforced.
As a resident who owns property and resides on a street that is closed for outdoor dining I am directly affected by the lack of sufficient rules and enforcement of the city’s DOT outdoor dining policies.
Outdoor dining is great for business and people but I consistently witness dining sheds not only open longer than the timeframe allowed but also becoming party spaces for after-hours long into the night which keep myself and my family awake. In the morning, they are littered with bottles and other garbage from the night before without any respect for residents.
We have also witnessed the closed street access giving people the idea to freely park in the middle with their car speakers playing loud music and dancing around them long into the morning hours and other similar things.
The size, sprawl, and hours of the sheds and the closed streets rules must be enforced properly to discourage their misuse that is in disrespect of the residents and families that share these same streets.
It’s one thing to enjoy dining outside, its another thing to trash people’s front yards. Please help us maintain a balance of quality of life, thank you.
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Ronald Ryer
I fully support any action designed to prevent the modification of rules which state that restaurants should adhere to the operating hours specified in LL 121, and ensure that our neighborhoods are not filled with uncontrolled restaurant noise.
The city is more than a free zone for business enterprise – it is a place where people can live and work together communally, respecting each other’s rights.
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Charles NY
I am Charles NY, a member of Community Board Five in Manhattan, and I’m reaching out to express my concerns on a matter close to my heart. The issue at hand is the impact of outdoor dining on the accessibility of sidewalks, particularly for those in our community who are blind or visually impaired.
Picture this: A blind person navigating the city streets with their white cane, relying on the familiar tap along the building line to safely traverse the sidewalks. Now, imagine the challenges they face when outdoor dining setups create obstacles that hinder their path. This is a real and pressing issue on some New York City blocks, especially those with narrower sidewalks.
The consequences are twofold. Firstly, outdoor dining on these narrow sidewalks transforms pedestrian traffic into a single-file struggle, causing inconvenience for wheelchair users and those who are blind or visually impaired, sometimes accompanied by a caregiver. Secondly, the narrowed pathways pose a risk to the safety and independence of these individuals who rely on tactile cues for navigation.
I believe it’s crucial for us to reconsider the placement of outdoor dining setups. Let’s reserve them for sidewalks with ample space, where pedestrians can comfortably walk side by side—facilitating smooth, two-way traffic. Additionally, we could explore innovative solutions, such as temporary tactile guide way strips or protective barriers around outdoor dining areas. These measures would not only enhance safety but also ensure that our public spaces remain inclusive for everyone.
As a community, let’s work together to find a balanced solution that preserves the vibrancy of outdoor dining while prioritizing the accessibility and safety of all our residents. Your support in this matter is greatly appreciated.
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cynthia vallone
The outdoor dining sheds are a public nuisance and safety hazard for our streets. please discontinue this program.
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RM Tran
Dining sheds must close by 10pm for noise! And sidewalks need to be clear for ADA. If dining sheds can not comply, they should not be allowed to operate.
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S Tran
Enough is enough. Outdoor dining is clearly a land grab by the restaurant and hospitality industry. Give us back our sidewalks for real, actual New Yorkers who live and work here.
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Marko Matuzzi
Outdoor dining is great for business and great for NYC. That said, while I think the proposed guidelines are a good start, there are some blind spots.
1) Before 2020, there was a path for a restaurant establishment to attain approval for an enclosed sidewalk cafe. The proposed rules eliminate this path to approval and summarily prohibit any barrier higher than 30″, effectively banning winter operation for sidewalk cafes, as there’s no way for outdoor heaters to be effective without a type of outdoor enclosure. It makes sense to remove roadway cafes in winter for snow removal considerations, but no such public good is served by forcing the closure of sidewalk cafes when the weather becomes inclement. There needs to be a path to approval of an enclosure for sidewalk cafes to provide the option of sidewalk outdoor dining in the winter, at a minimum the same accommodation to restaurants that existed before COVID.
2) Many restaurants are located on sidewalks that are sloped in such a way as to make sidewalk dining awkward, uncomfortable, and in some cases impossible. A design path towards permissibility of platforms on sloped sidewalks to mitigate these conditions would ensure an equitable experience for all outdoor diners. Confoundingly, platforms are prohibited on sidewalks but practically required for roadway sheds for ADA reasons; while I understand the desire to reduce rodent housing opportunities, a sealed platform on sidewalk cafes could be as effective as any roadway solution.
3) Many restaurants have invested significant dollars and care in cafes and structures that were compliant with the temporary dining program but have subsequently been rendered noncompliant by the new proposed rules. It’s not fair to a business for DOT to move the goalposts without any opportunity to appeal and prove the safety and appropriateness of an existing installation. I would suggest there should be a defined process to appeal for special considerations and exceptions, if only applicable to cafes that were legal during the emergency but have been made illegal by the new law. Restaurant owners who have made the investment to make their outdoor dining setups attractive and durable deserve to be rewarded for their efforts rather than penalized. -
Sandra LT
I am a resident of the LES and enjoy outdoor dining, but this program has been a complete mess and needs to be stopped.
I urge you to discontinue the outdoor dining program. It creates problems for residents, traffic, and sanitation. It creates noise pollution and safe haven for rats and trash pile up.
Forcing servers to go in and outdoors, across bike traffic is cruel and an obvious safety hazard.
Thank you for your consideration.
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sarah s z
The option to dine out was a saving grace for restaurants during the pandemic when there were few people wanting to dine in close proximity to each other. This is why these came to fruition. They’re now filled to capacity and are hardly ever checked on for compliance when they break noise regulations. They fill our small residential streets with clusters of noise that our streets just were not planned with in mind. Our street was repaved and there are big chunks missing because the sheds were in the way. the restaurants and buildings argue over who should clean on either side of the dining areas since it is beyond restaurant but the mess is due either directly to the restaurant or because it is in the way in the roadway. The water does not flow when sidewalks are cleaned by buildings due to the dining areas.
Local rules specify 10am-12am which already too much. Please don’t try to extend them. As neighbors we should be entitled to 10pm being cut off for outdoor dining being shut down. There is absolutely NO WAY to control the volume of these dining areas.
Restaurants like to open windows and allow sports games and music to be heard outside for those dining. This loophole needs to be closed.
The walls make for unsafe sidewalks. I can’t see if the roadway is clear unless I am directly in it. And it makes me feel vulnerable as it reduces visibility should someone be hanging out there after hours.
I have noticed that CB meetings aren’t held every month, so the review period can’t be 40days. It woud require minimum 60 days so that they can be assured a meeting and the public as well.
Enforcement has been laughable. There needs to be a fasttrack way that DOT can take complaints and investigate with the complainant and restaurant in a quick fashion. If the dot wants to make this a permanent and quick way to enlarge dining they also MUST invest at the same time a way to enforce it when complaints are made.
Our neighborhood has a great many bars and restaurants but it was never ever conceivable that they would move outdoors! If DOT want to make this permanent then let’s make reasonable permanent rules. Right now DOT is gearing up to create intense hostility between residents and restaurants with its intended expansion into permanent outdoor dining. There is a huge difference between having a restaurant in or near your building and having its diners outside your windows and the DOT seems to have completely forgotten about this. It’s truly outrageous and ruining quality of life in the neighborhood. -
Emily D.
Strongly in favor of outdoor dining in NYC. Year-round outdoor dining should be permitted so long as structures meet stringent rules / fully-enclosed structures shouldn’t be allowed year-round (I.e. require removal of panels and in warmer months).
Parking is a privilege, not a right in this city— I support permanently ceding parking to dining, and garbage bins, freeing up sidewalks for pedestrians / ensuring adequate sidewalk space for mobility.
Also fully supportive of requiring unused sheds to be removed and forbidding sound, TVs and advertising.
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Beth Maher
Roadway dining causes loss of parking spaces and/or loss of lanes for vehicle traffic. It also blocks sight lines st corners/crosswalks for pedestrians which is very dsngerous. In addition these structures are generally unsightly and can be a health hazard is not kept immaculately clean.
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Rose Plaisime
Greetings, Hi my name Rose , I am the owner of a small family restaurant, Anmwey Eatery, located in Bedford Stuyvesant, Brooklyn. We opened our doors in December 2019 just a few months before the shutdown. My team and I witnessed first hand how devastating it was during that period. Just when it was evident that we would have to shut our doors and give up on our longtime dream, the city initiated “ outdoor dining”. There’s absolutely no way we could have weather the storm and keep our business going without outdoor dinning and for that we are forever grateful. Dissolving sheds and canopies and replacing them with umbrellas and awnings will not serve the intended purpose of safe and reliable outdoor dining. Canopies are sturdy and when done right add vibrancy to our neighborhood. Our neighbors now have a safe space to gather throughout the year for meals and fresh air. As a nurse, I get to experience first hand how debilitating Covid 19 and any other airborne illness can be. Covid 19 is still very much in our community. Residents are still fearful of inside gatherings, especially if they are immunosuppressed. For these individuals outdoor dinning provide an opportunity for them to participate in food establishment events without the risk of becoming ill.
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Augustine Hope
Attached are the rules governing Outdoor Dining in Paris. They could serve as a blueprint for how to operate an outdoor dining program that is friendly to residents.
Comment attachment
PARIS-OUTDOOR-DINING-RULES-EN.pdf -
pong
Not having outdoor dining the winter could be bad for restaurants because when COVID cases go way up, there’s going to be a significant number of people who won’t want to dine indoors.
Many restaurants can be hurt by that given how much year after year, they have come to depend on that revenue. Winter is already a slow season for these businesses after the holidays.
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Alan
I live in Hell’s Kitchen. I have lived in Hell’s Kitchen since 1984. I moved into my present apartment in 1991. When I first moved into this apartment, there was a restaurant on the ground floor. It closed at 11 p.m. or perhaps midnight. Little noise came from the restaurant. There was no sidewalk dining. At that time, few if any people would have wanted to eat on the sidewalk at the corner where I live.
A few years later, a new restaurant/bar took over. It is still there. Since the beginning, it has stayed open till 4 a.m. Soon there was sidewalk dining. I am sometimes mystified when people talk of sidewalk dining as if it is something that started in 2020. It has been around for a long time.
This bar/restaurant blasts loud music till 2 or 3 a.m. on a regular basis. For a number of years, they blasted loud music till 4 a.m.or even later as people would still be inside after 4 a.m. Sometimes it went on till 7 or 8 a.m. when staff would be there still blasting loud music, quite audible — indeed, extremely loud — in the apartments directly above the bar/restaurant and even audible two flights up. I know that this is not on the subject, but this is something that a good number of people in the city live with, and enforcement of noise laws is virtually nonexistent in New York City, and that latter part is relevant here.
Ever since the bar/restaurant that is on the ground floor of the building in which I live started outdoor dining — probably in 1994 or 1995, I didn’t take note at the time of when it started — for six or seven months a year, I and others live with hearing talking, sometimes extremely loud, till midnight Sunday through Thursday and till 1 a.m. It is only because in the first few years we called whatever city agency is in charge of enforcing the rules about sidewalk cafes (I can’t remember offhand which agency that is) that it doesn’t go on till 4 a.m. I can tell from reading comments posted by others that there are people who don’t know what the rules are and still live with loud talking, shouting, incredibly loud, raucous laughter and screaming till 4 a.m. or later. Or perhaps they have tried to get help from the right city agency, but it has done no good.
This constant noise is extremely difficult to live with. Even with the windows closed, it is still loud and extremely disruptive, making it difficult to watch television, read or sometimes even carry on a conversation. Why should people have to live like this? I will add that I cannot afford to run my air conditioner all summer, and I am sure I am not alone in it, so I often must leave my windows open even when it is extremely noisy.
And, again, enforcement of noise laws in this city is virtually nonexistent. Everyone knows this, including the bars and restaurants that blast loud music.
Another thing that bars and restaurants do during the warmer months is keep their floor to ceiling windows open while they blast music. Why is this allowed? Why does this city care nothing about the people who have to live above or near these establishments?
I am sure that noise is a major factor in why many people choose to leave New York City.
For those who don’t realize it, noise is a health issue. I will post links to five articles below, but you can easily find more if you do a simple search online:
https://www.consumerreports.org/hearing-ear-care/health-effects-of-noise/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3988259/
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/noise-pollution-health-effects#mental-health
https://sph.uth.edu/content/uploads/2011/12/Noise-Pollution-Research-Summary.pdf
I am not so naive as to believe that outdoor dining will be stopped in this city. But cannot more limits be set, including as to hours of permissible operation, and then have those laws enforced? Charge fees to the restaurant with outdoor dining and have those fees go toward enforcement. Issue fines and make sure those fines are collected. If several fines go unpaid, close the establishment for a week. If this continues, close it for a month.
Have the regulations state that outdoor dining must end by, say, 10 p.m. during the week and 11 p.m. on the weekends. I would, of course, prefer earlier, but i know that earlier than that won’t happen but 10 p.m. and 11 p.m. seem reasonable.
One last thing that I meant to mention earlier: I am relatively fortunate in that I live by only one outdoor dining area. I have sometimes walked several of them are on the same block, and on top of that, they all have their floor-to-celing windows open and are playing loud music. The amount of noise can be incredible, nearly unbearable even just walking by. I can’t imagine what it would be like to live with that.
If steps are not taken to reduce the noise problems in this city, more and more people will leave, there will be more and more health problems with those who are here (and that will end up costing money). Please have a little pity and concern for those of us who have to live with this.
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Amy Gilcrest
I am a long-time resident of the West Village. The restaurants needed help during the pandemic, but that time is long past. On the small streets of the West Village, streets have become impossible to negotiate. Deliveries, even to those restaurants, cannot be made without blocking the street. Another issue is with safety. The fire trucks can barely make the turn radius onto the smaller streets. If there is an emergency and they need the ladder, they have to go over a shed structure. Safety is first & foremost. The sheds have created large amounts of garbage which in turn has created rat problems that traps and poison is not solving. Rats run on the tables, urinate and spread fecal matter.
Lastly, some of the sheds are not even used. Some have been boarded up for over a year. We have one on out block that just looks plain horrible with graffitti. It is not open for dining other than occasionally and the restaurant uses it to store their trash. This also should not be allowed. Another on the corner of my block has loud music and people well past 1am on weekends.
If the restaurants want to have outdoor dining, they should have to apply like they did pre-pandemic. I should also note that these restaurants get much added space without any taxation. One across the street from me has taken frontage of 3 buildings, which has also blocked entrance/exits.
I vote no to the sheds. I have tried to download pictures and your files will not take them.
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carlos gavilondo
Please see attached comments of National Grid.
Comment attachment
National-Grid-Comments-to-DOTs-Outdoor-Dining-Proposed-Rules_11202023.pdf -
Darwin Keung
Please see attached for comments and recommendations for the proposed rules on outdoor dining.
Comment attachment
2023.11.20-Outdoor-Dining-NYCDOT-TSTC.pdf -
Kevin Heald
Thank you for considering our comments.
I own a small beer and cheese shop called Malt and Mold on 2nd Avenue and 21st Street. We have utilized the sidewalk in front of our shop since the beginning of outdoor dining in Summer 2020. When Mayor DiBlasio said that that outdoor dining would be permanent and year round, we invested in a structure to cover the seating and protect our customers from the weather.
We have updated that structure three times since then to keep it attractive, clean, and fitting with the neighborhood. We ask that you reconsider the plan for sidewalk seating to include a structure with a roof. We need the structure both to hang heaters and to drop clear vinyl “walls” to keep customers warm. Without that, the outdoor seating will be less utilized and less effective. During warmer months, the roof keeps the rain out. We don’t want chairs and tables sitting on the sidewalk not being used most of the year due to the weather. (We tried umbrellas and they simply do not work to keep the rain off and of course won’t work at all to keep people warm in the winter.)
We’re happy to pay for the privilege of allowing our customers to utilize the sidewalk. We do need to maximize the time our customers can sit outside to pay for the fees. More seating means more customers and that also leads to more tax revenue for the city … at a time when the city desperately needs more tax revenue.
I would be happy to show you our structure and work with you on design rules so that all outdoor structures can fit in with their neighborhood (allowing the business owner the freedom to use the materials that make the most sense for that neighborhood), are clean, rodent free, and augment our city.
Thank you,
Kevin M. Heald -
Shreen Asem Elkenani
I think the rules need to be tailored to restaurants. Small businesses like mine already have no space to excel. The outdoor structure I built was built with all the rules and regulations. I don’t think it’s fair to tear mine down, only to build another one that probably won’t be structurally sound. I clean my outside area regularly. More than I would if there was no structure there. I maintain the street and I am kind of the needs of my neighbors. It would be so unfair to be punished for doing all the right things .
PLEASE DONT MAKE US REMOVE OUR STRUCTURES!!!!!
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Shreen Elkenani
I maintain my outdoor area very well. I follow all the rules and even go above and beyond to keep my place prestigious..
DONT MAKE US REMOVE WHAT WE ALREADY HAVE TO KEEP BUILDING NEW ONES EVERY YEAR. This opportunity was to help the bloodline of NYC! Don’t make it hard for us to sustain ourselves. My store is but so big and my outdoor seating helped me stand out a little more for big parties.
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Ugur cubukcu
I m a bartender in Hell’s Kitchen and i m pretty terrified with the comments indicating “outdoor dining is garbage and rat magnet” . As someone who sweeps our little outside dining area and around,i can easily say garbage is residential and rats are coming for those garbages which they were always here also which is reason that ny took action about residential and commercial garbage rule that indicates covered proper garbage cans etc. connecting rats with outdoor dinings is delusional for a newyorker. Of course there will be bad managements of restaurants or bars that causing problems. But overall only problem for the neighborhoods can be proven is 2 or 3 less parking spot for the area. I can send you 2 pictures with our dining shed outside and without it. Its the easiest decision to make anyone that thinks clearly:) also making us remove it during the winter and bring it back summer is way too pricey solution that will not make anyone bring their outside dining area back. They cost around 10k and this is not just tent you can bring it back after winter. Most places won’t be able to remove/rebuild so seasonal solutions mean you are getting rid of outside dining era. Plus none of you know when will next pandemic hit? Then what is going to happen? Oh sorry you can spend another 15k while you don’t have business to bring that back? I can tell you 100 more reasons why you should not make the changes you are planning to do. Trust me i know half of the locals in my block and they all agree with me:) i can prove it by sending pictures everyday if any of the residents want to challenge:) outside dining areas has no sound system and I haven’t seen any of them making more noise then cars. They don’t also make more garbages than people or homeless or drug dealer population. I can still take a challenge on any of my comments let me know:)
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Brian Swift
Much of what I have to say on this subject is just a rehashing of many of the comments below, so I’ll summarize my views in bullet points:
Storage of private cars is one of the worst uses of our streetscape.
Outdoor dining sheds served as a much needed boost to restaurants during COVID, but we don’t need permanent outdoor dining year round anymore.
We should envision an outdoor dining solution that allows for daylighting, doesn’t consume energy to heat or cool the outdoors and doesn’t create a semi-permanent home for pests.
Outdoor dining should not push restaurant employees or diners to consistently cross bike lanes or car traffic.
Outdoor dining should not impede the flow of pedestrian traffic on particularly narrow streets.In sum, I think outdoor dining should consist of folding tables that restaurants can put out on the sidewalk when the weather is good. We should look into seizing existing parking spots to expand the availability of these outdoor dining setups. There may need to be a reorganization of our streetscape to accomodate these changes.
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CY
I’m a lifelong New Yorker with long COVID and I strongly support outdoor dining. It allows those of us who are disabled, immunocompromised, or otherwise trying to avoid COVID to participate in public life more safely and equitably. I hope we can work together to generate a plan that balances everyone’s needs in terms of reasonable noise levels, operating hours (9AM-9PM M-Th, 9AM-11PM F-Su), sanitation, and accessibility for the continued benefit of restaurant owners and residents alike.