Tables outside La Boite en Bois on 68th.
By Renée Roden
At the Community Board 7 Business and Consumer Issues Committee meeting on July 8, the committee discussed the current safety hazards posed to communities by restaurant seating on sidewalks and streets. The committee deliberated as well on how to respond to the Department of Transportation’s Open Restaurants Guidelines.
The Committee Co-Chairperson Linda Alexander moved to write a letter to the New York City Department of Transportation (DOT). She said she gets “apoplectic” when she thinks of the three months that DOT had to create guidelines for restaurants opening with outdoor seating, but did not roll out guidelines until 24 hours of the Phase II re-opening on June 22.
Josh Cohen pushed back on this letter-writing proposal and asked what the committee was hoping to accomplish with the letter, “What are we getting at? Just feeling better by saying how annoyed we are?” “Yes,” responded Alexander emphatically.
“There’s nothing to be gained by it,” protested Barbara Adler, “There’s no question that they’ve made a lot of mistakes, but those mistakes have already been made, but we need to move forward with them,” she continued.
Alexander noted that these safety measures come with a cost. “DOT could have started with their own barriers,” but they didn’t use them, and they refused to loan them to the restaurant owners. Substantial barriers cost a lot, and Alexander noted now is not the time for cash-strapped owners to shell out thousands of dollars for proper barriers.
Andrew Rigie says that the DOT also changed the guidelines on restaurants who had already begun building their outdoor spaces, and the letter the DOT sent to restaurant owners with updated guidelines implied that the restaurant owners would have their outdoor space privileges revoked and receive a fine. The confusion caused by the rollout of guidelines and the potential punishments has worried restaurant owners.
Alexander says that she was getting calls from local restaurant owners who were afraid of getting fined by the DOT. Rigie noted that the DOT has not issued any fines, but they are sending inspectors to restaurants, ensuring compliance to the standard to increase diners’ safety.
Rigie posed the question: “Are we asking for something specific in the letter? Or is the letter just to say, ‘you screwed up’?”
Committee member William Ortiz suggested the letter look to the future. He said we could write a letter “not only to the DOT, but anyone who could help build a ‘future checklist’ or best practices for business owners” in order to better deal with a future wave of the pandemic.
Restaurateur Alon Chadad offered a concrete suggestion for the letter. He noted the steep cost of building outdoor seating spaces. He said, “Sending something to the city should be to help the mom and pop shops who can’t afford the tens of thousands of dollars” to build the necessary safety barriers. Committee member Susan Schwartz noted that when the weather gets colder, there would be an additional cost of installing heat lamps. Rigie seconded Chabad’s suggestion of building a fund for small business owners who don’t have the capital to build out the infrastructure for outdoor dining.
Chadad ultimately questioned how much good these safety requirements could do on their own. If the cars are speeding past the restaurants, “I don’t know what the difference is between a five-inch barrier or eighteen-inch barrier,” he added.
“Why is the bike lane so sacrosanct?” asked Schwartz. She suggested that the bike lanes be repurposed for restaurants since servers put themselves at risk crossing the bike lanes to the outdoor seating. Schwartz apologized for what might be a “controversial statement,” “I know it sounds like I’m anti-bike, but I’m not.” CB7 president Mark Diller said that the DOT had considered switching the parking spaces and the bike lanes, so that the green strip would go around the outdoor dining space instead of through the servers’ path to the seating.
Doug Kleiman noted that the danger from bike lanes in the middle of restaurant traffic is a danger that goes both ways, “I was on a CitiBike last night going north on Amsterdam, and there were patrons who might have had…a few, and they walked right in front of me and didn’t even look, so I had to stop in my tracks. So it’s concerning”
The committee consensus landed on not writing a letter to DOT, since the DOT does not seem to be issuing fines to restaurants. And they decided not to ask for funds for mom and pop restaurants or for a lending program for barriers for small businesses.
Alexander said they had already asked the DOT for barriers for restaurants, and they were not able to lend them to restaurants since they’re “using a lot of their barriers to protect the statues.”
It is possible to be both anti bike AND anti sidewalk restaurant tables. Take me for example. I am pro-pedestrian. Both the bikes and the tables create difficult obstacles and potential peril for walkers. I give the tables a pass for now, understanding that restaurants can’t serve indoors and likely won’t be able to for many months. But the bikes gotta go. NYC and bicycles are not a happy marriage. They could be, if cyclists obeyed traffic rules, stayed off sidewalks, etc. But I don’t expect that to happen in my lifetime.
For the pro-pedestrian lobby, would they suggest removing all trees, restaurant signage and traffic signage? NY sidewalks are not wide enough to accomodate these features. The trees paint a false picture from above that the city is “green” but when they are stationed beside 5 lanes dedicated to moving Karen in her SUV then they are pointless. We’ve already seen a number of incidents of drivers ploughing through outdoor dining so bikes should be the least of anyones worries.
Great job Ethan, making first post in an article on the safety of outdoor dining a finger-pointing anti biking comment…
I’m assuming your “Great job” is meant sarcastically, AJ, but if you would actually read the article, you will find that my earlier comment is entirely pertinent. Thanks.
Wouldn’t be a WSR article without some illogical anti-bike rants. It’s like the sun rising in the East; just the way it is.
Ethan, I could not agree more about the bicycles. I find that now more than ever there are cyclists on the sidewalks. And crossing the bike lanes is whiplash inducing, I never know which way the bikes are coming from. Crossing the street has become an obstacle course. The traffic doesn’t move freely, there are cars parked in the middle of the street, there are too many traffic lights and talking posts that scold WAIT!, mini medians with signage and those plastic things that stick up from the ground. And on the corner of 97th and west end there are boulders too. It’s all too confusing and quite ugly.
All this bike chaos is happening in the under-used bike lanes? What you say is a gross exaggeration and points to nervous anxiety you probably have navigating urban streets with or without bike lanes. At most, you have to cross 3 bike lanes going from Riverside Drive to Central Park. Is that a walk you take often? If you can’t look both ways and cross a bike lane, then NYC streets are not for you. There are plenty of 2-way bike lanes so bikes don’t necessarily have to follow the direction of vehicular traffic. How would you cross those lanes?
The boulders at 97 and a West End are to prevent cars from parking in such a way that causes a pedestrian blind spot. Before the re-engineering of the corner cars would whip around the corner. A child was killed there.
Why would anyone want to eat in a repurposed bike/parking lane with cars and buses passing within inches of their table?
How could this possibly be considered a pleasant dining experience??
I am surprised that weekend street closing was not mentioned as a possibility. Why not close Columbus and northbound Broadway every other weekend, alternating with Amsterdam and southbound Broadway?
Excellent solution V.N.!
I have never seen the charm of dining in the gutter.
heres a story relating to your comment
https://nypost.com/2020/07/11/nyc-restaurants-now-battling-rat-problems-amid-covid-19/
There’s something strange and wonderful about people who spend $40K renovating their kitchens and then fight to eat outside in overpriced, often mediocre restaurants on the sidewalk amid the noise and the pollution.
Everyone wants the restaurants to survive but very few are willing to eat in the filthy street(myself included).