Restaurant owners in New York City are poised to close thousands of outdoor sheds that sprang up during COVID-19 as they no longer feel that they are worth the money and trouble.
A new regulation, known as “Dining Out NYC,” went into effect on August 3 and requires restaurant owners to pay an annual cost based on the size of their sidewalk café in addition to a four-year license fee ranging from $1,050 to $2,100. If their business is located below 125th Street in Manhattan, they must also pay an additional tax.
As a result, by the end of this year, the number of restaurants offering outdoor eating is expected to drop from over 13,000, which used it in some capacity starting in 2020, to just a few thousand. According to the city Department of Transportation, less than 2,600 restaurants submitted applications for licenses prior to the deadline last week – in contrast to the almost 6,000 eateries that boasted COVID-era eating permits as recently as last month. The deadline of August 3 was limited to individuals who already had setups, according to the DOT.
Restaurants that do not comply with the new requirements or fail to remove their existing sheds will now risk penalties starting at $500.
Redesigned outside eating program “draws on lessons learned” during COVID-19 pandemic, according to Mayor Eric Adams. Although it prevented as many as 100,000 people from losing their jobs, the original outside dining initiative also “led to quality-of-life issues as a subset of restaurant owners were unable to maintain loosely regulated outdoor dining setups” – including roving rats, rowdy late-night diners, and “slum”-like shacks that harmed upscale neighboring streets.
