Monday, May 24, 2021

Restaurant shanties usurps nearly 9,000 curb spaces meant for cars

 


 NY Post

They have an appetite for obstruction!

Restaurants have gobbled up around 8,550 publicly-owned curbside parking spots for their outdoor seating set-ups since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to city data.

Since last June, City Hall and the Department of Transportation have let eateries build the dining areas in the now-former spots outside their storefronts. At the time, indoor eating was restricted amid the pandemic, though Mayor de Blasio has declared that the program will be permanent and year-round.

Around 11,500 restaurants joined the program, of which about 5,700 have chosen to set up shop along the curb. That adds up to “roughly” 8,550 spots transformed — out of around 3 million total parking spots across the five boroughs, City Hall spokesman Mitch Schwartz said.

For the operators of TRU Astoria cafe on Ditmars Boulevard, the extra space was well worth the trade-off — as business has “more than doubled” since installing dining tables along the sidewalk and curb.

“Thank god we adjusted. The extended patio. The outdoor seating. Being able to use the street. It strengthened our brand,” said Yanni Stathakis, 48, operations director for Astoria Hospitality Group, which owns the eatery.

“People in all five boroughs are now coming to Astoria to eat here at Ditmars. It was good the city did this.”

But just across the road, Sal Barretta of Alba’s Pizza said the program has taken a bite out of his business.

“My customers are telling me they aren’t coming here because they can’t find parking,” said Barretta, who opted not to set up dining tables in the roadbed because he figured there was plenty of space inside.

“The sheds, I did not do it. Maybe I should have,” Baretta said. “But we don’t need to be on the street. We have 101 seats inside. These sheds, really dangerous. It’s a huge liability. It’s dirty. It’s dangerous. You’re breathing in all the exhaust from the cars.”

Baretta said the restaurant next door to his closed months ago — but its outdoor dining set-up continues to clog up potential parking spots.

“The place next door, six months out of business. Still these three parking spots are closed because he left these out in the street,” Baretta said. “It makes no sense, but with this mayor — there’s no enforcement, no oversight. I don’t know what they hell he’s doing.”


13 comments:

Anonymous said...

Meant for cars? More entitlement from car owners. Park it in your living room, just like they do in Asia.

Unknown said...

Those spaces are now being used by far more than 9000 people per day, and they're paying to use them. Much better for business than parking spaces.

Anonymous said...

Parking spaces are generally turned over multiple times a day, too, and patrons use them when they visit restaurants.

Anonymous said...

Come on, man
Where will I Charge my new $75,000 Tesla ?

Anonymous said...

Shanties ? I'm French Canadian and find that word RACISt !

Anonymous said...

I thought we were depending on Antifa and BLM to clear these spaces out. Where are they when we really need them?

Anonymous said...

Start to boycott restaurants with street shacks and do not sit in the dangerous shack - go inside.

Anonymous said...

Good restaurants will survive . There arent' any decent restaurants in Middle Village, Maspeth ,barely any in Woodside. So this realy won't effect them.
Maybe somein Forest Hills,Bayside, LIC,Astoria..... but lets face it. There are very few palces to waste your money to eat out in.
Cheers.

Anonymous said...

These loss of parking spots can take away from business too because people won't want to come if there is no parking. And heaven forbid if people who actually live here actually take the trains and busses. I've never seen so many cars in my life in nyc. 35 years of living here and the amount of cars here is only getting worst. Clean up the subways, tax owning cars, limit the amount of cars one person can own without a garage, and start reversing this dumb law of not limiting uber and taxi cars and start getting the trillion cars out of this city. Its fucking ridiculous. I thought people moved here to use public transportation not to own multiple cars. If you want to own more than one car, then you should be required to rent a garage or show proof that you own a driveway that can accommodate more than 1 or 2 cars. This is just ridiculous here anymore.

Queens car friendly silent majority said...

With those streetsblog assholes. The next thing they will say is that owning a car is racist. Or what about that psycho in the streetsblog comments section vooch who always says car driving is like a smoking addition, that is a laughable analogy that doesn't make sense and shows they are desperate and agressive.

Anonymous said...

I know this is too common sense to ever happen but what if wanted to park a car on a street in NYC over night that car had to be registered to an NYC address. In my neighborhood in Ridgewood on any given block on any given day it would open up a large amount of spaces for cars registered out of state.

Anonymous said...

Here's My Proof said...
"Show proof that you own a driveway" Get lost Big Brother. My car is taxed, my gas is taxed, my tires are taxed, soon my feet will be taxed by people like you asking for more government control and taxes that hurt the middle class working men and women of this country.

Erik Baard said...

I remember the days when a lack of parking spaces was supposedly going to KILL restaurants. ;)

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