Outdoor Dining Sheds Say Good-bye

: People eat dinner in an outdoor sidewalk shed at a restaurant on Bedford Street in Greenwich Village on December 17, 2021 in New York City.

NYC's dining sheds have to come down by the end of next week. Ryan Kailath, WNYC/Gothamist arts and culture reporter, breaks down what happens next for the restaurant industry, including new rules for roadway structures that will take effect starting April 1, 2025.

Title: Outdoor Dining Season Comes to a Close

Amina Srna: It's the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. I'm Amina Srna, a producer for the show, filling in for Brian today. More than 13,000 restaurants took advantage of outdoor dining during the pandemic, but in August, after a couple years of debate in the media and city council about rats and parking spaces, the city finally put new rules in place. Restaurants that wanted to keep outdoor dining had to apply to a new program with fees and strict design rules or remove their sheds completely. So far, almost 3,000 restaurants have applied to the new program, with far more restaurants interested in dining on the sidewalk itself versus dining sheds in the street. To make sense of what all this means, I'm joined by WNYC and Gothamist arts and culture reporter Ryan Kailath. Hi, Ryan. Welcome back to the show.

Ryan Kailath: Hey, Amina.

Amina Srna: Listeners, we do have just a few minutes for maybe one or two calls, but for those of you who do, or for those of you who have to work with outdoor dining sheds, restaurant workers, bar owners, what changes are your establishments planning to institute when you build your new outdoor dining shed this spring? Give us a call at 212-433-WNYC. That's 212-9692. Only restaurants with approved permits can continue to have street sheds, but even those approved restaurants have to take their street setups down for the season by late next week. What's the goal of doing this seasonally?

Ryan Kailath: Yes, so the deadline to come down for the season is November 29th. To be clear, this is just the sheds, right? The ones that sit in the street where cars sometimes go. Sidewalk dining, allowed year round. Open streets, everybody knows these. This is where they pull some barricades and close the street off for a few hours and you can drag tables. That's also year round and staying. The sheds need to come down November 29th. That goes back to what you mentioned. You know, rats and parking spaces, all the reasons these are controversial. Making it seasonal was a part of addressing those concerns.

Amina Srna: We do know these permits themselves cost a few thousand dollars, plus the additional costs of building the dining set, tearing it down, building it again. Do you think the cost is causing restaurants not to participate as readily?

Ryan Kailath: Oh, Yes. I don't just think so. They have told me that in large numbers. I talked to so many different restaurant owners who were like, we simply can't afford this. It's a few thousand dollars for the permit, as you said. There's takedown and setup costs. The city estimates that, at minimum, the new approved setups are in the five figures and that can go as fancy as you want, depending on how you want. A lot of small businesses just can't do this and they're opting out.

Amina Srna: We are going to bring in a fan of the outdoor dining sheds in just a minute. I do want to ask you about, do we know the new guidelines for these dining structures? What they have to look like or--?

Ryan Kailath: Yes, if I remember correctly, the set of rules is 37 pages long and I'm going to read the whole thing now. No, just kidding. [laughter] Yes, it's byzantine. The website even, it takes like an hour to navigate it. They're all well-intentioned. I think it's going to be safer. They're going to be-- sheds have to be far from stop signs so that traffic moves easily and everybody knows what's going on. There's safety stuff, there's rat, sanitation stuff, but it is onerous for a lot of people.

Amina Srna: I'm going to bring in a caller now. John Tymkiw has documented the outdoor dining scene in New York City for four years. He's also published a series of six books called How We Ate, available at howweate.com. Hi, John, welcome to WNYC.

John Tymkiw: Hi there. Thanks for having me.

Amina Srna: Tell us a little bit more about your photo series.

John Tymkiw: Well, you know, it started like, I think there's a lot of people during the early days where this was just one of the more interesting things you could do when there was nothing much to do. I soon realized that this was a moment in New York City history where something was changing and it might be worthwhile to actually document these properly. I really turned my hobby into a vocation, a calling. I think I've shot over a thousand outdoor dining shelters, which is maybe 8% or so of all of them that have been up.

Yes, and I keep publishing little books of my photographs. It's very interesting and very-- I'm very curious about these things. I think what draws me to these is the creativity and the interesting, unique solutions that people come up with to address the issues. Like Ryan was saying, the specifications on the website are very complicated and I think bureaucracy can get in the way of actual practicality, because when it boils down to it, the new rules are basically safety and cleanliness. For safety, you obviously have to have some kind of barriers.

What's new this year is the police and fire department want to be able to see through from the street to the sidewalks into the buildings. That's why they're not allowing these walls anymore, and the roof have to be taken off. Then for cleanliness, what I really am excited about is floors are not mandatory. Floors are the biggest problem, I think, for rats and for rodents and all kinds of critters and stuff-

Amina Srna: Yes, that's a big problem.

John Tymkiw: -that get in there. If you have a floor, you have to be able to get under there. What's not really stated clearly on the website is, it looks like, "Oh, this is what you have to do," but there's a lot of interesting solutions that are simple and are very cost effective.

Amina Srna: John, I hear you. For the interest of time, I believe Ryan has a question for you, so I'm going to throw to Ryan.

John Tymkiw: Oh, I'm sorry.

Ryan Kailath: Hey, John, I've seen your pictures. Very fun project.

John Tymkiw: Thank you.

Ryan Kailath: A sentiment that I hear a lot around now, and maybe you're documenting too, is that as these sheds are coming down all month, every New Yorker has noticed as they start to disappear. I think of it as that thing like, sometimes you turn a corner you've turned a million times and you can't tell, but something looks really different. Then you realize scaffolding has come down that was up for years. People are having that experience all over the city. Esthetically, I wonder what you think. Are some streets looking better? Are they being opened back up? You can wave to your neighbor across the street who you couldn't see before. Have you documented that at all?

John Tymkiw: In some ways better, in some ways worse, I think there was, you walked down the street and was like, "Oh, this was a fun street with people outside enjoying themselves, and now it's just boring parking again." Or like you said, you couldn't see across the street and now you can. I think it's kind of a mixed bag. For me personally, I think if there's nothing there and we're back to cars again, it feels a little more boring. I did do a little before and after video. You can see on-- I have an Instagram where I kind of do a fade out of before and after. I think we lose something. I think it loses a little bit of this kind of charm and community vibe that we get with outdoor dining when they're taken away.

Amina Srna: John Tymkiw has a book about the outdoor dining scene. You can check it out at howweate.com. Thank you so much for your time, John.

John Tymkiw: Oh, thanks. Thanks for the plug.

Amina Srna: Ryan, we just have about a minute left here, but I do want to ask you, how are restaurants impacted? Do we know yet? What are they saying?

Ryan Kailath: Yes, I've talked to so many. The thing I think that's important to understand is these rules opening up during the pandemic, for a lot of restaurants it wasn't just a pandemic lifeline. Hey, you can stay open during COVID. It was actually a lifeline for the business model of small restaurants in New York today. They were struggling even before the pandemic with high rents, with increased costs, et cetera. Many, many restaurants told me that having these extra seats outside where they could sometimes double or triple their number of seats, that's new revenue without a lot of added costs, that it saved their business model.

There are already restaurants that have been closing with these new rules. Not 100%. You know, there's inflation and other reasons, but there's restaurants that have been closing saying, without our outdoor seats, we're just not viable anymore.

Amina Srna: We have time for just one caller. Let's go to Marilyn in Manhattan. Hi, Marilyn, you're on WNYC.

Marilyn: Hi.

Amina Srna: I'm afraid we only have 15 seconds for you, just to let you know.

Marilyn: I'm going to get right to it.

Amina Srna: Thank you.

Marilyn: I noticed since the announcement of the change that a number of small places like coffee shops and a bakery that used to have seating just outside-- No, you know, no, whatever. The little cabins there-- have taken in their chairs and tables and no longer have their on the street seating. That's a real loss because that was very charming and easy and nice to be able to be at. I wondered why that would be. What were they [crosstalk] [unintelligible 00:10:16] .

Amina Srna: Marilyn, I'm just going to get a quick response for you from Ryan. Any thoughts about what Marilyn had to say?

Ryan Kailath: I'm afraid we probably don't have time for that. It's a long one.

Amina Srna: [laughs] Well, we'll leave it there for today. My guest has been WNYC and Gothamist reporter Ryan Kailath. We'll have you back to talk more. We had a lot of calls we didn't get to. You can read more of his work at gothamist.com. Thank you so much, Ryan.

Ryan Kailath: Thanks.

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