New York City launches new website that offers outdoor dining shed guidance
NEW YORK (PIX11) -- Outdoor dining in New York City is here to stay, but changes are coming in August and November.
The NYC Department of Transportation launched The Dining Out NYC Marketplace website on Monday to try to help restaurant owners who want to participate in the permanent program to keep the street sheds and sidewalk structures.
"We want to make it as easy as possible for businesses to participate in Dining Out NYC," Ydanis Rodriguez, the NYC DOT commissioner, told PIX11 News.
The website includes a search engine for vendors that can help restaurants comply with the new prototypes for street sheds.
The site has businesses "that can provide the services they need to remove, install, and assemble the new type of dining out structure," Rodriguez said.
According to the DOT, restaurants participating in the current roadway program must apply for Dining Out NYC by Aug. 3.
Restaurants with existing setups that do not apply for Dining Out NYC must remove their setups from the roadway by Aug. 3. Restaurants that do apply before Aug. 3 must have a compliant setup in place within 30 days of their application's approval.
If a restaurant is waiting for approval beyond Aug. 3, it can continue operating under the old rules.
The sidewalk program is year-round, but setups on roadways are now seasonal. Participants in Dining Out NYC will have to take their setups down by Nov. 29 and can set them up again beginning April 1, 2025.
"It is kind of a lot of work, so we're waiting to see how everyone else responds. We'd have to build a whole new setup and then be able to store it every year, over the winter...it would be very difficult to do," Greg Baumgartner, the manager of Karazishi Botan on Smith Street in Brooklyn, told PIX11 News.
Marco Erdo, the owner of Levant on Smith, told PIX11 News that his current street shed cost $20,000 to build and that it "doubles our revenue."
He is concerned about the cost of bringing it into compliance and adds that he has nowhere to store it over the winter.
"The basement is for storing our wine, our dry food, so it is going to be very hard for us," Erdo said.
The DOT points out that the vendors on the marketplace site offer more easily storable offerings and services like setup, tear-down, and storage.