Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Outdoor Dining topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
CB2 chair pushes for clearer ADA guidance and cites lower fees after outdoor-dining walkthrough
Summary
Manhattan Community Board 2 leaders said a May walk-through with the city raised accessibility and enforcement questions for Dining Out NYC, and stressed the city’s post-pandemic fee structure is generally cheaper for many sidewalk cafes.
Valerie Dela Rosa, chair of Manhattan Community Board 2, said at the board’s May Executive Committee meeting that a walkthrough on McDougal Street with Council Member Ydanis Rodriguez’s office and Small Business Services staff identified recurring accessibility and demarcation problems at outdoor dining sites.
The committee chair said the walk-through included the Department of Transportation (DOT) outreach lead for Dining Out NYC and the Department of Small Business Services (SBS). Board leaders told committee members they pressed for clearer, centralized guidance from the Mayor’s Office for People with Disabilities and DOT on the 36-inch (3-foot) minimum accessible route required under ADA Title II.
"What we really want is clear guidance about that 36 inches accessible route," Dela Rosa said, noting that current online guidance is fragmented across an Open Restaurants PDF and a 311 knowledge base. She said that some operators and applicants are not following standard demarcation practices and that SBS flagged accessibility as an issue.
The chair and other members described a pattern in which some curbside and roadway dining enclosures do not meet DOT configuration rules (for example, enclosures that are closed on four sides or that use vertical bars that DOT staff judged noncompliant). Board members said DOT’s enforcement typically begins with a 30‑day corrective action request before summonses are issued.
Dela Rosa also framed the program’s economics: she told committee members CB2 now has roughly double the number of sidewalk café participants than before the pandemic and said fees have been reduced under the Dining Out NYC framework. "For the majority of the land area of CB2, it is 55% cheaper to participate in the program than it was in the pre-pandemic sidewalk café program," she said, adding an example that a prior fee of about $40 per square foot for some zones is now approximately $18 per square foot for comparable sidewalk space.
Committee members said that fee-zone maps produce uneven pricing across nearby blocks (for example, different Hudson Street pricing below Christopher Street). The walk-through, they said, highlighted a need for improved interagency coordination among DOT, SBS and MOPD to clarify compliance and to ensure Liquor License Committee reviewers and other permit reviewers are aware of accessibility requirements.
Board members asked the office to track outstanding corrective actions and to feed specific compliance examples to DOT and MOPD for follow-up. Dela Rosa said CB2 will continue advocacy for clearer, consolidated online guidance and for stronger coordination between agencies so operators and the public understand ADA requirements for outdoor dining.
The board expects the Outdoor Dining Working Group and SLA committees to continue reporting back as new applications and corrective actions are filed and processed.
