This weekend marked the deadline for restaurants to apply for the city’s new outdoor dining program.
The program will require permits for sheds, which are only allowed to be up between April 1 and Nov. 29 of each year. Restaurants will also have to follow a standardized design and be removed every winter.
Any restaurants that still have outdoor dining setups that are not approved by the city will risk being fined $500 on a first offense.
While the Open Restaurants program during the pandemic was popular, with an estimate 13,000 restaurants participating, the city says it has received fewer than 3,000 applications as of the deadline.
Ya-Ting Liu, the city’s first-ever chief public realm officer, joined NY1 political reporter Ayana Harry on “Inside City Hall” Monday to discuss more.