ANNAPOLIS, Md. — If you frequent Annapolis, it's hard to remember a time when this wasn't normal - people eating in parking lots and on side streets. It's hard to imagine downtown without it now.
The city council just made a move to ensure this type of outdoor dining sticks around a little while longer.
"Over the years, it's given a whole totally different feel to all of downtown," Bob Harrison, owner of the Market House, told WMAR-2 News as we talked amidst outdoor diners taking advantage of the unseasonably warm November day.
The concept of expanding outdoor dining was born out of necessity, a way for restaurants to survive during COVID-era restrictions.
"Of course, at the time, there were so many people afraid to eat outdoors, so it made all the difference in the world. Most of us down here probably wouldn't be here today if they didn't allow this outdoor dining," Harrison said.
Although those restrictions haven't been in place for years, restaurant owners and their customers have gotten used to this new way of dining out.
"The outside area has doubled our capacity so obviously, we can all do that math," Gary Beardmore, general manager of The Federal House, said.
The permits do cost money, but business owners say the benefits outweigh the cost.
The Federal House in Market Space has even been able to add more staff. Examples like that are why the Annapolis City Council has been in no rush to dismantle what was initially thought to be a temporary fix. Year after year, the council has voted to extend the so-called "Parking Lot Dining Program" for another 12 months.
"We've been optimistic but in the back of our mind it is a little nerve-wracking, because it would change drastically if we went back to the way things were."
Some council members hope it never does. Three of them recently put forth legislation to make the current outdoor dining program a permanent fixture in the city. The law would only allow it through mid-April to Nov 1.
In case that law doesn't pass quickly, the council just voted on Monday to extend the program for another year.
"We're just waiting to get that OK to make it permanent and then the next phase of that goes into effect," Beardmore said. "One thing we would push for is to brick the whole area."
In 2022, the city conducted a study to examine the impact of the Parking Lot Dining Program on business owners, the fiscal impact on the city itself, and the impact of the loss of parking spots in the area. The study found that the outdoor dining program had positive impacts on the participating restaurants’ bottom lines. The program was found to have little fiscal impact on the city in its temporary format. If it were made permanent, “direct fiscal impact would be the cost of additional inspections, adjustments to use permits, and an increase in capital facilities fees related to the additional restaurant occupancy.”
Issues with parking were identified mostly in the Eastport neighborhood. The study’s authors write: “The primary impact of the Parking Lot Dining Pilot Program on the Eastport community is on-street parking on 4th Street, Chesapeake Avenue and Severn Avenue. There are clearly times, especially on weekends. when restaurant patrons who might otherwise have parked in the restaurants’ lots, park on these streets in competition with residents. Another impact related to increased traffic and congestion from the 4th Street restaurants is an incidence of vehicles, especially trucks, unable to negotiate narrow streets, damaging cars parked on the street, including hitting parked vehicles and damaging or removing rear view mirrors. Recent studies adopted by the City Council have identified implementable solutions to the issues voiced by residents of parking scarcity, management, and traffic congestion, but have yet to be implemented.”
