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Gothamist received an intriguing email from reader S.:
Thought you might be interested in hearing that the Dept of Buildings posted signs on most of the doors of restaurants on Smith Street during business hours last night, ordering them to close their gardens immediately. It seems that there are conflicting laws regarding the use of back gardens at restaurants and bars in Brooklyn, and the Dept. picked one set and is cracking down. The restaurant owners have no clue where to start as far as getting some sort of permit so that their main revenue builder in the summer can stay open. Some restaurants are ignoring it for now until their hearing date so they can get due process, others are scared of getting fined and have closed their gardens. That's all the scoop I got, but it sucks for Brooklyn residents!Does anyone know what's going on? There's a reason why the Smith Street restaurant scene exploded - great chefs were attracted by lower rents/operating costs. City Councilman David Yassky will have to work on a referendum to have the DoB ease up on outdoor dining, because that's one of the purest joys of warm weather months.
Citysearch on the best outdoor dining and New York magazine's list of 543 restaurants that offer outdoor dining. Some of Gothamist's very favorite restaurant gardens are the one at Paradou in the Meatpacking district and Five Front in Brooklyn - what's your favorite?
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Dear Lord - my favorite garden is Robin Des Bois, on, well, Smith Street in Brooklyn. If this is being shut down, we'll need to re-enact Bastille Day to break it out of it's regulatory prison.
well, you know, terrorists like to be outdoors.
therefore the back gardens must be closed.
yay government!
AOC on Bleeker has a decent garden. Five Ninth in the MePa isn't bad.
Most of the restaurants on Smith Street kind of suck anyway, barring a couple of exceptions (maybe 2 or 3). I know everyone talks about how great it is, but the best restaurants are still going to be in Manhattan. Sorry to spoil it for you folks.
is this only for restaurants or is it also for bars? they better not close the gowanus yacht club!
Dude, are you saying Manhattan is better than Brooklyn for restaurants? How dare you!
Pioneer Bar in Red Hook has great outdoor dining, haven't been over to Smith Street in a while.
Liquors on Dekalb Ave. in Fort Greene has a very cool garden space and serves a mean cocktail. There is restaurant life in Brooklyn outside Carroll Gardens.
Oh, I hope this turns out not to be true. I live in the neighborhood and I think I spend half my life in gardens at restaurants/bars on Smith St.
I second that Pioneer is good- Went there recently w/ friends and had the garden entirely to ourselves for nearly the whole evening.
Following up on Austin's comment, Fort Greene has fantastic outdoor dining.
On DeKalb: Liquors, Lulu, and Chez Oscar are fantastic.
Maggie Brown on Myrtle and Pacena on S. Portland are my favorites.
I think Liquors, Chez Oscar, and I-Shebeen Madiba are too expensive for the quality - for dinner, anyway. It's DeKalb, not Lexington. Still, it's fun to eat outdoors, and I LOVE Liquors weekend brunch. I still haven't been to Loulou, but I'll surely try it soon. I love Pequena as well. Been meaning to try the Cafe Habana outpost.
I hate to say it, but I'm all for this crackdown. Apartment 138's back garden has been making me miserable since they opened, and no amount of pleading will make them control the noise. One of the owners hung up on me the last time I called to ask them to keep it down (at 1 AM, mind you). Hopefully this will save me some money on legal fees.
I've been told that the restaurants on Smith St. do not have licenses to use the backyards nor was permission to use the backyards granted in their leases. This has caused residents to be particularly irrate about the situation and hence the resolution and subsequent action by the landlord. In June, Brooklyn CB6 adopted a resolution calling on the establishment of a Mayoral Task Force to study backyard gardens. This only affects backyard gardens where there is not multiple points of entry and exits (e.g. pacifica and gravy i believe are ok) and not side yards (e.g. Yacht Club is ok). BUT a place like Robin des Bois, Brooklyn Social, Lobo, etc. are prob not ok from what I understand...
sripraphai in queens has quite a lovely garden, which you wouldn't know from its insurance office style storefront.
Lobo should be forced to close just because the new name is bad. I liked the old name - bring it back!
Speaking of which, has anyone gone to Blue Star? That place double blows. I realized, after I ate there, that it's run by the same guy that ran Swim, or whatever it was called on DeGraw. I think it was an "oyster bar"; they had a "Grateful Brunch" on the weekends, where he served crappy food and sang along to Grateful Dead music - not my idea of a good time.
Blue Star's food seems better than Swim's was, but it's just as irritating. I think the Community Board should investigate restaurants with irritating owners, and kick this place to the curb.
Hooray - As a resident - who needs to hear yakking and clanging of dishes. The bars/restaurants invade the sidewalks and then they want the backyards too (where noise echos).
Close down the 'gardens'!
I am THRILLED to find this...a bit belatedly. Does anyone know where this stands at the moment? I HATE having to listen to Cholitas' (on Smith Street) music day and night. I live at least half a block from them so the noise is really unreasonable. I moved to Brooklyn to have a nice quiet garden. I'm a writere and a meditator so this kind of constant noise really interferes with my life. I also love Robin des Bois and have noticed they're much more quiet than they used to be. If everyone could just keep it down we wouldn't need to run them out of business.