Skip to content

Outdoor dining on Main Street one step closer

Barrhead and District Chamber of Commerce present tentative plan to allow Main Street businesses open temporary outdoor patios
Gazebo pic copy
The Barrhead and District Chamber of Commerce suggested that the town add additional picnic tables at the community gazebo and park as part of a community outdoor patio strategy. Barry Kerton/BL

 

BARRHEAD - Restaurants, coffee shops and other eateries on Barrhead's Main Street are one step closer to being able to open temporary outdoor patios.

The real question is what form they will take.

The Barrhead and District Chamber of Commerce narrowed down some of the possibilities during a presentation to the Town of Barrhead councillors during their May 11 meeting.

Councillors approved the presentation as information and instructed administration to draft a plan for May 25's meeting to see how it would work.

Coun. Dausen Kluin brought up the possibility of allowing the businesses to set up temporary outdoor patios on April 13 to help them mitigate the impact of public health restrictions that prohibited in-person indoor dining. Shortly after, the province also restricted outdoor patio dining.

Council delayed a decision to see if there was any interest from the businesses by asking the Chamber of Commerce.

Kristine Bryant and Dave Sawatzky, 1st and 2nd chamber presidents, said they polled Main Street eateries and came up with potential options to make it a reality.

Bryant said not only would the outdoor patios potentially help one of the hardest-hit sectors of the pandemic, but it could be a selling point for Main Street for years to come.

"We have the opportunity to create an atmosphere in our downtown where people will want to stop and explore, to allow our businesses to be successful in or out of COVID restrictions," she said.

The chamber investigated what other communities have done in regards to allowing permanent and temporary outdoor seating areas.

Sawatzky said the chamber suggests going the temporary route, not only to allow businesses to be ready to take advantage of the outdoor seating areas when public health restrictions are lifted, but because of the cost.

He added if the concept of temporary seating was well accepted by both the businesses and the public, in future years they could look into expanding the program by allowing businesses to install more permanent structures.

Bryant agreed, saying after talking to the restaurants the chamber came up with three basic configurations. The first was to allow businesses to set up small tables on the municipal sidewalk. Tim Hortons, Pizza O'more and Barrhead Bakery expressed interest in this approach.

The second option would allow businesses to set up tables on the municipal sidewalk and then block off a portion of the parking stalls to use as a temporary walk-around. In this scenario, the town would have to install a temporary ramp to help people with mobility issues access the walk-around.

Later in the meeting, Kluin suggested the ramp could be the same type that the Barrhead Accessibility Coalition utilizes. He noted that the association has been making the ramps with the assistance of students in the Barrhead Composite High School's woodworking program.

BTowns and the Flower Shoppe favoured this approach.

About six parking spots would be needed, divided between the two businesses to accommodate for the walkarounds.

As part of its plan, the chamber recommended that the town install extra picnic tables at the small park at the gazebo.

"The tables would be installed at the municipality's expense, but there are restaurants that are willing to sponsor the tables with their name and contact information on it or maybe a QR code that would link to the businesses' website," she said.

Kluin asked if the chamber consulted with any of the restaurants not on Main Street, namely the Spring Sun or the Prairie Chef.

Sawatzky said no, adding they wanted to see how the initiative would work on one street before potentially expanding it.

Coun. Ty Assaf supported the plan but was concerned that any structures put in place to create the walkarounds would interfere with the Main Street revitalization project.  Construction will start in June and is expected to take about 10 days.

Mayor Dave McKenize noted any structures would be temporary and easily removed.

"Between the inevitable weather issues and construction, is it worth the restaurants' effort to put the tables out there for such a brief time?" Assaf then asked.

Bryant said the restaurants they talked to were excited about the opportunity.

"Knowing that our community has had the uptake and enjoyed outdoor dining at other businesses, they see it as having the potential to help businesses, despite it having some risk," she said, the risk being the potential of future public health restrictions as well as the weather.

Coun. Don Smith supported the concept but asked if the neighbouring businesses had any reservations about losing parking stalls.

Sawatzky said they did not have a chance to talk to all the businesses potentially impacted, but in the discussions they did have, no one expressed any concerns.

Barry Kerton, TownandCountryToday.com

 


Barry Kerton

About the Author: Barry Kerton

Barry Kerton is the managing editor of the Barrhead Leader, joining the paper in 2014. He covers news, municipal politics and sports.
Read more



Comments

push icon
Be the first to read breaking stories. Enable push notifications on your device. Disable anytime.
No thanks