Outdoor fires, heaters and tents could mark outdoor winter dining in Grand Rapids

GRAND RAPIDS, MI — Outdoor fires, tents, heaters, canopies and more could be coming to Grand Rapids streets as the city looks to keep its open-air street dining open through the winter.

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“Social zone” outdoor seating on Monroe Center St. NW in Grand Rapids on July 1, 2020. Grand Rapids city leaders are considering tools to give businesses that would help them adapt the social zones to winter use.

The heating devices and temporary structures would allow businesses, especially restaurants and bars, to maintain the additional outdoor seating during the coronavirus pandemic. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s restrictions on restaurants have limited the amount of people allowed for indoor dining.

City commissioners gave initial approval Tuesday morning, Sept. 29, at their Committee of the Whole meeting to several items related to the outdoor dining and drinking zones, as well as the tools businesses could use to adapt to the coming winter.

Final approval on the measures is expected to come at the commission’s 7 p.m. meeting Tuesday via a sweeping consent agenda vote.

Under the first proposal, the social zones initially established June 1 by the city would continue through May 31, 2021.

Social zones allow dining and drinking in designated areas of streets, sidewalks and parking lots throughout the city. The idea behind the zones is that restaurants, hamstrung by limited indoor dining due to COVID-19, can serve additional patrons through take-out meals that customers can eat at nearby street dining.

Related: Igloos, heated tents among ideas for Michigan restaurants anxious of looming cold weather

Patrons also can bring in sealed containers of alcohol to drink within the boundaries of the social zones. There are currently nine social zones in the city, with 16 distinct dining areas.

Some social zones, like the one downtown on Monroe Center, close portions of the roadway to accommodate the expanded seating.

“Multiple businesses have described Social Zones as helping them to survive and/or sustain higher customer volumes and payroll than would otherwise be the case,” Lou Canfield, the city’s development center manager, wrote to commissioners in his staff report on extending the social zone time frame. “Concerns generally are centered on a desire to maximize compliance with public health guidelines, as well as to ensure public enjoyment of Social Zones free from disruptions.”

Six of the nine zones currently overlap with “social districts,” which are areas where approved restaurants and bars can serve outdoor drinks for patrons to consume anywhere within the limits of the district.

If the latest round of businesses seeking social district privileges are approved, the total number of businesses in the city that can serve to-go drinks would be 41.

Related: Drinking areas could be designated in Calder Plaza, other public spaces in downtown Grand Rapids

To prepare for the upcoming winter, commissioners gave initial approval for businesses to install heating devices and wood fires as well as tents, canopies and other temporary structures to shield patrons from the cold.

The heating devices, as well as the limited wood fire pilot program, would need approval from the city’s Fire Department before businesses can install them. The wood fires cannot be within 120 feet of an occupied residence and come with other conditions.

Likewise, the temporary structures would need approval from city building officials before their construction.

Additional rules for the social zones given initial approval Tuesday morning include the banning of all begging and solicitation within 12 feet of a dining area within a social zone or done in a threatening or disorderly manner.

Skateboarding and biking are also up for being banned within the social zones.

City officials say the bans are to reduce close contact during the pandemic, and that the banning of begging and solicitation gives business owners the same rights they would have within their own establishments.

Another proposal given initial approval would provide expedited administrative approval from the Planning Department for the placement of outdoor structures related to business activity.

Lastly, commissioners gave initial approval as well to outdoor wood fires in certain areas of college campuses in the city to encourage students to spend more time outdoors, where transmission of COVID-19 is less easily spread.

Eligible colleges for this in the city are Aquinas College, Calvin University and Cornerstone University.

Read more:

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