BUFFALO, N.Y. (WBEN) – Chippewa Street between Delaware Avenue and Franklin Street is closed until Labor Day in an effort to help restaurants recoup costs they lost due to restrictions implemented because of coronavirus.
Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown and other cities officials announced the closure on Friday afternoon. The closure took effect at 2 p.m.
“During the course of COVID-19 we’ve been looking for ways to support businesses in the City of Buffalo, particularly restaurants that have been hit by COVID-19,” Mayor Brown said. “We knew that even when restaurant and businesses reopened, it would be with limited capacity. Our commissioners and staff in city government came up with the idea of a small business, social distancing initiative to allow businesses to expand on the outside of their business so they could increase capacity safely.”
This stretch of Chippewa Street includes Jim’s Steakout, Buffalo Tap House, Bottom’s Up, Soho Buffalo, Rec Room, Local Kitchen and Beer Bar, and other businesses. These restaurants will now expand their seating outside another eight feet into the road where cars typically park.
“82 percent of the hundreds (of people) we sent (a survey) to said they would feel far more comfortable eat on a patio outside,“ Rachael DeDomico of the Chippewa Alliance said. “We all started talking and collaborating and came up with this fantastic idea to close down the street and bring the patios out into the streets so we can get more people out here and help make this neighborhood look more vibrant and have something a little different than we did in the past.”