January 11, 2024 / By mobanmarket
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DARIEN, CT — A Darien restaurant has asked the Board of Selectmen if it could lease spaces in the Center Street parking lot for six months out of the year to offer outdoor dining, which was a popular feature during the COVID-19 pandemic.
David Genovese, the founder of Baywater Properties which owns 980 Post Road, and Mario Fontana, owner of Bodega Taco Bar, went before the selectmen with the request on Monday night.
Citing the success of outdoor dining during the pandemic, Genovese and Fontana proposed leasing five spaces in the parking lot behind the restaurant from May to October, at $1,000 per month. There would be 54 seats added.
Fontana said he came up with the $1,000 number after looking at the value of a municipal permit and the amount of rent being paid per square foot.
The board did not take any action but expressed support for the idea.
First Selectman Jon Zagrodzky said the board will work on getting a lease drafted and consult with Planning & Zoning and the Architectural Review Board. Selectmen Sarah Neumann and Monica McNally agreed there should be escalators to the lease each year.
There are three tables in front of the restaurant and a small patio in the back, but the patio is adjacent to a garbage dumpster, Genovese said.
“We’ve tried to make it as nice as we could, but it’s still adjacent to a garbage dumpster and it’s not optimal outdoor seating,” Genovese said. “We’ve asked the town to reconsider allowing us to lease the five parking spaces from the town on a seasonal basis to allow Bodega to have outdoor dining again. They can’t invest in it and make it as nice as they would like if they’re not certain they can have this for some period of time.”
Zagrodzky asked Fontana what the vision would be for outdoor dining.
“What we try to do with our restaurant is to make you forget for 90 minutes, two hours that you’re in Connecticut,” Fontana said, calling it more of an outdoor garden than an outdoor patio. “We try to put in a little bit of escapism into what we do on the interior build-out and the ambiance. We would follow that path outside as well.”
For the first year, Fontana said he’d follow the same formula that was in place when the outdoor garden was set up during the pandemic.
“Once we were open and operating then we’d start to formulate and enhance how we would approach it for the remainder of whatever the agreed-upon term was,” Fontana said, adding that he would hire a designer and improve things like furniture, umbrellas and lighting.
McNally said she was concerned with taking away parking spaces when more might be needed because outdoor dining is so popular.
“The peak times in our restaurants are the peak times in almost all restaurants, which is between 6:30 p.m. and 8:30 p.m.,” Fontana said. “By that time of night, usually the parking lot behind us, there’s a lot of availability. During the day, most people will choose to sit outside. If it’s not a nice day, those people will choose to sit inside.”
Last year, Genovese said there were concerns about what the increased demand for parking would look like because the first phase of the Corbin District was opening. Those concerns were quelled during the summer and fall months, Genovese said, and now construction on the second phase has begun.
Baywater Properties was able to get an agreement with a bunch of neighboring property owners to disperse some of the parking for employees to other lots around town, according to Genovese.
Selectman Marcy Minnick asked if there were concerns about safety in the parking lot. Fontana said the barriers that are used are designed to New York Department of Transportation specifications.
Genovese and Fontana may need to appear before Planning & Zoning and the Architectural Review Board first before the Representative Town Meeting can vote on the proposal, likely in February.
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