Open city restaurants

If I were the dictator-mayor of a city, this is what I'd do: make many streets on-way, and use the opened up lane as sidewalk. Then use the sidewalks as open-air venues for restaurants that can't take customers in. That way everyone wins, folks get some semblance of sanity -- not only that, being able to eat out is a great way to de-stress even in normal times. The restaurants get their business back. The city gets tax revenue, doesn't have to spend on unemployment benefits. The local businesses get some folks walking out and about, and can leverage the attention towards their wares. The city live thrives, civic pride increase, people actually start caring about what happens in their surroundings. Cities become livable and walkable. Traffic decreases, because first, why bother, and second if everyone's out in the open it's a good idea to bike anyway. Public health improves due to increased biking.

I bring this up for a reason. Restaurants are opening in large cities with only open-air sitting allowed. It sucks when it rains, but they've got umbrellas, and besides if the rain's not serious enough it's not a big deal. While it's true this won't work for winter months, with nice gas heaters and some padding, it wouldn't be the worst idea in the world to keep at it. Let's open our streets, lets open our doors, lets make it happen folks!

Anywho, we went out for dinner last night. After almost four months for me, went to eat out on my Birthday in March before that. We went to a couple of restaurants and they had long waiting times, on a Tuesday evening. Finally got to the German bar that's been mentioned here before, sat down, got rained upon, left, got back in because we found a table with an umbrella and it stopped raining. It felt so nice. So many cute people to look at too. And it's fun to just experience the cool (it was kinda' humid) air, the people, the vibe of the city. So much fun.

The world would be a better place if we kept this up. I'm excited about the future. I'm cynical, it's unlikely it's going to happen, there's enough rich people driving expensive cars using super-duper subsidized parking and road space to stop this from happening. Particularly in large rich cities. But it's a possibility that has opened up. I'm cautiously optimistic.