Outdoor Eating Returning to 5th Ave in St. Cloud

(KNSI) – St. Cloud will close a downtown street to make room for more dining as COVID-19 restrictions on restaurants stay in place.

The agreement worked out so well last year that it’s happening again.

St. Cloud officials met with business owners along historic 5th Avenue South on Monday to make plans to bring back outdoor seating under the festoon lights.

Ray Harrington owns 7 West TapHouse and Pioneer Place on Fifth and told KNSI’s Dan “The Ox” Ochsner that he can’t wait to start serving on the street.

“We’re all excited everyone I’ve met with and the city also, everyone’s all fired up. We know what a great success it was last year. It benefited the restaurants during a tough time. So, everyone’s working together on it, and everyone feels really good about it going into it this year.”

Restaurants were allowed to serve food outside to help restaurants serve more customers while maintaining social distance during the pandemic.

Harrington says business owners are working with the St. Cloud to make the outdoor seating a little different this year.

“So, this year, now that we have a little more heads up, we can make it a little more attractive, so it looks more like a more common area and not just sectioned off with cement barricades and orange columns. We’re trying to make a little better looking and still safe and secure.”

St. Cloud is looking at possibly hosting outdoor dining on the street yearly.

Outdoor dining will begin in April and continue through September.

St. Cloud is still meeting with business owners to finalize the plans for outdoor seating.

St. Cloud Convention and Visitors Bureau Executive Director Julie Lunning says the deal will be a big help to many downtown restaurants.

“We’re now at 75% occupancy on the interior with additional outdoor seating. Unfortunately, some of our local restaurants are pretty much capped out. So, where we’re at with social distancing, although we have occupancies that have moved to 75%, it really doesn’t change capacities for restaurants all that much.”

Lunning says business won’t truly be back to normal until all the occupancy restrictions are lifted.

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