City council approves more parking patios along Broadway, Riversdale and downtown

Customers may soon be able to dine “al fresco” at even more businesses in parts of Saskatoon.

At Monday’s meeting, city council voted to approve a motion to allow restaurants in the Broadway Ave., Riversdale, and downtown areas to install parking patios in front of their shops, and to keep them until at least mid-September.

The restaurants will be able to use one or two spaces in front of their establishments to set up the outdoor patios as a way to increase available space for customers.

Tourism Saskatoon Vice President Stephanie Clovechok made the request of council on behalf of businesses affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“It was an opportunity for us to ask council to extend a number of different policies and augment a number of policies as it relates to parking patios. Right now we know that our restaurant partners and our food tourism partners have been incredibly impacted by the global pandemic.”

Some of those policies include waiving the fees for creating those parking patios and refunding the fees some businesses have already paid out, allowing two parking patios per block, and allowing the patios to exist until the end of the year.

Council decided to waive the fees, which will result in a nearly $28,000 revenue loss for 2020, and will allow two patios per block.

The decision to allow them to remain for the rest of the year will be revisited at a later date.

Clovechok says they’re grateful for any measures the city can take to alleviate the financial strain on businesses.

“Food tourism partners, restauranteurs – they are not only an asset to our tourism industry – they are a critical part to our tourism framework and fabric here, and without them we would not have the global recognition that we have of being a world class culinary destination. So it is of greatest importance that we help these businesses survive in this critical time.”