DALLAS (WBAP & KLIF News) — The Dallas City Council’s Quality of Life Committee is mulling changes to noise and parking ordinances as they pertain to bars and restaurants.
Under the proposed changes, Dallas bars would be required to close at midnight instead of 2:00 AM, and establishments with uncovered outdoor patios would be required to add additional parking based on the square footage of the patio.
The proposal is a result of Dallas residents who live near popular nightlife spots filing complaints about noise and disorderly conduct.
“It’s not just a matter of noise late at night,” said one Dallas resident in favor of the changes. “It’s people urinating in our shrubbery and trampling the shrubbery, vomiting on our sidewalks, and passing out on our front porches.”
A group of Dallas restaurant owners who oppose the changes have banded together to form a group called “Save the Patio,” whose website says “we believe the restaurant, bar, and entertainment industry is a tremendous contributor to Dallas’ economic growth” and “we want to live and work in a sophisticated city that supports walkability, outdoor patios, and late-night serving hours.”
Chris Zielke is the owner of Chicken Scratch, The Foundry, Smoke, Bolsa, and The Theodore — all restaurants and bars in Dallas — and he says the ordinance would do more harm than good.
“We feel it would be extremely detrimental to jobs in the restaurant business,” Zielke said, “As well as the overall environment and enjoyment of outdoors and nature for the people of Dallas.”
In addition to bumping closing time up from 2:00 AM to midnight, he says the change in the parking ordinance isn’t feasible.
“A big outdoor area like the one I have at Chicken Scratch is about 10,000 square feet of outdoor space,” Zielke says. “That could require an additional 100 parking spaces, which we could just never come up with.”
He says if passed, the ordinance could cause many patios to close down due to the inability to generate enough parking spaces, though he said it is still in the early stages of discussion.
A public meeting was held Tuesday night at the Jonsson Public Library in Dallas, where residents and restaurant owners were allowed to voice their support or disagreement with the proposal.
“If the problem is people not being able to sleep at night, then the solution is not to make the bars close at midnight,” another Dallas resident said. “The solution is to enforce a noise ordinance.”