KEY POINTS:
Five years ago, Auckland's City's bureaucrats came up with a 34-page bible of Street Trading Principles and Guidelines. Three years in the making, it was so finicky it even specified the size - not less than 35mm - of the rubber pads all street furniture had to be shod with.
Mobile gas heaters were to banned because of the city's "sloping terrain" and terracotta planter boxes were not to be used near driveways because "they will shatter on impact". Street furniture had to be "of a high standard" and of "restrained" colours. It was so Mother Hennish that councillors realised they'd be mocked if they perservered with it. So they kicked for touch and set up a working party.
It must have been some party because it's taken five years to report back. But the wait was worth it. Instead of the prescriptive silliness of the 2002 report, the new version sticks to the core issue of ensuring that pedestrians have first rights to the pavement. At the same time, it acknowledges that few want to return to the boring old days before alfresco dining became a fun part of Auckland life.
In a perfect world, regulations would not be necessary, but anyone who has tried to walk through any of the popular restaurant enclaves knows the meek of the earth tend to come second. Particularly when on foot.
Restaurateurs are supposed to leave a 2m wide strip of pavement for pedestrian use, but often this simple rule is breached the moment someone pulls out a chair to sit down.
There are plans to regulate the practice of enclosing the space outside a restaurant with drop screens running from the verandah to fastening rings in the pavement. Like many, celebrity eatery Vinnies, in Jervois Rd, goes even further and encloses - or did last winter - the front of their little pavement room with another opaque modesty-screen, in effect turning half the public pavement into a private room.
Rather vaguely, the proposal talks of imposing "limits" on these screens and barriers. Having braved pavement eating on blustery Auckland days, I support wind breaks, but in my experience, a side-screen high enough to protect seated diners from cross-draughts, is a fair compromise.
I also hope there are second thoughts about allowing tables and chairs along the kerbside of the pavement. I'm not so worried about a wayward driver bowling the odd table full of diners, it's more the effect this de facto takeover of the whole pavement has on pedestrians. With diners on both sides, the passing stroller can feel like they've intruded into a private room, particularly when the waiters strut about the narrow pedestrian way as if it's their working space.
As for plans to ban liquor drinking except "in the context of alfresco dining", I'm of two minds. Collapsing at a shaded pavement table for a reviving glass of something cold on a hot summer's day is one of the delights of present-day Auckland.
The planned regulations demand we dine as well. If my companion wants a long black and can have it, I don't see why I can't be trusted with a glass of sauvingon without a bowl of fries to help it down.
Admittedly, there is a problem where bars are concerned. Just around the corner from me, there's a tiny shop-front bar that of a busy evening often has more people crowding the pavement outside than are squeezed inside. With cell phones to their ears, and blowing smoke rings at passers-by, the 2m wide pedestrian freeway is a joke. This is a problem not just for my little part of the world.
The following from a reader yesterday. "Alfresco dining is fine, but a cafe or restaurant should have a purpose-built area set back off the footpath and not spilling onto it. Try walking past the Ellerslie Cock and Bull at 5:30pm Thursday, Friday, Saturday."
A workable compromise would be to insist pavement drinkers must be seated. That would limit outdoor patrons to the number of seats the establishment was licensed for.
Finally, to be successful, regulations must be enforced.
The city council has parking wardens out at night, ticketing the badly parked cars of restaurant patrons. Would it be so hard to deputise them to enforce the street trading rules as well?
