Earlier this week the City of North Bay waived all fees associated with the “creation or expansion of new or expanded outdoor patio space” city-wide for 2020.
See: City waives patio fees for local businesses
Responding to city council’s decision, downtown business owner John Lechlitner, owner of Cecil’s Brewhouse and Kitchen, said council has taken the approach that it wants to do everything it can to help business.
Going a step further, Lechlitner said he would like to see the Downtown Improvement Area (DIA) turn Main Street into a type of pedestrian mall.
“We are hopeful the downtown association will see their way through to ask city council to close Main Street. I think that would be very positive. They could have a pedestrian mall downtown.”
As it turns out, the DIA board is preparing to poll its membership to find out who is for and who is against the idea of closing the downtown Main Street area to vehicular traffic.
“We’re hoping to get the poll out within the next week. It is going to go very fast and we should have the results fairly soon, I’m hoping, so we can move forward,” said board chair Michelle Trudeau.
“We’re going to count the vote and the majority rules.”
The DIA is comprised of over 200 voting members which include banks, professional offices, retailers, and restaurants.
“There are very strong opinions out there. That is why we’re putting it to a vote. It could be just for weekends; it could be not at all or it could be just for the summer. We don’t know,” said Trudeau.
“We’re only talking about this year. We’re all just running to catch up right now, but we will know soon enough.”
Others will need to get involved, if the DIA membership gives the green light.
“I’m sure the city will weigh in on that a little bit and the health unit and all kinds of interested parties. I’m just not sure right now how that is going to look,” said Trudeau.
“We’ll have a more educated response in about a week or so. It is all up in the air right now and I don’t want to speculate. The state of emergency is still on, so we have to be very, very careful here. We don’t want to do the wrong thing.”
