Beer gets later bedtime

Winter Park’s City Commission had voted for years against the idea of moving back drinking hours for some local restaurants. But in less than five minutes, they voted unanimously to change one newcomer’s hours to let it sell drinks later into the night.

After several years of refusing to let restaurants near the western edge of the Hannibal Square area and a few select others to move their open hours back, the Commission voted Monday to allow The Shipyard Emporium to move its closing hours to midnight.

Until that ruling, the restaurant had been forced to close its doors at 10 p.m. daily due to its proximity to residential areas on the block behind its property along Fairbanks Avenue.

“They made it seem like they were losing a significant amount of business,” Community Development Director Jeff Briggs said.

The law preventing the restaurant from staying open later was an ordinance designed to prevent late night noise from disturbing nearby residents.

To try to determine whether any neighbors were bothered by noise from the restaurant, or would be opposed to later hours, city staff knocked on doors along nearby streets to ask residents.

But unlike residents in the Hannibal Square area, who live less than 300 feet from Dexter’s Restaurant at the corner of New England and North Pennsylvania avenues, residents near the Shipyard Emporium did not object to any noise, Briggs said.

“Basically what they said was ‘We can’t hear anything because [the building] is front facing,’” Briggs said. “The only thing they could hear is the clang of the trash when they take it out at night.”

Uniform hours

The results of the poll by city staff seemed promising for allowing the restaurant to move its closing hours later in to the night, but meanwhile the city is considering a change in late-night restaurant hours that may impact all restaurants in the city.

“The caveat is that we may be going to a consistent uniform set of hours,” Briggs said.

Mayor Ken Bradley had previously advocated for less exemptions for laws.

“We have laws that aren’t consistent,” he said. He was part of the 5-0 vote in favor of moving back the Shipyard Emporium’s hours.

But that potential uniform restaurant hours ordinance may allow restaurants to be open as late as 2 a.m. on the weekends if it passes. Some restaurants must close earlier than that during weekends, or as early as 10 p.m., had been the case with the Shipyard Emporium.

Commissioner Carolyn Cooper suggested that the Shipyard Emporium should move to a more uniform set of hours now, mirroring Hannibal Square restaurants rather than giving it a specific exemption only to rewrite that rule within the next few months.

“Right now we have three different sets of hours for restaurants,” she said. “Standard closing time for restaurants is 12 o’clock, another that goes to 2 a.m. and a third for Hannibal Square. Instead of a separate special deal for this restaurant … possibly instead of going to midnight every night, we go to 11 p.m. weekdays and then 12 on weekends like Hannibal Square.”

Tuesday morning Briggs met with Shipyard’s stakeholders to discuss changes with the restaurant’s hours and the possibility of a unified restaurant hour ordinance.

“It’s kind of a beer summit,” he said.