New streetery designs could boost Philadelphia's outdoor dining scene
Add Axios as your preferred source to
see more of our stories on Google.
The more expensive streetery design features the option to add greenery to brighten up the vibes. Photo: Mike D'Onofrio/Axios
The new streetery displays at Love Park offer a glimpse into the future of Philadelphia's outdoor dining scene.
Why it matters: The prototypes are the city's latest attempt to revive a popular outdoor dining experience that has nearly gone extinct.
State of play: The Parker administration developed the two designs as potential options for restaurants, bars and eateries.
- The prototypes meet all of the many requirements and building codes for an outdoor dining structure.
What we saw: The modular designs are bubbly, have customizable colors and wraps, and can be fit to any size space.
- Cheaper option: No frills, made of aluminum, and you step down onto the pavement to enter.
- Pricier option: Slatted fencing made of recycled milk cartons, space for plants along the top, and a raised platform floor.
Context: Businesses have been complaining for years about the city's costly, complex and time-consuming process for setting up an outdoor dining structure.
- Many of those concerns were backed up in a 2024 report from the City Controller's Office.
The result: Philly's streetery scene is a small club these days.
- Roughly 32 restaurants throughout Philly have active licenses, per city data.
- Those with licenses include Marc Vetri's Fiorella in Bella Vista, the Bayou in Manayunk, the Good Dog Bar in Center City, and Loco Pez's West Philly outpost.
Flashback: During the pandemic, roughly 800 streeteries popped up across the city, but the scene cratered starting in 2023 once stricter city regulations came online.
The intrigue: If adopted citywide, the designs could homogenize Philly's streetery scene, making each structure at every restaurant nearly identical.
- Yes, but: We'd lose one of the coolest aspects of streeteries: those unique, colorful and artistic structures — think igloos and greenhouses — that help make restaurants a destination and stand out in a competitive dining scene.
What they're saying: Ben Fileccia, a spokesperson for the Pennsylvania Restaurant & Lodging Association, tells Axios he's hopeful the prototypes reduce red tape and wait times for restaurants looking to add outdoor dining as an option.
- But he says the city must do more if it wants to revive al fresco dining, which prospered during the pandemic.
- "This is one step in making outdoor dining more robust."
What's next: You can share feedback on the designs with the city through Nov. 23 by scanning a QR code located on the prototypes.
- Once it evaluates the public feedback, the city expects to make the designs available to download for free.
If you go: You can sit and eat at the prototypes daily from 9am-5pm.