New Era For Outdoor Dining In Our City Centres

Wyndham residents and visitors will be dining in the open air on footpaths, streets, parking spaces and pop-up alfresco areas, as metropolitan Melbourne celebrates the reopening of outdoor dining.

Across the world, cities are embracing new modes of alfresco dining as the hospitality industry returns in a COVID-safe way. Wyndham City is doing all it can to make trading as easy and as practical as possible for businesses to be able to be bring the café and restaurant experiences we love, outside. All initiatives will have COVID-safety measures in place, to best ensure the safety of all visitors and residents.

Wyndham Director City Design and Liveability, Ludo Campbell-Reid said a range of Council initiatives had been developed, with a goal of supporting businesses by offering additional outdoor space to trade from.

“With the support of grant funding from Victorian Government’s Outdoor Eating and Entertainment Package, Wyndham City will deliver a number of projects to support businesses with more options as they adapt to new models of outdoor dining in a safe and practical way,” Mr Campbell-Reid said.

“This includes free, streamlined permitting processes to support and guide businesses to expand their outdoor space by using Council-managed land. This includes footpaths, streets, car parks and open space.”

Mr Campbell-Reid said there are also a range of activations and special projects in the works, in collaboration with local businesses, that would collectively deliver an additional 1938m2 of outdoor dining space to residents, allowing for an extra 700 patrons to be served at local businesses in each sitting.

“We’re also working on a series of pop up activations, which will add an extra 1484m2 of dining space across Wyndham.”

One of the many initiatives is a West End Experience – a concept developed in response to feedback from local businesses in the heart of the Werribee City Centre.

“We’re still going through the consultation process with many businesses in the area, but what we’ve heard from many is that they would be interested in extending their outdoor dining offering onto the street,” Mr Campbell-Reid said.

“The plan, which is still being developed, would see an outdoor alfresco dining area extending out onto the road of Watton Street between Bridge Hotel and Wedge Street Piazza. This will be delivered as part of a series of one-day activations, with the potential to build to a multi-day event. No single business would own the space, and all local businesses are invited to participate.”

“Earlier this year, when restrictions were eased, Wyndham City developed six parklets through a pilot program which provided an additional outdoor dining space for patrons.”

“Through that process, we took feedback from local businesses on how they were used and what they offered. In response to this feedback, we’ve made changes to the design and use of these parklets, and their placement is being guided by the local business community.”

“Three parklets will be installed in Hoppers Junction in November and up to three units will be available for interested businesses in the Werribee City Centre.” 

We are also supporting local businesses to create new dining precincts which will be created at the Point Cook Town Centre and Soho Village, where patrons can safely gather to enjoy a meal of a drink.

“This is in the form of removable, engineered, in-road bollards –  a key step for those precincts to be able to utilise a section of the Council-managed street to develop flexible outdoor dining options.”

In addition to these initiatives and programs, to make the process easier for businesses, the permitting system has been fast-tracked and streamlined, with fees waived.

“We’ve waived the Footpath Trading Permit fees to 31 August 2021 and fast-tracked review of applications to five businesses days to help businesses quickly expand onto footpaths and work with neighbouring businesses to increase their outdoor trading zone,” Mr Campbell-Reid said.

“We have also introduced a new, free Temporary Commercial Use of Public Space Permit to provide additional options for businesses in town centres and shopping strips when it comes to Council-managed land, such as streets, car parks and open space (excluding parks and reserves).”

Wyndham City will also provide free use of a flexible suite of outdoor dining infrastructure, including four alfresco pods and eight dining kits, with expressions of interest via the Temporary Commercial Use of Public Space permit process.

We encourage businesses to visit Outdoor Dining and Trading for Wyndham Businesses,  to explore these options in greater detail.