San Jose seeks to bring the party back to its city center by creating “entertainment areas” via new rules allowing more outdoor events with alcohol.
The municipal council gave Tuesday the green light to open at least seven entertainment areas in San Jose, which would also remove part of the administrative formalities for restaurants to organize events.
“There is still much more than we can do for our small businesses and our commercial districts,” said Mayor Matt Mahan. “We need to.”
The idea behind the entertainment areas is that restaurants and breweries could come together and organize events with the appearance of an outdoor coffee in the closed streets. The examples include a watch game or a festival where people can order alcohol and enjoy their drinks in the outside areas.
City leaders believe that entertainment areas could be beneficial for businesses while South Bay is preparing to welcome the Super Bowl and the World Cup next year.
“I hope the city will make the city much more dynamic and much more interesting and will encourage people to go out and spend time in the city center,” said Eric Nielsen, co-owner of the 55 cocktail bar and lounge. “I think it’s huge.”
Nielsen also believes that the city’s efforts would greatly help restaurants, even if they would still need to acquire a special permit to accommodate an entertainment area.
“So that encourages us to do something interesting,” he said. “To join other people, especially my neighbors, to organize interesting fun events that are good for the community that people really like to spend time here.”
The city notes the recent success of the Steve Aoki event last week and believes that it could make the city center more alive. It could also encourage certain companies to open new stores.
The downtown association said that in five stores and offices are vacant in downtown San Jose.
“It is really a question of kissing our small businesses and our districts of small businesses and giving them flexibility to create truly unique experiences, memorable social experiences, which gives them the flexibility of being more creative,” said Mahan.
The mayor said that San Jose police had been involved in the preparation of the order to ensure that the areas are safe.
Since the approval of the municipal council, entertainment areas could open in July.