Unlike this reclining Buddha statue in Indonesia, Tribeca residents didn’t take the prospect of a Buddha Bar franchise on their street lying down, but the state approved it anyway.
BY COLIN MIXSON
Like Siddhartha himself, the State Liquor Authority has taken the Middle Path in approving the liquor license for a Tribeca location of Buddha Bar — a swanky international bar-and-restaurant chain that locals opposed for fear will operate as a nightclub — with a litany of restrictions meant to keep things serene.
With its booze permit approved, there’s now nothing standing in the way of Buddha Bar’s opening on currently quiet Thomas St., but the state’s approval came with a laundry list of stringent stipulations that the watering hole owners agreed to adhere to, including early weekday and weekend closing times of 11 p.m. and 12 a.m. respectively.
“It is definitely a blow to a nightspot to have to close at midnight on weekends,” said Tribeca resident and former New York Daily News columnist George Rush. “They wanted 2 a.m. closing on weekends and 1 a.m. on weekdays, and I think most of their money comes from the later hours, and it’s seen as a night spot. So that was a big win.”
Locals opposed the proposed watering hole for fear that the 12,000-square-foot franchise would be operated as a nightclub and attract a clientele of rowdy clubbers to the narrow, residential Thomas St.
Nicolas Barthelemy, center, promised skeptical residents in April that the proposed Tribeca Buddha Bar would be a good neighbor.
Operators, meanwhile, claimed the establishment would be run as a high-end restaurant with bills averaging $100 per person.
“We want to run a clean, nice operation,” said Nicolas Barthelemy, who will be the restaurant’s director of operations, at a Community Board 1 meeting in April. “We’re not here to ruin your life and make it a nightmare. I reached out to the neighbors. I think we’re being proactive about addressing some of these issues.”
But community members pointed to other classy Tribeca restaurants, including Obeca Li and Megu, which were unable to make rent merely by catering just to a dinner crowd, and eventually turned to party promoters to make ends meet.
“Megu started out as a clean, nice operation, it was well loved by the community,” said CB1 member Bruce Ehrmann at the April meeting. “But the space was so large and the street was so obscure that they couldn’t make it, so they took desperate measures to try to stay in business — which was so disruptive that we closed them down.”
Ultimately, CB1 voted to oppose Buddha Bar’s liquor license application, and an administrative law judge with the SLA — who presides over hearings regarding booze permits for bars within 500 feet of other watering holes — also ruled that issuing the bar a license would not be in the public interest.
Nevertheless, both the advisory group’s recommendation and its own judge’s ruling were ignored by the SLA on Oct. 11, when the state agency made its decision to approve the license.
That license, however, does come with stipulations designed to prevent Buddha Bar from living up to the community’s worst fears and operating as a nightclub.
Mainly, they preclude dancing and private parties from occurring at Buddha Bar, in addition to the early closing times that will prevent the kind of late-night revelries that locals dread.
The bar operators have furthermore agreed to construct a 400-square-foot vestibule in front of the restaurant in order to reduce noise from the establishment, according to a public interest statement penned by owner Stefan Setfanov.
In the end, locals would have preferred the state nix any plans to establish a Buddha Bar on their narrow street altogether, but they’re hopeful that the stipulations will prevent they quality of life apocalypse that called the community to action.
“Its somewhere in between a loss and a win,” said Rush.
