THUNDER BAY – A specialty vegan and vegetarian eatery will be allowed to continue to operate as a restaurant, despite frustrations from area residents that its lack of on-site parking creates safety concerns and congestion in the neighbourhood.
Thunder Bay city council on Monday night approved amendments to continue to allow Bonobo's Foods to function as a restaurant within its mixed use designation, as long as the business pays the city to lease a portion of the boulevard to create eight angled parking spaces.
Bonobo's, located at the corner of Oliver Road and Ray Boulevard, began as a specialty grocery store before evolving to offer take-out meals and later adding dine-in service. It has spent the past number of months in limbo, unclear about its future and whether it could continue to function as a dine-in business due to its lack of available parking.
Manager Morgan Zimmer, who will be taking ownership of Bonobo's in 2019, said denying the business the opportunity to function as a restaurant could have put it in jeopardy.
“We’ve been dealing with it for such a long time now that it’s definitely a good thing it’s been resolved,” Zimmer said after the meeting. “If it did not go the right way we would have had the very scary potential of shutting down because without the tables the business just wouldn’t be viable.”
City administration has tried to mediate the interests of the business with concerns from the neighbourhood residents, who have grown fed up with customers parking down the length of Ray Boulevard, often blocking their driveways and crowding the street.
Sheila Madigan said 38 people signed a petition requesting administration deny granting the restaurant designation, arguing its traffic causes headaches along the street.
“Small business such as Bonobo's are and should be welcome in the city of Thunder Bay, but their presence should not detrimentally impact the safety of a neighbourhood, pedestrians and drivers alike,” Madigan said.
Prior to the meeting administration had recommended against granting Bonobo's restaurant status before reversing course to its initial position of eight angled spaces.
Members of council quickly realized there was no way to please everybody.
“There’s no win here,” Coun. Linda Rydholm said. “You hate to kill a business on the other hand there’s insufficient parking and there will continue to be problems in the neighbourhood. Our staff will get called out again and again.”
Coun. Trevor Giertuga called on city bylaw enforcement to make sure the situation is handled as smoothly as possible.
“I see the issue as being enforcement. If we enforce this and someone is in front a fire hydrant or too close to the lane, if they get a $25 ticket when they’re going to get a $20, $25 meal they’re going to think twice,” Giertuga said.
“They’re going to walk that further distance and they’re not going to park illegally but we have to be committed to going there at lunch time for a month straight and ticketing people and getting the message out.”
Zimmer said Bonobo's is trying to do its part to improve the situation for their neighbours, including requiring staff to park away from the building to keep those spaces for customers, who are also trying to help.
“One thing a lot of our customers have told us before is that with the tables, the people in the community walk to Bonobo's because they don’t have the fear of their food getting cold by the time they get home,” Zimmer said. “There’s many more walkers that come to our business as well because they’re eating their food directly in the building.”
