The Metro reports city officials oppose the idea of a Mexican restaurant on Bromfield Street staying open until 4:30 a.m. It would attract drunks, police say. That's almost 24-hour food service, licensing-board head grumps.
City officials allowed as how they might let Tequila Mexican Grill stay open until 2 a.m., but only after the owner meets with nearby residents. Apparently, only the so-called Innovation District will be allowed to have late-night food, if you don't count the 24-hour license the South Street Diner has, but, sheesh, that's just a few blocks away from the Innovation District and right near the new gateway the city and state want to build for our world-class city by South Station. Certainly nowhere near downtown.
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Comments
Grow Up Boston
By Jamobey
Wed, 01/18/2012 - 10:51pm
This is the type of thing that makes me sad about living here. Is the city going to fall apart if you can get a burger and coffee at 3am?
And so
By anon²
Wed, 01/18/2012 - 11:14pm
Boston continues it's slide into a FL style retirement town.
You heard it here first people: the only people in this city at night are drunks and crackheads. What a wonderful motto from the mayors office.
Here's a rational solution to the problem of people who might congregate at the only place open at 2-4am: Open more! More options means lower density. Want to diffuse the problem even more? Let bars close shop when they deem it necessary, repealing last call. Letting club goers and bar patrons leave on their own accord means no mass flood of inebriated beantowners all at the same damn time. Last call is more dangerous and problematic than letting bars stay open till 6am.
Lets go Boston, you're supposed to be smarter then this. Start acting like a city, and not a retirement home for the rich who would rather live in a quiet burb. More late night options and later closing times means more people, and less bad things that go bump in the night. Crime proliferates on the ability to do so when no one is around to see it.
The city should not regulate business hours...
By Ron Newman
Thu, 01/19/2012 - 12:42am
... of any non-alcohol-serving business establishment. Period. Let the market decide what hours such businesses are open.
Besides, nobody lives on Bromfield Street. It's a business district.
thats what cracks me up....
By anon
Thu, 01/19/2012 - 2:08am
The city is begging for Downtown crossing to become a vibrant, active retail/business scene.
Let's hope we get advance
By anon
Thu, 01/19/2012 - 12:50am
Let's hope we get advance notice of potential hearings to go and at least try to shout down the bed-at-9PM assholes
"nearby residents" Er, what
By tape
Thu, 01/19/2012 - 7:01am
"nearby residents"
Er, what nearby residents? It's a business district. Unless they're talking about Sam Adams, John Hancock and Paul Revere up at the Granary Burying Ground, but I don't think they'll voice much complaint.
Time to update the mental map of downtown
By adamg
Thu, 01/19/2012 - 7:17am
There are now several thousand people living downtown, many in converted offices, some in towers such as 45 Province, right around the corner from Bromfield.
That having been said, my first guess would be most of them are living downtown because they like the idea of being in a real downtown, with the possible exception of the suburbanites in Tremont on the Common.
There are dozens of us
By Mike B
Thu, 01/19/2012 - 7:54am
For those who don't know, the top floor of many of the shops downtown are apartments or condos. Also keep an eye out for tiny doors with no storefront (such as the one next to Radioshack on Winter St); those are also condos.
Oh wow, dozens?
By spenser
Thu, 01/19/2012 - 2:34pm
I shouldn't be surprised that the kind of people who pay for an overpriced downtown condo would think that the desires of "dozens" of people should trump the hundreds or thousands who would take advantage of late-night food options. I wish people got to vote on stuff like this instead of letting the nannies at the licensing board decide what the people want.
The ironic part is if we started letting bars and restaurants stay open later, more cool businesses might open in the area and actually make downtown a desirable place to live.
Thanks for telling us!
By JPFree
Thu, 01/19/2012 - 3:10pm
Now I know where I'll be pissing from now on after Hub Pub last call.
no tacos at 3:30 am = first world problem
By anon
Thu, 01/19/2012 - 9:33am
Isn't the real crime that the city of Boston doesn't have an In-N-Out Burger?
Pathetic, truly pathetic.
By JCK
Thu, 01/19/2012 - 9:56am
Pathetic, truly pathetic.
Why is this even decided on a case-by-case basis?
By spenser
Thu, 01/19/2012 - 2:13pm
It just seems unfair to allow one restaurant to stay open 24 hours and another a few blocks away has to close at 2 (if they're lucky). Same with the 1 a.m./2 a.m. closing times for bars. If the place attracts enough customers that it's worth it to stay open later, just let them.
It's probably the same reason they're so stingy about alcohol licenses. If the city treated every business fairly, there would be no reason to bribe anyone.
Blame the state, not the city
By adamg
Thu, 01/19/2012 - 2:43pm
The Boston Licensing Board is, actually, a state agency (even if it does operate out of City Hall and with stationery that features the city seal). You can thank Irish-hating Brahmins around the turn of the last century for that. The state also sets the number of liquor licenses allowed in Boston (unlike in other municipalities in the state, where it's based on a population formula). Dianne Wilkerson, of course, was a state senator, and, yeah, she got Boston more liquor licenses (in exchange for which she got an extended stay in Danbury, CT). True, Chuck Turner got his own relocation, to West Virginia, but I don't think he was anywhere near as deeply involved as Wilkerson.
Irish-hating Brahmins?
By anon
Thu, 01/19/2012 - 3:29pm
While the Brahmins can certainly be accused of having hated the Irish and viciously discriminating against them, there was also some legitimacy to their creation of the Licensing Board, the MDC, etc.
The demographic writing was on the wall; the civic leaders, seeing the inevitable rise of the impoverished Irish electorate in Boston, the same electorate that had brought utterly corrupt machine-style politics to Baltimore and New York, sought to get critical infrastructure (e.g., the public water supply) into safe hands before the wave hit Boston.
Take a look at this economic paper on the 'Curley effect'
www.economics.harvard.edu/faculty/shleifer/files/c...
So, in other words, the Brahmins hated the Irish
By adamg
Thu, 01/19/2012 - 3:55pm
And they determined that because New York was corrupt and because the Irish had taken over there, therefore all Irish everywhere were corrupt and not to be trusted. These days, that'd be called profiling.
This is not to defend the corruption of a James Michael Curley, but Brahmin efforts to limit the electoral decisions of the state's largest city didn't start with him. Mass Moments writes about the election of Hugh O'Brien as mayor in 1885 (when Curley was 11):
Just playing devil's advocate
By RP
Thu, 01/19/2012 - 6:14pm
As much as we all love to whine about a lack of dining options late at night, there's a tendency not to support the ones that do exist. Remember News? Or Miel back when it was open 24 hours? Odd that nobody in this thread has mentioned that numerous places in Chinatown, just blocks away, are open till 4 (as long as there's business to support it). There actually more places to at least get a slice of pizza (or chicken and waffles if you're in Dorchester) till 3 than people realize, particularly if you're in Allston or Harvard Square and particularly on the weekends. And there are plenty of other cities where late-night dining options are scarce. As is often the case when people stomp their feet and complain that something is "a Boston problem," it's not really all that unique.
That being said, it should be the restaurant's prerogative to try and fail. That also being said, I can't imagine anything I'd like to do less than eat crappy Mexican food in Downtown Crossing at 3 a.m.