Sue Strachan, Uptown Messenger file photo
A table with green umbrella can be seen in this 2020 photo.
The Columns’ graceful front porch, framed by the columns that give the hotel its name, has long been popular spot for celebrations, date nights or just sipping a cocktail on a balmy evening as the St. Charles Avenue streetcar rumbles by.
It’s so popular that the current owners expanded the outdoor seating into the front yard. As part of a 2020 renovation after the hotel, bar and restaurant changed hands, they installed pavers to create new seating.
In Uptown Messenger’s December 2020 story on the renovation, reporter Sue Strachan wrote: “One of the changes people see right away is the entrance: In the past, guests would enter via a central walkway flanked by greenery. The new entrance has moved to the side with the greenery and walkway replaced with a brick patio. This allowed a more controlled flow into the building, and more outdoor seating.
That’s where the renovation went too far, according to a city official.
Director of Safety & Permits Tammy Jackson has told the Columns owners the seating in the front yard of the historic hotel has to go. The pavers, though permeable, need to be pulled up and the former landscaping, with its central walkway, must be restored, according to a zoning determination letter issued Feb. 23.
The multi-family residential zoning for the area doesn’t permit the hotel or its bar and restaurant. The Columns, however, operates with a “legal nonconforming status,” because the grand Italianate building at 3811 St. Charles Ave. has housed a hotel, bar and restaurant since the 1980s.
Google Maps
A 2014 photo shows seating to the left of the porch.
Under the city’s zoning regulations, however, a legal nonconforming business cannot expand beyond its historic footprint.
The beloved porch for the bar and restaurant is well-established. Tables with red umbrellas can also be seen to the left of the porch in Google Maps photos going back nearly a decade, so seating is allowed there. But the seating can’t spill into the front yard.
“At question here is specifically limited to the use of the front yard for outdoor seating for the restaurant and bar,” zoning administrator Nicholas Kindel states in the determination letter.
The Department of Safety & Permits received a complaint in 2020 about the changes to the front yard, city documents show. In November 2021, a Safety & Permits inspector found that there was a “brick addition” with tables in the front yard, in violation of the property’s zoning restrictions.
The Columns management argued that the yard had long been used as a seating area for weddings and other special events. But the city code states that occasional use does not apply, Jackson ruled.
“Any use of this front area as outdoor seating shall be prohibited unless it has been approved as part of a special event permit,” Jackson stated.
It is not clear whether the Columns will appeal the decision. Uptown Messenger reached out to Columns management and to its New York public relations firm, but they did not reply.
