Local restaurants welcome more customers with loosened provincial restrictions

New guidelines and restrictions for restaurants From CTV Kitchener's Krista Simpson: The Ontario government is now allowing more people to dine indoors at restaurants.

KITCHENER — With the announcement of dining restriction changes, restaurants in Waterloo Region and across the province are now welcoming more customers inside and outside.

Expanded limits for dining establishments in the orange and red zones were announced on Friday and came into effect Saturday.

These include outdoor seating being allowed, and restaurants in the red zone can now seat fifty per cent capacity inside, with a cap at 50 people total for establishments that have the proper space.

However, businesses are expected to limit tables to members of the same household, with exceptions for those living alone as well as caregivers.

Up until this point, only 10 people could eat inside red zone restaurants, a cap that applied to even larger establishments as well.

Megan Stover of Charcoal Group of Restaurants says reservations filled up quickly at Waterloo's Bauer Kitchen leading up to and following the announcement.

"We've been full at capacity for over a week," she said. "We've been booking at least a week in advance in our restaurants."

Bauer customer Karin McNabb says she is looking forward to the day when eating out feels more like it used to.

"Just the ambince of having a bigger and busier restaurant adds to the excitement of the evening," she said.

In orange zones, the cap for people allowed inside to eat stands at 100 people.

This rule applies restaurants in Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph now, where diners like the Delamares are able to celebrate both 20 years together and the increased limits.

"We can do our part to enjoy our evening together but also be able to keep these businesses going because they're hugely important for our city and our economy," said Sandy Delamare.

Stover notes that, with Charcoal Group restaurants in different zones across Ontario, they can now bring more employees back to work.

"It's not just about the impact on our team, but also about the impact on all the small breweries and produce supplies and wineries that we have worked so closely with over the years and are such a valuable part of our business," she said. "They're going to be impacted by this expansion as well."

At Jack's Family Restaurant in Waterloo, which is able to hold 200 people, the owners say they've been scrambling to serve under the new capacity limits.

"It was a matter of what are we going to do, what's the plan, and texting staff to see who's available to come in," said co-owner Saddy Kulafi. "It makes us feel more like a restaurant, that's for sure.

"We'll be able to bring more staff back, we definitely won't have the lineups and hour wait times we used to."

In the grey zone of Toronto, restaurants who haven't been able to offer indoor dining since Oct. 10 are allowed to serve people outdoors again starting Saturday.

University of Waterloo Public Health professor Zahid Butt says he is concerned with the new rules and stresses there could be an increase in COVID-19 cases tied to the loosening restrictions, along with a lack of proper ventilation at indoor venues.

"At this point and time it's premature to relax restrictions," he said. "These variants are far more transmissible than the previous version of the virus, so if you go out for indoor dining you still have to be very careful."

While the expanded indoor capacity is what restaurant owners have been waiting for, the owners of Morty's Pub in Waterloo say their focus this weekend is their patio.

"Almost everyone of our guests have wanted to be outside, it's a beautiful day," said co-owner Jay Taylor. "They're going to be happy to get sun and get out of their house and be with their family and have fun."