Plado: The Little Restaurant that Couldn’t Cut a Break During the Pandemic

Image: Plado

Back in March, just as the full impact of the COVID-19 pandemic was beginning to be felt by the city’s dining scene, AppleEats’s Tim Gilberto made an appeal to readers to “be true” to their favorite restaurants by ordering in from them in these troubled times.

The city government has risen to the challenge as well by permitting restaurants to set up makeshift cafes outdoors that sometimes spill into the streets. But not all restaurants have received the same consideration.

One “odd man out” is the East Village tapas restaurant Plado (reviewed in this space last October). Like the century-old veteran Gene’s on E. 11th Street, Plado suffers the misfortune of having a Citi Bike dock along the curb, preventing full expansion of its outdoor cafe. Unlike Gene’s, which somehow persuaded the city to move the bike dock outside its front door, Plado’s appeal to City Hall fell on deaf ears. “I was told there was not enough funding and they didn’t have the manpower to come and remove the bike docks for us,” Plado co-owner Kristin Rizzo told WLNY.

The restaurant is now in danger of closing down altogether. Where’s the justice in that?

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