CENTRAL PARK — The iconic restaurant at the Loeb Boathouse in Central Park is set to close permanently, as economic conditions make it impossible to keep the business up and running, according to public filings and the restaurant's owner.
The eatery will close by Oct. 16, according to a notice filed with the state by owner Dean Poll. All 163 of its employees will be laid off, the filing says.
"Due to rising labor and costs of goods, the business will be permanently closing," the notice reads.
Poll, reached by phone on Wednesday, told Patch that the notice "pretty much speaks for itself."
"I've been there for 21 years. The economics just don't work anymore," he said.
"The Boathouse is a beloved place in the city of New York, for New Yorkers and tourists alike — but the current economic situation does not permit it to sustain itself," he added.
After shutting down in October 2020, the Boathouse restaurant made a grand return in March 2021, once again hosting lunch and dinner service, rowboat rentals, weddings, Bar and Bat Mitzvahs, and more.
But Poll, who also owns Gallagher's Steakhouse in Midtown, told Patch he has known since before the pandemic that rising costs of labor, insurance and goods would jeopardize the business's long-term future.
"COVID has nothing to do with anything. The volume was there," he said. "But the expenses just eat away at it."
A Parks Department spokesperson said the agency planned to "engage a future operator as soon as possible" to take over the Boathouse space.
"We are working in good faith with the current operator in an effort to accommodate those individuals who have an event already scheduled at the Boathouse," spokesperson Crystal Howard said.
Poll said he would have a conversation with the Parks Department on Thursday to discuss the restaurant's future.
A spokesperson for the Hotel Trades Council union, which represents the restaurant's workers, called the owner's decision to close the restaurant "very disappointing," adding that the union would work with members to "make sure they are protected and taken care of in terms of benefits and severance."
The union will also work to secure jobs for the current employees at whatever restaurant opens in the Boathouse space next, the spokesperson said.
The Loeb Boathouse first opened in 1954 on the shores of the Central Park Lake, named in honor of the investment banker Carl M. Loeb and his wife Adeline, who helped fund its construction. The restaurant, which bills itself as the only lakeside event space in Manhattan, has played host to countless private events, and has been featured in numerous films.
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