Health Risks of Dining on Lincoln Road (Miami, Miami Beach: hotel, landscaping)

[HotandHumid]

Seems rather odd to me that no news coverage that I know of has ever been made about the health risk of dining on Lincoln Road at the outdoor restaurants there.

I used to work at the Vandyke when it was in business and the City of Miami Beach never required that any of us servers cover the food that we were bringing to the customers at the outside tables on the mall.

There are green parrots and other birds on the mall dropping their poop all over the place all the time and it's got to be a given that some of it lands in the food waitstaff is carrying to tables ever so often.

Then you've got the situation of seeds, pollen, leaves, etc. dropping off the trees that can easily land in the food that you are eating at a table or that the wait staff is carrying to the table because even though some of the tables are covered by umbrellas, not all of them are and again, the restaurants on Lincoln Road are not required to bring the food to the outside tables with covers on them and if you've ever been on Lincoln Road, you know it can get pretty breezy and stuff flies off those trees around there in the breeze. I'd imagine some of that stuff coming off the tress isn't considered safe for human to eat.

Also, imagine if your wait person or someone walking by sneezes or coughs on your food carrying it that long distance from the back of the restaurant where the kitchen is located, through the restaurant past all those people at tables, then out onto the mall and then over to your table. Too much risk of something coming in contact with your food that you don't want to before it gets placed in front of you.


When I worked as a room service waiter in a hotel, we always had to cover the food we were delivering to rooms and I have to say that some of the rooms I delivered to in the hotel were a much shorter distance from the kitchen to the room than the distance that some of the tables at the restaurants are from the kitchen so I don't know why there isn't some rule that the food has to be covered when carried outside onto the mall.


Also, there's these signs on the fountains on Lincoln Road that they're treated with chlorine bleach or something like that that can stain clothes. So you're sitting there in your $1,000. new Prada shirt and there's water from the fountain being blown over on your food and on your clothes by the breeze. Can't be too good to be eating that food with those chemicals blown on it or for the clothes.


Used to be that when the outdoor dining started on Lincoln Road some years back, the restaurants only put tables and chairs out next to their windows and doors but now it's anywhere the restaurant wants to as long as they pay a fee to the City of Miami Beach to put the tables and chairs out on the mall.

There's also the situation where there's those bromeliad plants planted as landscaping on the mall by the City. Those plants hold water that mosquitoes breed in and mosquitoes here carry the Zika virus, along with Malaria and several other tropical diseases that aren't so hot for humans to catch so that's kind of strange that the City would be getting money from restaurants for permission to put out tables and chairs but then is landscaping with plants that can help spread tropical diseases to restaurant goers who want to sit outside.

For my health, I'll eat inside at a restaurant on Lincoln Road but you won't catch me at one of those outside tables where the food is being brought to me without a cover on it or some chemical or the other is being blown over on me and my food from the fountains or I'm at risk of being bitten by a mosquito that grew up in the water of a bromeliad on the mall.

[MadManofBethesda]

I've never eaten in any casual outdoor dining venue anywhere in the world where the food was brought to you in covered dishes a la room service. If you don't want to sit outside, that's your choice. But LOL on the dire warning to others.

[HotandHumid]

Originally Posted by MadManofBethesda

I've never eaten in any casual outdoor dining venue anywhere in the world where the food was brought to you in covered dishes a la room service. If you don't want to sit outside, that's your choice. But LOL on the dire warning to others.

Well, I've lived in Key West and eaten outside there but the wait staff didn't have to walk half a block with my food uncovered under trees, etc.

[Hammocks Bum]

I love Lincoln Road, but I will not eat outside ever., there, in Guanajuato Mexico, in Madrid Spain, In Key West,,,, nowhere. I just do not like the feeling, never did, never will.

I eat at a couple of favorite places in Lincoln Road, but inside and away from the chick crowds.

And true, I would not like being in Piazza San Marcos and a filthy piggeon flying by crapping on my food or vino...

[elchevere]

And here all along I though that bird crap was foie gras.

[boxus]

If the stored and served outdoor food in India, Egypt, and other wonderful places did not get me, I surely as hell am not worried about this. I do think it is an issue at all, a big ado about nothing.

Originally Posted by MadManofBethesda

I've never eaten in any casual outdoor dining venue anywhere in the world where the food was brought to you in covered dishes a la room service. If you don't want to sit outside, that's your choice. But LOL on the dire warning to others.

Lol, same, never had anyone anywhere in the world bring it covered and I typically eat outdoors when possible.