Is every pizzeria a fast food restaurant?

The difference between a fast food restaurant and a restaurant is normally fairly easy to make in everyday life. In zoning cases, it is a bit different. This was evident in a recent ruling on a new-to-open New York Pizza in Amsterdam.

Distinction between fast food and regular restaurants

Zoning plans regularly distinguish between types of catering establishments, because catering establishments can differ considerably from one another in terms of the impact they have on their immediate surroundings. A common distinction is between restaurants and fast food restaurants, for example, because fast food restaurants generally have a greater traffic impact than "regular" restaurants.

What is a fast food restaurant?

Everyone has an idea of what should be understood by fast food (concepts).

However, legal interpretation is not that simple, as a ruling on August 2 shows. That ruling concerns a new establishment of New York Pizza on the Ferdinand Bolstraat in Amsterdam. A restaurant, but not a fast food restaurant, is permitted at that location.

New York Pizza argues that while it is known for its takeout pizzas and the sale of pizza slices, this case involves an entirely different restaurant. This restaurant will be set up to eat the pizzas on-site and allow customers to stay longer. Thus, the restaurant will have 74 seats and plates and cutlery will be used. Moreover, if customers have ordered at the counter, they will be served at their table. There will also be no pizza delivery from this establishment. Therefore, according to New York Pizza, this is not a fast food restaurant in this case.

Still fast food

However, the Amsterdam District Court concluded, just as the city council had done earlier, that in this case it really is a fast food restaurant. It arrived at this conclusion on the basis of the descriptions given about this in the Groot woordenboek van de Nederlandse taal (the "Dikke van Dale"). In fact, the zoning plan itself does not contain any definitions about this.

The preliminary injunction court reached this (final) judgment because the food to be sold by New York Pizza has a limited preparation time and the average customer will spend no more than 30-50 minutes in the restaurant. That limited preparation time is also used in the dictionary as an explanation of what fast food is.

That New York Pizza is normally classified as a fast-food restaurant may not come as much of a surprise, but the arguments used by the interim relief judge to designate New York Pizza as such in this case as well are striking and, in my opinion, somewhat flimsy. After all, there are many restaurants and concepts where a (hot) meal can be ordered and eaten within 1 hour. So that does not seem decisive to me. Furthermore, it is also not clear to me what is to be understood by a "limited" preparation time.

Is even the authentic pizzeria around your corner a fast food restaurant now? That does not seem to me to be the intention, but then why New York Pizza? So I can well imagine that New York Pizza will not acquiesce in this ruling and will appeal.

Fast food restaurant or not

Without clear definitions in a zoning plan, it is unclear what is meant by fast food. It is therefore preferable to regulate this properly in a zoning plan, formulating as many objective criteria as possible.

Indeed, in my view, the standards used by the preliminary injunction court and borrowed from the dictionary mean that all kinds of concepts and restaurants that one would qualify as a "regular" restaurant in everyday business are suddenly a perhaps "prohibited" fast food restaurant. It is to be hoped that there will be more clarity on appeal.

Quickscan zoning plan

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