With coronavirus cases spiking across the country, including New Jersey, Governor Murphy has announced that bars and restaurants will have to stop their indoor dining at 10PM in an effort to get the number of positive cases back down and minimize the chances of COVID-19 being spread in large groups at a time.
Governor Murphy has now issued a requirement for all New Jersey bars and restaurants to close at 10PM, as well as all indoor interstate organized sports up to the high school level NJ.com reported. The restaurant and bar changes do not affect outdoor service areas that remain open during the colder weather.
Restaurants, bars, clubs, and lounges will not be allowed to serve food and alcohol between 10PM and 5AM. New Jersey casinos will also be restricted from serving food and alcohol during that time. These restrictions will go into effect Thursday morning, November 12, 2020.
According to the report, Murphy will also announce seating at indoor bars will be banned. Bars and restaurants, however, will be able to seat groups of people at tables closer than six feet together as long as they are separated by plexiglass barriers and they can set up outdoor igloos for individual groups as colder weather approaches.
In Hoboken, on October 29th, Mayor Bhalla announced via Nixle that bars and restaurants will temporarily be required to close at 12 midnight until further notice to prevent a greater spread of COVID-19.
“With health experts predicting a substantial rise of cases during the winter months, and a second wave already upon us here in Hudson County and New Jersey, I believe the time is now to begin taking additional precautions against the threat of COVID-19 spreading indoors,” the Mayor’s press release stated.
COVID-19 cases have seen an increase in Hoboken, with 49 new cases since November 1st. In Jersey City, COVID-19 cases have averaged 55 per day over the last few days, with 81 new cases being reported on November 6th. Read the latest numbers in our COVID-19 tracker article here.
