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Wagner Park restaurant goes to a Queens company that operates The Migrant Kitchen
Renderings courtesy of Battery Park City Authority
The Battery Park City Authority has chosen a company called JD Enterprises to run the restaurant in Wagner Park. The company currently operates a ghost kitchen in Long Island City where it provides meals for K-12 schools, food service management programs for higher education, and meals for emergencies and disasters. They also have a sister brand called The Migrant Kitchen, four brick-and-mortar locations across the city, and operate The Ballfields Café in Central Park and some concessions at the U.S. Open.
One of the two founders and the CEO, Daniel Dorado, is a Battery Park City resident who was formerly the chef de cuisine at ilili, the noted Lebanese restaurant in Nomad.
The BPCA said the company will offer affordable, all-day, sit down and grab & go service starting in the second half of 2026. They will operate a temporary kiosk in the park in the meantime, offering charcuterie and mezze platters, hot dogs, desserts and beverages, including house-made lemonade and iced tea.
The pavilion restaurant is 5000 square feet with indoor dining for 80 on the “main floor” — which is at the park level and now elevated off the street — and 775 square feet for outdoor dining. The other half of the restaurant will be at the street level, underneath the park, essentially. Respondents to the park’s request for proposals were also given an option to program the 5300-square-foot rooftop space.
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Doesn’t sound very appetizing. I guess they’re targeting the tourists.
Agree on the tourist emphasis. Ilili has very good food so that sounds hopeful. But the space certainly sounds large enough to have been divided into finer dining and the affordable options.
This is so upsetting for downtown. Having a beautiful local restaurant with a view was downtown’s best kept secret. Gigino was so delicious and affordable for a nice night out! This sounds like a spot that won’t stay open very long if tourists don’t keep it going. And given location I can’t imagine tourists keeping it going. This area of the city is mostly for residents and downtown workforce. What a loss for the neighborhood!
Right on!
I live in that neighborhood and I’m glad they gave the contract to people who will open something fast and affordable. Sure, there’ll be tourists, but it comes with the territory.
Agree with most of the posters that this was a real miss for the neighborhood and a classic example of why committee based group think that has to please too many vocal constituent groups is always a disaster. If you look at all of the ridiculous hoops and special interest check boxes that any vendor had to check to get this deal, it is a sick joke and why the rest of the country laughs at us.
“Grab and go” from the people who do foodservice for the school district? Really? Gigino’s was (is) a neighborhood gem that is reasonably priced and used the space is a way that was welcoming yet still special. Why not reach out to the former operators of the Bryant Park Grille? Or an established and stable restaurant group like Starr or Danny Meyer?
Tourists being dumped off buses so they could be attacked by illegal vendors and then buy a plastic bottle of coke in this beautiful structure is a loss. No locals will eat there – ever.
Plan for a failure in 2 years and an empty structure for 2 more after that. Sometimes common sense is the best strategy, not pleasing Community Board 1.
Make Gigino’s great again!! It sounds like a Salvation Army is coming