Love 'em to bits: St. John's drops Tim's drive-thru objections

St. John's city council's moratorium on new drive-thru restaurants lasted for only a couple of weeks. (CBC)

Everything is sugar sweet between St. John's city council and Tim Hortons again, as councillors dunked a recently imposed moratorium on drive-thru restaurants.

Council attracted national headlines earlier this month with a halt to approving any additional drive-thru outlets, in the wake of traffic problems at several busy Tim Hortons restaurants around the city.

Councillors voted unanimously on Monday to rescind the two-week-old moratorium, which some business leaders described as a blight on the city's image, after a face-to-face meeting with franchise owners.

"The Tim Hortons corporation and the owners are as concerned about public safety as we are," said Mayor Dennis O'Keefe, adding that issues about traffic problems that spill out from Tim's parking lots into major roads "are certainly going to be met head-on."

O'Keefe said franchise owners have agreed to look at a variety of options, from acquiring additional land to reorganizing parking-lot layouts to adding double lines at some drive-thrus.

Coun. Tom Hann said a key will be to keep lines of communications open with the franchise owners.

"If there are any further problems with drive-thrus of any kind, then maybe we can sit down and resolve them, as these have been resolved," Hann said.