How Rent Spikes Are Creating Fine Dining ‘Deserts’ In New York City

In 1995, the restaurateur Jonathan Morr opened a 3,800-square-foot noodle shop called Republic on Union Square West in New York City, paying an annual rent of $220,000. “The rent was relatively inexpensive for what it was,” he said. “But remember, when I opened, Union Square was very different than it is today. There was very little there along with the drugs in the park. At the time we were taking a risk.”

Twenty-two years later, Union Square has been gentrified beyond recognition. It's home to a Whole Foods supermarket and an apartment building whose penthouse sold for more than $16 million. And now Republic is on its way out. Morr said he expects to close the space by the end of 2017, three and a half years before the lease expires. “It’s just a fact of life—there’s no way that we’re staying there after the lease is up,” he said. Taking advantage of an impatient landlord, Morr plans to leave the space early and will "split the difference between what [the landlord] gets from us and what he’ll get from the next tenant, and call it a day," he said.