Emerson installed five awnings covering outdoor seating in the 2 Boylston Place alleyway on March 5, in an effort to keep the five tables in the alley available during inclement weather.  

The awnings are an addition to Emerson’s outdoor seating area nestled in the 2B alley. The awnings were added this semester after the college did not install them in the fall, and serve as a way for students to dine outdoors any time of the year.  

“People can’t use them in inclement weather and people always want to be outside,” Duncan Pollock, interim assistant vice president of facilities management and campus services said in an interview. “As the pandemic came, we said ‘What better time than now?’”

With the pandemic still looming, outdoor seating has become more popular because of lower transmission rates of COVID-19 outdoors than indoors due to the constant circulation of air, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. As a result, Emerson has set out to add onto its alleyway seating area to promote social distancing and safer dining. 

“There’s some electrical lines that have been run out there for heaters [in] the future,” Pollock said. “Over the summer months we’re going to be installing some heaters so that even when it’s cold out there students can still sit outside.”

Pollock could not give an exact dollar amount for the cost of the awnings. 

Emerson is planning on adding minor additions like potted plants, but to gain approval for larger changes, the college must seek permission from the other buildings that share space in the alleyway, Pollock said.