ANOTHER taste of continental café culture could be coming to the heart of York with plans by Pizza Hut for al fresco dining in Parliament Street.

The company has applied to City of York Council to vary the premises licence for its restaurant, to allow a pavement café to open at the front.

It wants permission to sell alcohol with food there from 10am until midnight, from Monday to Saturday, and from noon until 11.30pm on Sundays.

However, this could fall foul of a temporary council decision to monitor pavement cafés staying open beyond 8pm.

Councillors voted last month to bring in new restrictions on cafés wanting to open after 8pm.

Only councillors, and not officers, will be able to grant consent for late opening.

This will apply for the next six months, while a full consultation and review of policy is carried out - although businesses which already stay open late into the evening can carry on doing so in the meantime.

John Lacy, the council's licensing manager, said Pizza Hut's was just the latest pavement café application to be made to the council as businesses encountered increasing demand from customers to eat and drink outside.

He felt such demand was related to the increasingly warm climate, but the looming ban on smoking indoors was possibly set to increase demand even further.

Mr Lacy said anyone opposed to the application had until May 18 to lodge an objection and, if any such objections could not be resolved, the matter would go before a City of York Council licensing committee.

He said Pizza Hut would also have to win planning permission before it could open the pavement café.

A Pizza Hut spokeswoman said as al fresco dining became increasingly popular in the UK, it was continuously looking at a number of sites where outdoor dining would complement its brand, the town and its customers - and Parliament Street was one such site.

"We have already introduced it to a number of sites where it has proved very popular with our customers," she said.

Gillian Cruddas, chief executive of York Tourism Bureau, said the bureau was broadly in favour of pavement cafés and keen for the city to have a continental feel.

"Outdoor eating and drinking is a big part of European culture," she said.

"We know our visitors appreciate outdoor cafés and restaurants.

"But we also understand that applications have to be carefully considered alongside any objections, to ensure we achieve the right atmosphere in the city for our residents and our visitors."