"For Samesa, the move to Rockefeller Center has been up and down. Eli Sussman, one of two brothers behind the popular Middle Eastern lunch counter, relocated his restaurant from residential Williamsburg to the rink level of Rockefeller Plaza in March 2021. He had doubts about running a business out of the Midtown development during a pandemic — tourism was at an all-time low, and office vacancies were at an all-time high — but he signed on anyway. Roughly a year and a half later his restaurant is temporarily closed for renovations, according to a spokesperson for Tishman Speyer, though there’s no reopening date on the calendar. 'They want to change the way New York thinks about a tourist destination,' Sussman said in January. 'It’s a tall order.'" - Luke Fortney
