Signs of the Times: Michael Mina Cutting Hours in '09

Union Square: File this away under foreboding signs for the restaurant industry: come the new year, the eponymous flagship of Michael Mina will be cutting its hours. The four-star restaurant has offered dinner service on a nightly basis since opening in 2004, but has now decided to cut Sundays and Mondays from its repertoire, effective January 2009.

The move, we think, is not so much a reflection on the health of the restaurant per se—for what it's worth, OpenTable shows zero availabilities this weekend—but more so the entire industry. We had the Rubicon situation earlier this year, and when a heavyweight restaurant like Michael Mina shows some cracks in the armor, small as they may be (though there are rumblings of staff cuts, there and well, everywhere), fellow restaurateurs take notice and brace accordingly.