Word spread fast that the McDonald’s drive-through at Bushey, near Watford in Hertfordshire, was on the list of Golden Arches restaurants that had reopened after eight weeks, and the queue of customers craving Big Macs and Happy Meals began building rapidly. By 1pm, two hours after it reopened, a line of about 40 vehicles meant an hour-long roadside wait for burger fans.
The branch is among 33 outlets the fast food chain has reopened for drive-through only in London and south-east England as it eases back into business following the loosening of lockdown restrictions.
McDonald’s and other fast food chains including Burger King, KFC and Nando’s are trialling a gradual reopening of restaurants to allow staff to get used to new safety measures and practise physical distancing inside.
In Bushey, sisters Casey and Alycia Levy, aged 18 and 20, had bought burgers, chicken nuggets and cold drinks as a surprise for their grandparents, who have been isolating for 11 weeks. “They’ve been at home since 1 March, so we wanted to cheer them up,” Alycia said.
Matthew Cohen had brought his children Dylan, 7, and Summer, 11, for lunch. “We’ve been missing the sweet and sour sauce with our chicken nuggets,” Cohen said.
The family usually visit the drive-through weekly, and had a longer wait than usual, because only one lane was open, but did not find a radical change in the experience.
The changes in restaurant operations will be more noticeable for the staff. They now have their temperatures checked when they arrive for a shift, and will be given protective equipment including masks and gloves. They are also protected from customers by perspex screens installed at the drive-through windows, and from their fellow workers inside the restaurant’s kitchen.
As a McDonald’s employee – his face covered with a face mask and wearing a hi-vis vest – marshalled the queue of cars, other staff members walked the line of vehicles to tell customers they were serving only a limited menu. Clients were asked to use contactless payment methods if possible and spending was capped at £25 per vehicle.
The details of which branches were reopening were kept secret until just 45 minutes before the first customers were served, as McDonald’s tried to avoid a rerun of its experience in France and Switzerland. When drive-throughs were reopened there, the first locations were announced well in advance, leading to queues of up to seven hours.
Many customers at Bushey had heard about the reopening on social media and had brought their children for a trip out to buy a meal.
By lunchtime, so many vehicles were queueing for the Bushey branch that they were starting to disrupt traffic on the adjoining A41, and the restaurant’s franchise owner and some of his staff enlisted the help of a nearby highway maintenance crew to cordon off part of the road, creating a one-way system.
Despite almost two months passing since the government introduced lockdown measures and the closure of seating spaces in all restaurants, some customers were still unsure how to behave. Having ordered burgers from their car window, one mother and son were disappointed not to be able to eat their lunch at a sunny table outside.
The fast food chain said it had informed police forces, local authorities and the highways agency in all places where it was due to reopen. At one restaurant, in Peterborough, a police officer called in to check that the agreed vehicle queueing system was in place and that no further crowd control measures were required.
