The Last Days of Lit, ChickenShack Madness, and More A.M. Intel

— East Village bar Lit is closing after 13 years in business on Second Avenue. The Grieve notes that a "for rent" sign currently hangs above the door. The bar will close for good at some point in the next two months. Owners Erik Foss and David Schwartz opened a spinoff of the bar in Bushwick's McKibbin lofts a few years ago called Currant Cafe. When asked about the reasons for the closure, Shwartz told nightlife writer Steve Lewis: "Ehh, not happy with the newbies in the East Village. Millenials don’t go out and the artistic ones left for Brooklyn digs 4 yrs ago."

— The long-in-the-works pedestrian plaza in front of Punjabi Grocery and Deli is nearly complete, which means that hopefully, those barricades will come down and business will improve at the Indian restaurant, which is beloved by cabbies and the city's cheap eats enthusiasts. Soon, work will begin on a taxi relief stand in front of the restaurant.

— Here's what the scene at the Fulton Street Shake Shack looked like yesterday around noon:

Hillary Dixler

The lines were longer than usual, presumably because people wanted to try the new ChickenShack. The Brooklyn locations of Shake Shack will not serve the sandwich for another week.

— Hero chef José Andrés backed out of a deal to open a restaurant in a D.C. building owned by Donald Trump because of the tycoon's idiotic, disparaging comments about Mexican immigrants.

— The Jacob's Pickle team got initial approval from the CB7 SLA licensing committee to open a bar underneath the dining room. The new subterranean space will be reservations-only.

— Cool kid restaurateurs Matt Abramcyk and Akiva Elstein (Navy, Smith & Mills) plan to take over the old Ivy's Bistro space at 385 Greenwich Avenue in Tribeca. No word yet on what they want to do with the space, but Abramcyk has had designs on that corner since at least 2012, when he announced plans to open a restaurant called Maritime.

— Here is your daily moment of zen, courtesy of Dominique Ansel:

Morning meditation watching DKA dough develop the right amount of gluten.

A video posted by dominiqueansel (@dominiqueansel) on Jul 8, 2015 at 6:17am PDT