New Yorkers looking for a taste of indoor dining before it returns here Feb. 14 can come across the river to Jersey City.

They're already making the trip.

"The second that indoor dining closed in New York, we knew we were gonna see like an increase in New Yorkers and it just been more and more," Marianne Pinaha, hospitality leader at Porta Jersey City, said.

New Jersey is now loosening its restrictions on indoor dining, before New York even brings it back. 

Now, restaurants in the Garden State can seat people at 35% capacity -- up from 25%

And the 10 p.m. curfew is lifted.

"I think we're gonna see a lot of late-night New York diners tonight," Pinaha said.

She said the extra hours are particularly helpful to the restaurant's bottom line.

"Now, we're getting two more hours of kitchen time, which is going to be really, really great for our revenue," she said.

Patrons, like Phil Testa, a bartender himself, had a message for New Yorkers.

"I have a few friends, my family actually lives in Brooklyn. They see me go out a lot and I think there's a little bit of an envy there," Testa said. "I do tell them you can come here, you can come see me at work but when the places open in New York, go. Show your appreciation for small businesses and ownership trying to get back and give that initiative."

Back across the Hudson River in New York, restaurant owners are eager to seat customers indoor at greater capacity just like businesses in New Jersey or elsewhere in New York State.

"It doesn't make sense to me because when I go to Yonkers, as I was the other day, it was a lot of people at 50% there," Lolo Manso, owner of Socarrat Paella Bar, said. "It is not logical."

The looser restrictions in New Jersey comes just in time for the Super Bowl, an important event for Evelyn Padin, owner of Hard Grove, a Cuban restaurant.

"The extra hours will really make or break your payroll. What we're looking at is a very lean February this is a big moneymaker for the restaurants," Padin said.

Not even the big game swayed Governor Cuomo to lift the 10 p.m. restaurant closure in New York, though he did say he may push up the return of indoor dining, a day or two earlier, it depends on COVID-19 rates.