Caffe Aldo Lamberti seeks Cherry Hill Planning Board okay to add to its Route 70 indoor dining.

The owner of the Caffe Aldo Lamberti restaurant on Route 70 is scheduled to go before the Cherry Hill Planning Board on Monday for approval to enclose a front patio dining area to provide added indoor dining.

ACRRP LLC, the upscale restaurant's owner, is asking the board for minor site plan approval with bulk variances to construct the 1,099-square-foot addition, restripe the parking area, modify an existing drive aisle and replace a sign with a LED changeable-copy one.

"The existing patio area is currently used as an outdoor dining service, so the footprint of the impervious coverage area is not proposed to be changed," according to the restaurant's operating statement filed with its application.

Caffe Aldo Lamberti over the years has made extensive changes to the 64-year-old building near the Haddonfield Avenue/Grove Street intersection. In the past, the site at 2011 Route 70 West has housed the Late Show dinner club and Bagel Nosh, according to Township records.

A rendering of the addition provided to the Planning Board shows that the restaurant would be able to add 11 tables, with four diners each.

Variances sought, according to the application documents, include small changes from existing dimensions for maximum lot coverage and open space.

"Since customers are already able to be served in this area of the restaurant, the proposed improvements will not change the hours of operation, the number of employees, or other as well as any other aspects of the existing operations," the operating statement noted.

The restaurant's founder, Aldo Lamberti, emigrated from Naples, Italy with his parents in 1963 when he was 13, according to the company's history. He returned to Italy to study northern Italian cuisine and in 1985 opened the first Ristorante Lambert on Brace Road in Cherry Hill. That restaurant now is Lamberti's Tutti Toscani.