Hi Steve, I see what you were trying to do. That ancient hamburger joint is interesting as a kind of urban wabi sabi, but if you're going to include a long stretch of sidewalk like that, unless there's some reason to de-focus the background you shouldn't shoot at f/1.4, as you did in this shot. By shooting at f/1.4 you softened both the foreground and the background. At f/11 there'd have been an interesting look down the long tunnel of the street and you'd still still have been shooting at around 1/60 second. If that Canon lens has VR, that shouldn't have been a problem.
And to answer your question: lenses don't make anywhere near as much difference as photographers do.