Police are gearing up for a rowdy weekend in Kelowna, B.C.
It's all because of a nightly ritual that peaks in the summer months, and gets very intense on long weekends. In Kelowna, they call it the bar flush, a time when thousands of young partiers spill out onto the streets. The result is often chaos.
It's a ritual that's been repeated since before many of the city's night club crowd were born. It's a time when fights are not uncommon and taxi drivers feel nervous picking up passengers.
"We've had a lot of dented doors, broken windows brawls outside, six people trying to get in when can only take four, said Kim Jakku of Kelowna Cabs. " It's a really big mess,'' she said.
The latest attempt to fix the problem has involved the creation of two taxi stands where people line up for a cab. Of course every solution comes with problems of its own.
People who stand in line often can't get a cab.
For over a decade, there have been efforts to encourage the bars to stay open longer after the last call for alcohol, but success has been limited. The nightclub crowd says the real solution is to allow the bars to keep serving drinks until 4:00 a.m.
"People will start to call cabs because they're tired,'' said one night clubber. "Two o'clock in the morning is garbage for the simple fact that everyone is still hammered and ready to go,'' he said.
In nearby Penticton, a 4:00 a.m. closing is nothing new. But police say it hasn't solved the problem of after-hours rowdiness.
The RCMP have a big presence in the bar flush. They are part of the ritual, trying to practice a fair, but firm degree of tolerance.
For now, it's primarily up to police to find the best way to manage it all.
"[It involves]interacting with the people, doing positive re-enforcement and helping them get out of the area in the safest way possible.,'' said Sgt. Terry McLachlan of Kelowna RCMP.
With a report by CTV British Columbia's Kent Molgat
