{"id":21099,"date":"2020-10-31T08:35:09","date_gmt":"2020-10-31T15:35:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/hi-lo\/?p=30000016356"},"modified":"2020-10-31T08:35:09","modified_gmt":"2020-10-31T15:35:09","slug":"long-beach-to-crack-down-at-least-for-halloween-on-large-nighttime-crowds-gathering-at-downtown","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/news\/long-beach-to-crack-down-at-least-for-halloween-on-large-nighttime-crowds-gathering-at-downtown","title":{"rendered":"Long Beach to crack down\u2014at least for Halloween\u2014on large nighttime crowds gathering at Downtown"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Evening hours in Downtown Pine\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/aaB3YDD8ggU?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Long Beach has been trying for years to bring more people to Pine Avenue. Finally efforts have paid off\u2014unfortunately, however, it\u2019s happening in the midst of a pandemic.<\/p>\n<p>Late night crowds have been flocking to the Pine Avenue stretch between First and Fifth streets, which the city <a href=\"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/hi-lo\/addison-coronavirus-pine-closure-fifth-street-dlba\">fully closed to vehicular traffic <\/a>this summer.<\/p>\n<p>City officials wanted to close the business corridor in part to help restaurants and bars that were financially struggling under city health orders to limit service to outdoor areas.<\/p>\n<p>The plan appears to have worked, with crowds milling the streets while drinking alcohol in the late-night hours, with little ability for bars and restaurants to contain the crowds or enforce social distancing regulations.<\/p>\n<p>Joe Hernandez, manager of King\u2019s Fish House, agreed that it\u2019s a bit like New Orleans, with \u201ca lot of open drinking out in the streets, gathering of people, kind of a festival that\u2019s gotten out of hand.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The city is cracking down\u2014at least for one day, today, Halloween. City Manager Tom Modica issued a letter to businesses along the corridor on Thursday advising that all businesses allowed to operate parklets must stop accepting diners at 10:30 p.m. Saturday, and must close by 11 p.m.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_10000032051\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-10000032051\" style=\"width: 1110px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-10000032051\" src=\"https:\/\/img.lbpost.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/31013522\/sevilla_pine_ave_parklet_cropped-1110x567.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1110\" height=\"567\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-10000032051\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">It&#8217;s nearly 11 p.m. Friday Oct. 30, 2020 as patrons mill about the parklet space in front of Cafe Sevilla in Long Beach. Photo by Cheantay Jensen.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Signage is being installed Downtown advising patrons of the change, as well as requirements for social distancing. Modica said the city will be monitoring activity over the weekend \u201cand will take additional future steps to prevent gatherings if problems persist.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Though many bar and restaurant owners agree the crowds have gotten large, they hope the city doesn\u2019t go overboard with restrictions.<\/p>\n<p>Ron Hodges, owner of Shannon\u2019s on Pine, said managers are trained to deal with problems, including a recent episode in which a man who violated rules against drinking on the street was kicked out.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy managers tell me they\u2019ve seen people drinking on the street, drinking out of cups, yes it goes on,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhat happens with the city when it comes to enforcement is it\u2019s either lax or it\u2019s strong. It\u2019s been lax\u2014they haven&#8217;t been reminding people, and now they\u2019re saying, \u2018We\u2019re going to slam you.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Hernandez said he expects some pushback from patrons to the new rules on Saturday night.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think people are going to try to find an area to party,\u201d he said. \u201cWith the city cracking down on that, I feel like that\u2019s going to push a lot of that out of the area.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em>Reporters Steve Lowery and Cheantay Jensen contributed to this report.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Long Beach has been trying for years to bring more people to Pine Avenue. Finally efforts have paid off\u2014unfortunately, however, it\u2019s happening in the midst of a pandemic.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":71340,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","inline_featured_image":false,"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":"","_EventAllDay":false,"_EventTimezone":"","_EventStartDate":"","_EventEndDate":"","_EventStartDateUTC":"","_EventEndDateUTC":"","_EventShowMap":false,"_EventShowMapLink":false,"_EventURL":"","_EventCost":"","_EventCostDescription":"","_EventCurrencySymbol":"","_EventCurrencyCode":"","_EventCurrencyPosition":"","_EventDateTimeSeparator":"","_EventTimeRangeSeparator":"","_EventOrganizerID":[],"_EventVenueID":[],"_OrganizerEmail":"","_OrganizerPhone":"","_OrganizerWebsite":"","_VenueAddress":"","_VenueCity":"","_VenueCountry":"","_VenueProvince":"","_VenueState":"","_VenueZip":"","_VenuePhone":"","_VenueURL":"","_VenueStateProvince":"","_VenueLat":"","_VenueLng":"","_VenueShowMap":false,"_VenueShowMapLink":false,"_":"","_author_alias":"","cap-aim":"","cap-description":"","cap-display_name":"","cap-first_name":"","cap-jabber":"","cap-last_name":"","cap-linked_account":"","cap-newspack_employer":"","cap-newspack_job_title":"","cap-newspack_phone_number":"","cap-newspack_role":"","cap-user_email":"","cap-user_login":"","cap-website":"","cap-yahooim":"","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_email_html":"","newspack_email_type":"","newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_hide_page_title":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_show_share_buttons":"","newspack_sponsor_byline_prefix":"","newspack_sponsor_disclaimer_override":"","newspack_sponsor_flag_override":"","newspack_sponsor_only_direct":"","newspack_sponsor_url":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2002],"tags":[1011],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[2080],"class_list":["post-21099","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-open-streets","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21099","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21099"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21099\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/71340"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21099"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21099"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21099"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newspack_spnsrs_tax?post=21099"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=21099"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}