Public alcohol consumption

[Sirotnikov]

Something that I only now realized.
Most of you guys live in areas where public alcohol consumption is prohibited, right? What is the basic reason / justification for this?

This totally doesn't exist / isn't enforced in Israel. Many of the times that I go out to meet friends we drink on the street in one way or another.

Either we grab a beer each, and go for a walk along a main road, and then talk about stuff as we walk. Or we take up some sort of public park or playground, and sit there, drinking beer, sometimes smoking a hookah.

We've never been given a dirty look by anyone, or bothered by cops. And we've passed lots of cops on our foot trips, or when sitting in the park.

As long as we didn't make terrible noise to startle the neighbors, or started fighting/drunk behavior, then no one seemed to care.

[Spec]

We can drink in the streets as long as the beer is in a paper bag.

Spec.

[Addled Platypus]

use a styrafoam cup.................





when you drink and drive

[KrazyHorse]

Re: Public alcohol consumption

Originally posted by Sirotnikov
Something that I only now realized.
Most of you guys live in areas where public alcohol consumption is prohibited, right? What is the basic reason / justification for this?

This totally doesn't exist / isn't enforced in Israel. Many of the times that I go out to meet friends we drink on the street in one way or another.

Either we grab a beer each, and go for a walk along a main road, and then talk about stuff as we walk. Or we take up some sort of public park or playground, and sit there, drinking beer, sometimes smoking a hookah.

We've never been given a dirty look by anyone, or bothered by cops. And we've passed lots of cops on our foot trips, or when sitting in the park.

As long as we didn't make terrible noise to startle the neighbors, or started fighting/drunk behavior, then no one seemed to care.

AFAIK in North America laws prohibiting the consumption of alcohol in public places are local, not state/provincial or federal.

[lord of the mark]

1. Its enforced sporadically here

2. Given that both your major ethnic groups have traditions of restraint with respect to alcohol, allowing public consumption is easier than it would be over here, I suspect (although I realize Russian traditions may be distinctive)

[Dauphin]

Re: Public alcohol consumption

Originally posted by Sirotnikov
Something that I only now realized.
Most of you guys live in areas where public alcohol consumption is prohibited, right? What is the basic reason / justification for this?

To my knowledge, usually to move along homeless people or other undesirables. It thus becomes an excuse not a reason.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Spec
We can drink in the streets as long as the beer is in a paper bag.

Spec.

That's an enforcement question, not a legal one.

[KrazyHorse]

Re: Re: Public alcohol consumption

Originally posted by Dauphin


To my knowledge, usually to move along homeless people or other undesirables. It thus becomes an excuse not a reason.

It may be different there, but if you walk around with a bottle of beer in plain view as you drink from it then you will get in trouble fairly quickly, even if you look otherwise "respectable".

[Dauphin]

Re: Re: Re: Public alcohol consumption

Originally posted by KrazyHorse


It may be different there, but if you walk around with a bottle of beer in plain view as you drink from it then you will get in trouble fairly quickly, even if you look otherwise "respectable".

I've seen many people drinking in public and the police have done nothing. The law is on the books, so I can only think that the drinking in public card is only used when other things are occuring.

[lord of the mark]

KH

Im just trying to imagine what Fells Point would be like if public alcohol consumption were allowed.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by lord of the mark
KH

Im just trying to imagine what Fells Point would be like if public alcohol consumption were allowed.

Errr...awesome, probably.

[KrazyHorse]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Public alcohol consumption

Originally posted by Dauphin


I've seen many people drinking in public and the police have done nothing. The law is on the books, so I can only think that the drinking in public card is only used when other things are occuring.

In north america other than at large public festivals and on people's own stoops the law is enforced strongly enough that you basically don't see people drinking outside "blatantly" (they cover the bottle in a paper bag, which allows the cops to pretend it's not happening or drink from another containter)

[Dauphin]

April 7, 2007
Court ‘attracted criminals’

BLACKWOOD

A magistrates’ court has been shut after 100 years — because it had been turned into a troublespot by young criminals.

Drunk and violent youths facing hearings over antisocial behaviour orders turned the outside of the court in Blackwood, South Wales, into a meeting place. Gwyn Berkley, 64, a retired policeman, said: “Groups of defendants stand in the street drinking and swearing. It makes a farce of the law that there were signs up banning drinking in public, yet the one place you could see it was outside the magistrates’ court at 10.30am. On one occasion a group of girls had a large crate of booze and were just lining the drinks up. Elderly people were frightened of walking in the street.”

The court held its last hearing last week. Cases will be transferred to courts in nearby Caerphilly and Abertillery.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article1624159.ece

[Ecthy]

IIUC it has recently been banned in Spain to avoid further "botellones" which means tons of young people meeting in one public spot (park etc.), drinking lots and leaving empty bottles.

Also an excuse though, this nation is really a bit Franquistic still

[Dis]

Where I live you can drink on the strip and downtown outside. That's about it.

I think the law is originally designed to crack down on bums? I'm not sure of the origins.