Well-behaved crowd for first night of Celebration of Light
Posted July 26, 2015 11:06 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – A quarter of a million people turned out to English Bay to see China fill the sky last night, not as many as years past.
Vancouver Police say there were a few tickets handed out for open-liquor and public drunkenness, but no real problems.
Constable Brian Montague says part of that is because they have improved their crowd-control techniques and learned from past events. “The crowds are also learning. The crowds are getting better at not bringing down things they shouldn’t be bringing down and those that are looking to cause problems realize that there is a really heavy police presence and they are not going to last very long if they cause a problem.”
Montague says the unstable weather played the biggest role in keeping the numbers down for the first night. “I believe our biggest numbers last year were 400,000 in the downtown core. So a lot of people [this year] but not as many as we have had in the past. I expect Wednesday will be about the same at 250,000 to 300,000 and next Saturday will probably [have] the biggest crowds.”
Transit Police also had a quiet night with only 17 liquor pour-outs compared to last year’s 49. All ticket totals are not in yet but approximately 12 violation tickets were also issued.
