Thursday, April 15, 2010

More Drinking At Montrose Beach....

... if the Mayor gets his way (meaning additional liquor licenses for park restaurants, including one at Montrose Beach).  Read "More Liquor Could Flow At Lakefront Parks" in the Tribune. 

Our favorite line:  "It will be scrutinized very closely."  Because, you know, it's already so hard to find a drink in Uptown's parks.

15 comments:

  1. Maybe I am naive, but I do think that having licenses at sit-down restaurants on the water would be fabulous, especially if it is not a hot dog stand. My wife and often lament the fact that there are so few places on the water to sit with a nice glass of wine. If the laws prohibited people from taking the drinks from the cordoned area I think it would be good.

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  2. Well the licenses are a good idea but when I go to the Montrose area to fish last year I always see plenty of liquor being sold around the soccer field. Beer being sold. $3.00, out of taco carts, vans and car trunks that park all around the soccer field and they have no food or liquor license. I think until they enforce the license laws that these people break all the time then talk about liquor licenses for park restaurants.........

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  3. @Uptownism - agree! as for the taco carts, etc. - that needs to be enforced. Call your Alderman to complain LOL

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  4. Uptownism, you are naive. The proposed site is a hot dog and taco stand.

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  5. Although public drinking *can* be a problem, I haven't noticed intoxication as a problem at Montrose Beach/Park. I've spent a lot of time there the past 3 years to sail off the beach. To be sure, there are problems: Gay prostitution in the Audobon reserve, traffic, seagull poop, etc.

    But I don't play soccer. perhaps they're more rowdy? Dunno.

    I'm not thrilled about licensing for hot-dog stands, though. I don't want the beach to feel like a street festival. Street fests are generally non-combative, but not peaceful and relaxing either.

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  6. How is it that residents can dine on their own cheese & wine in the Summer at Pritzker Pavilion while listening to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, yet the same activity at Montrose Beach is illegal?

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  7. I am all for this one...And if we don't behave ourselves, hold us accountable.

    It will be fine. We go down to Castaways and drink now...

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  8. Brennen...when does the Chicago Symphony Orchestra play at Montrose? I'll be there wine/cheese or no.

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  9. Bradley: My phrasing was confusing.

    At the Pritzker Pavilion they host the symphony in the park events. It's always been a Sunday evening when I have gone. You can drink wine in the field while the stage serenades as the sun sets. It's really fun.

    This is legal.

    But if you drink wine and eat cheese while listening to your own symphony playing through small speakers at Montrose beach then you're breaking the law.

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  10. Then it's not the same activity at all.

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  11. Yet another shaft-the-little-guy-while-giving-big-bucks-to-the-city's-vendors (in this case the Park District) scheme by the King and his Court.

    For years now the locally-owned liquor stores/taverns have had extreme difficulty, thanks to our leaders, to obtain/retain/pass on liquor licenses, regardless of how law-abiding the owners and non-disruptive the clientele.

    But the Big Guys will be able to serveintoxicating drinks to large (therefore potentially more unruly and difficult to control) crowds at public (and presumably family-friendly) parks.

    Still the city-on-the-make and presumably the city-on-the-take, 60 years after Nelson Algren's classic book of that title.

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  12. Bradley: Both activities involve consumption of alcohol on Chicago Park District property. On the contrary, they are the same.

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  13. The concerts I've been to at Millenium Park (Grant Park Orchestra) have always been organized, monitored, scheduled (start/end) events. This is entirely different from someone deciding to have their own private concert on public space. So, while at the micro level they are similar they are hardly the "same."

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  14. From what I know they plan on opening a sit down place at Montrose this year, hence why they want a liquor license.

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  15. OH NOES! Somebodyz Drinking Teh Beerz!

    Look, I'm all for law and order, it's been my bread and butter for 20 years, but the laws/regulations we have here are among the most draconian in the nation and perhaps the world. If a person is a taxpayer (or more likely in UT a recipient of taxpayer monies) of voting age, is not driving and is not being a nuisance, having a beer by the lake should be his or her business, bottom line.

    Me and three friends sat on the lakefront with a cooler of beer and cups watching the air show this summer. I paid $19 bucks for the case, $5 for the cooler and $3 for the ice. That's $27 dollars for a day's worth of beers for four people at the lakefront. One ROUND of beers would have been almost $20! Know what we did then? We watched, we drank, we left and went to a local pizza joint. Our only REAL crime? Not paying the mayor or his vendors of choice.

    No. This is about freedom. IF someone is acting like an idiot, deal with THAT idiot, don't ban everything for everyone because of that one idiot.

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