Temple Bar: Alcohol licence holders in Dublin have been asked to observe a 4pm curfew during the St Patrick's Day parade. Photo / Leon Hard Niederwide, Unsplash
Temple Bar: Alcohol licence holders in Dublin have been asked to observe a 4pm curfew during the St Patrick's Day parade. Photo / Leon Hard Niederwide, Unsplash
Irish pubs and the gardaí are at odds over a proposed ‘dry zone’ prohibiting the sale of alcohol in Dublin city centre on St Patrick’s Day.
Liquor stores and supermarkets have been asked to not sell alcohol before 4pm on Friday, to avoid street drinking during the annual St Patrick’s Day parade. However Publicans have protested the “voluntary alcohol ban” saying that it would not apply to their premises.
The local police force Garda Síochána said that there would be cordons around the city’s Temple Bar hospitality district to prevent crowding.
Donal O’Keeffe the chief executive of the Licensed Vintners Association told The Irish Times that many pubs would not be observing this curfew, saying March 17 was a “very important trading day” for Irish Pubs.
“Under no circumstances will we be shut until 4pm on St Patrick’s Day. Pubs are an integral part of the festival. They come to us for drink, they come to us for food. We haven’t been asked to close,” he said.
Assistant Garda Commissioner Angela Willis told local media that the alcohol ban was voluntary but alcohol licence owners, observing the 4pm curfew would play “a significant contributing factor to make sure it is an enjoyable experience for everyone.”
The annual parade runs from Parnell Square to St Stephen’s Green from midday on Friday and is expected to attract hundreds of thousands of visitors from Ireland and around the world.
While the weekend is a high point for tourism and hospitality in the city, St Patrick’s Day also sees a rise in alcohol-related incidents.
Last year 72 drivers were arrested for drink driving and 33 for drug driving over the St Patrick’s weekend, said Commissioner Willis.
All gardaí officers have had leave suspended for St Patrick’s Day weekend, with 600 officers in attendance of the two-hour parade.
Chicago's St. Patrick’s Day Parade is one of the USA’s largest processions. Photo / 123rf
Dublin braces for hundreds of thousands of St Patrick’s Day visitors
All 1,700 tickets for grandstand seating along the parade route were sold months in advance. Costing between €100 to €250 ($170 to $430) each, many were bought up by international travellers and visitors from the US.
The national patron saint’s day is a huge event for trans-Atlantic travel, with many Americans making the most of a strong US dollar to visit Ireland.
Delta Air Lines has tripled its seats on flights to Dublin from the US over March compared to in 2019, adding flights from Atlanta and Boston due to high demand.
Not everyone is thrilled by the influx of St Patrick’s Day travel. This week over-enthusiastic musicians on an Aer Lingus were blasted for serenading passengers with Irish ditties.
The fiddler and accordionist were dubbed “selfish” and “rude” for bombarding their captive audience with music on a flight between Ireland and New York.
“Aer Lingus flight from Dublin to JFK yesterday. I mean, I understand it’s done from a good place, but also feel like you don’t play music (or much worse, sing) in an enclosed space there’s no escape from,” wrote passenger Adam Singer, who was not amused.
Tourist traffic also flows in the other direction. New York sees one of the largest St Patrick’s Day Parades outside of Dublin with roughly 150,000 marchers and two million onlookers departing down Fifth Avenue set to attend on Saturday.
