On Sunday The Sun chronicled - hour by hour - the downtown Naperville party scene as evidenced by a recent Friday night when a reporter and photographer rode along with the police and observed things firsthand. All in all, the bar scene seemed to be pretty raucous but not too out of control. And, it seemed there were plenty of Naperville's Finest on hand to make sure people had a good time and got home safely. Just wondering - was this a typical weekend night in downtown Naperville or was it pretty quiet, comparatively speaking, given that August is a big vacation month. We'd like to know if anybody out there has an opinion or any first-hand knowledge on how the "night" described in the paper compares with other weekend nights when the party-hearty crowd comes out to play downtown.
Downtown after dark
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If you didn't step in a puddle of vomit, it's not a typical Friday night in downtown Naperville.
Oh my God, Suzanne, that is the most absurd, ignorant comment I've heard in a long time. You make it sound as if it's New Orleans. Grow up. Naperville has quite a night life and people do come to party. Some weekends are crazier than others and I am guessing the summer "madness" is slowing down since all of the college kids have gone back to school. All that being said, I am pretty sure it's common knowledge that the Naperville Police do not mess around with drinking and driving. To Suzanne and all of those who feel the scene in downtown Naperville has become too much of a burden here is some advice: Move. See, the great thing about Naperville is they don't force anyone to stay here who doesn't wish to.
I think Suzanne is referring to the blatant and obvious over-serving that takes place in downtown Naperville... which like it or not is a real problem. There's nothing wrong with coming to downtown Naperville to party, the problem lies in the sheer excess a lot of people take their partying to.
I often play the role of designated driver, and as such have spent a lot of time making small talk with the bike cops babysitting the drunkards. I've been told by multiple cops that the number of drinking related citations they issue in a night is limited only by the amount of cops available to write the tickets.
It doesn't make sense to me why the police don't go after the bars themselves, since they serve as the source of the problem. I promise you if bar owners even had a hint of fear of either losing their liquor license or having it suspended that blatant over serving would come to a complete stop.
Until the city puts pressure on bartenders to take responsibility in not pouring booze down the gullets of the obviously intoxicated the routine for downtown Naperville night life will remain as it is now:
Take as much money as you can out of the ATM, drive to downtown Naperville, get as drunk as humanly possible, then drive home and either wrap your car around a tree or get slapped with a $1000 DUI ticket.
If anyone wants to argue that, I encourage you to look at the FACTS. Naperville has been LEADING the Chicago area in DUI's issued for over FIVE YEARS now. I am at a total loss as to why the city chooses to deal with the effect of over serving, and the potential loss of innocent life than deal with the CAUSE of overserving: Irresponsible money grubbing bar owners, and bartenders who don't give a damn.
I hate downtown Naperville's entire atmosphere and I avoid it at all costs. Mark is right about the over-serving, and the Sun's article even mentioned watching people barely able to stumble to cabs. The problem with this and the main reason why I'd rather stay home than join my girlfriends on a night in downtown Naperville is that when it becomes status quo for people to be so drunk they have to be carried out of a bar... how do you tell who is actually drunk and who has been drugged?
Someone could slip something in to my drink towards last call at any of downtown Naperville's bars and then carry me to a cab without anyone even giving him a second look or thinking someone barely able to stand is out of the ordinary! How messed up is that?! How many more women have to be date raped and how many more people need to die at the hands of drunk drivers before the citizens of Naperville put their foot down and decide enough is enough?
I doubt the city will do anything about it on their own. Think about it, liquor taxes and money generated from DUI fines are practically a money printing machine and it will be a cold day in hell before Naperville turns their back on a revenue source.
I'm glad to be back at school and able to have a night out in a town with a safe and sane atmosphere unlike downtown Naperville which for all practical purposes is little more than a city sponsored frat party.
Suzanne and Mary are right. Downtown Naperville is nothing but an overpriced college bar scene. $10 for a martini at Hugo's? Are you kidding me? I can get a full dinner with chips and a drink at Chipotle for that! I never venture to downtown Naperville anymore. Too many drunk, snobby, social climbers running around smoking big fat cigars and talking about how successful they are!
Here's something interesting:
Did you know that if an ambulance picks up a drunk driver who was in a car accident and they tell the EMT or someone at the hospital how much they've had to drink and where they got so drunk at they are protected under hipaa privacy laws (that peice of paper you sign at the doctor) and anyone who relays that information to a police officer could go to jail for doing it???
So more or less these bars are able to operate completely anonymously if some drunk dies in the back of the ambulance after running over a half a dozen people and slamming his car into a wall. But, as people have already said, the cops would much rather just write DUI tickets than stop the problem at the source
if you value your life stay away from downtown naperville after midnight.
You people are out of your mind, and that's why you're lame. Eli Hodapp is behind all this.
Haha, give me a break. ELI HODAPP RUINS EVERYTHING!
I've been happy as a clam since the city started enforcing the noise ordinances.
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