Barcelona’s nightclubs are changing their hours of operation to make it easier for you to catch the first train home …
If you like to boogie down on the dance floor until the wee hours of the night, then your luck has changed in Barcelona. The city’s municipal government has just decided to extend the hours of nightclubs until six in the morning. This hour coincides with the time the subway stations open and will hopefully mean less noise and disturbance for residents living near the clubs. Joan Boada, Interior General Secretary of Institutional Relations and Participation, explains that this change will apply to nightclubs and discotheques but not to bars and pubs.
The innovation is the result of two years of activism on the part of Fecalon (la Federacion Catalana de Locales de Ocio Nocturno), roughly translating as the Catalan Association of Night Leisure Sites, which has been pointing out the urgency of revising city norms to adapt to the realities of urban living. Fecalon believes that this change will benefit young people who will no longer have to wait more than an hour to go home, especially those who live in small and medium suburbs of the big B. The municipal government hopes this adaptation to public transport schedules will reduce teenage degeneracy, and will stop those young drunken fools, who are hanging out in the streets waiting for subway doors to open, from bothering their downtown neighbors.
Starting in about two months, Barcelona clubs will stay open until 5 during the week — half an hour later than they do now, and until 6 am on week-ends and holiday eves.
Spain has a reputation for hosting a vibrant nightlife, Barcelona in particular. In comparison to other European countries, in Spain dinner out tends to begin at a later hour, such as 11 PM.
Last year, the hours of the Paris metro were extended by one hour–to approximately 2 AM–on Saturday nights and holiday eves to offer patrons of nightspots an alternative to battling for a taxicab. Most major cities worldwide close their subway operations roughly between midnight and 2AM and reopen between 5AM and 6AM. Exceptions are Chicago and New York systems, which run 24 hours a day, and Copenhagen which operates all night on weekends.
This article was published Friday, March 30, 2007.
