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Monday, January 01, 2007

The Madisonian Model



'[In an] area of nearly one square mile — between Lake Mendota, Lake Monona and Blair and Lake Streets — [the University of Wisconsin's city of Madison] has 120 places that serve only or mostly alcohol. They have a capacity of more than 11,000 people, city officials said. ... According to a recent police department analysis of attacks in which someone was injured downtown, about 75 percent of the victims and perpetrators were intoxicated. The analysis also found that after midnight on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays, police officers, paramedics and firefighters often spent half to all of their working hours responding to alcohol-fueled fights and disorderly conduct. Noise, public urination and vandalism are constant concerns.... [One resident] said she quickly grew irritated at being awakened at 2:30 a.m., when the noisy bar crowd usually begins to make its way home, dropping empty beer cans and other trash along the way. One morning she woke to find that garbage had been torched and the flames had charred a tree.

“I want to live downtown, but I also want a decent quality of life,” [she] said.