Miami Beach Spring Break problems -- Curfew & Causeways closed

[JimMIA]

Spring Break in Miami Beach has just been totally out of control this year.

Police made over 150 arrests this weekend (120 of them Friday night). 42 were felony arrests (many for felony fugitive warrants), and police have also seized more than a dozen guns -- all just in South Beach! Two officers were injured and they had to deploy pepper balls and concussion grenades to disperse one crowd.

It's so bad, Miami Beach Mayor Dan Gelber gave a speech today saying, "The Entertainment District is not working for us. It's got to go." He actually wants to get rid of Miami Beach's tourist area and replace it with art galleries and museums. Good luck with that idea!

Fort Lauderdale, just a few miles north, doesn't seem to be having any of these problems.

Anybody else having Spring Break problems?

 

[NotUrsula]

DS says it's pretty quiet in St. Pete. The restaurants are busier than before, but he's not seeing any lunacy near the beaches.
Clearwater is probably at highest risk for it in Pinellas; they have a campaign sending out people to give out free gift cards at the beach businesses to those wearing masks.

 

[JimMIA]

I finally found a link I could post without a bunch of offensive reader comments on the news websites. Fortunately this TV station doesn't allow comments.

https://www.nbcmiami.com/news/local/pepper-balls-kick-off-miami-beachs-spring-break-weekend/2404718/

Unfortunately, Spring Break will continue until April 18 or so.

 

[Dan Murphy]

Anybody else having Spring Break problems?

Hopefully we won't have the post spring break problems as the kids bring the virus back with them to all the states.

 

[1GoldenSun]

The Florida university where I teach isn't having a spring break this year; they're ending the semester early instead. I'm very happy about this. The Super Bowl crowds were bad enough.

 

[Kae]

My kids College is not having a spring break. But the only thing she would have done is her friends Uncle's Condo in FL a low key area they went last year and saw 3 other groups/familes at the private area beach

 

[Southernmiss]

Our major universities did not schedule a spring break for this year. They will end their semester April 30th with exams the first week of May.

Our local infectious disease doctor has a 2nd home in Pensacola. He said there were lots of people in Pensacola this weekend.

Our own outlet mall was swarming with out of state guests on Saturday when I ran by for a gift. Our highways were as busy as thhey ever were pre-pandemic.

People are out and about all over.

 

[JimMIA]

Hopefully we won't have the post spring break problems as the kids bring the virus back with them to all the states.

If they do, they do, Dan. You can't fix stupid.

Our local police are passing out masks and trying to encourage mask wearing -- and they're having some success. But when the sun goes down and the kids get a couple of $18 beers in them, sometimes the brains and masks get discarded.

But we're really more worried about violence. We've had problems the last couple of years with stuff I would never associate with Spring Break (shootings, stabbings, etc), and we've had a number of street fights already this year.

 

[kirstenb1]

We're in Virginia. Was talking with a close friend today about Spring Break. We're going to Amelia Island, but she said a lot of the parents at her daughter's school are going to Texas, because they think they won't have to wear masks. I think she's going to steer clear of them for a couple of weeks.

 

[fancymouse]

Spring Break in Miami Beach has just been totally out of control this year.

Police made over 150 arrests this weekend (120 of them Friday night). 42 were felony arrests (many for felony fugitive warrants), and police have also seized more than a dozen guns -- all just in South Beach! Two officers were injured and they had to deploy pepper balls and concussion grenades to disperse one crowd.

It's so bad, Miami Beach Mayor Dan Gelber gave a speech today saying, "The Entertainment District is not working for us. It's got to go." He actually wants to get rid of Miami Beach's tourist area and replace it with art galleries and museums. Good luck with that idea!

Fort Lauderdale, just a few miles north, doesn't seem to be having any of these problems.

Anybody else having Spring Break problems?

We live in Fort Lauderdale and just remarked it doesn’t feel like Spring Break here. There’s definitely more tourists, but the influx of college kids is not as bad as normal. Not sure why Miami would be so much worse!

 

[tcufrog]

There are plenty of businesses and restaurants that still require masks, thank goodness.

 

[JimMIA]

We live in Fort Lauderdale and just remarked it doesn’t feel like Spring Break here. There’s definitely more tourists, but the influx of college kids is not as bad as normal. Not sure why Miami would be so much worse!

Miami Beach has been changing for several years. It used to be the playground of the rich and famous, but that has changed, at least temporarily, and especially during Spring Break.

This time 2-3 years ago, it would not be unusual to see a very elite photoshoot with supermodels along Ocean Drive. NOT now, lol!

For the last 4-5 years, we've had a week or two that have become increasingly low-rent. And for the last year, of course, all of the better events (art festivals, boat shows, golf and tennis tournaments, top-notch music festivals) have been canceled because of Covid. So now we're getting nothing but the low-rent weeks.

Ft. Lauderdale seems to have escaped most of the low-rent traffic. But if you look at local TV coverage of the two areas, you will see a marked difference between Ft. Laud Beach and South Beach.

 

[kdonnel]

Police made over 150 arrests this weekend (120 of them Friday night). 42 were felony arrests (many for felony fugitive warrants), and police have also seized more than a dozen guns -- all just in South Beach! Two officers were injured and they had to deploy pepper balls and concussion grenades to disperse one crowd.

How does it compare to 2017, 2018, 2019?

It doesn't seem like a lot of felony fugitive college students exists.

Is it locals or college students causing the problems?

Sounds more like South Beach is doing its best to imitate Chicago.

 

[JimMIA]

How does it compare to 2017, 2018, 2019?

No comparison. Much worse. But in those years, the hotels were charging much higher rates. Now flights are cheap, hotels are cheap...and it's COLD up Nawth!

It doesn't seem like a lot of felony fugitive college students exists.

No, but big time raucous partying attracts a variety of folks, including some real problem people.

Is it locals or college students causing the problems?

It's a mix -- mostly tourists, but some locals. The vast majority of the crime on South Beach is tourist/tourist. Somebody gets "disrespected" and the next thing you know, you've got a problem.

Sounds more like South Beach is doing its best to imitate Chicago.

That's what the mayor, and many citizens of Miami Beach are worried about. Most people don't realize it, but probably 85% of Miami Beach is quiet residential neighborhoods.

 

[NotUrsula]

Didn't Ft. Lauderdale deliberately roll up the Spring Break welcome mat back in the mid-1980s? I seem to remember that; requiring bars to stop the kind of drink specials and events that attract binge drinkers, kicking out MTV, etc.? Then ground zero moved up to Daytona until the early mid-90s, and then THEY kicked out MTV, and ground zero moved up and over to PCB? I remember my niece used to go sometimes in that era, and she told me that the crowd seemed to divide in the 90's, with the less affluent kids sticking with PCB while the rich kids went abroad or to South Beach. (Of course, I guess the COVID travel restrictions are also bringing back those kids who otherwise might have gone abroad.)

Did Ft. Lauderdale change their minds and welcome the Spring Break crowd back at some point in the last 20 years?

(I grew up in South Louisiana and I could never afford either the money or the time to spend a week traveling for Spring Break, though at the time, Florida's drinking age was 18. We always just got in a car late one night and headed for Destin; slept on the beach on towels, and then rolled on back home about 36 hours later when the liquor money ran out. At state schools in the South back then, it was mostly only the Greek-affiliated kids who did the whole week-long Yankee-style "Spring Break" trip.)

 

[Colleen27]

That is horrifying. Do you think that's a shift in the types of people traveling to party mid-pandemic or part of a larger trend in what spring break is like down there?

My college kid isn't doing anything for spring break. Her restaurant called her back to work two weeks ago, when indoor dining reopened, so we cancelled our plans... which weren't exactly "girls gone wild" anyway (we were planning a hiking trip to Sedona). But she has no interest in party-type spring breaks; last year, she was on a service trip in Appalachia for the break when all the shutdowns started.

 

[JimMIA]

@NotUrsula, I don't know the ins and outs of Spring Break history, but I really don't think our current problem has anything to do with that.

Currently, Ft. Lauderdale is doing more enforcement than a normal time period, but nothing like they would do for air shows, major music festivals, boat shows, etc. And they're not having any serious problems.

Ft. Lauderdale's "thing" is a beautiful beach. They have some nice hotels and good restaurants, but nothing like Miami Beach. They have bars, but nothing like the clubs of South Beach...nothing. The ambiance is just totally different.

Miami Beach's problem is that it has the reputation of being a world-class party destination, and it is super-cool.

So, if you want to spend a few days on a beautiful beach with some things to do, you go to Ft. Lauderdale.

But if you want to BE somebody(!), and be super-cool, and make Snapchat/Instagram/Tik-Tok history...you go to SoBe. And you act out. Totally different clientele for spring break.

 

[JimMIA]

... or part of a larger trend in what spring break is like down there?

Larger trend that actually initially had nothing to do with spring break. It expanded to spring break from other less-busy seasons. Our current problems have something to do with college kids, but did not start with college kids.

 

[*DisneyDreamer]

I don’t know the Miami area well enough, but it kind of makes me glad we won’t be in Miami in a couple weeks like we were supposed to before boarding our Disney cruise.

 

[okeydokey]

I’m not sure I understand what you mean by “low rent”.