"There seems to be a shift in the whole moral kind of indignation towards drinking and smoking," said Houck, who supports no limits to drinking hours. Tom Houck, a former Creative Loafing nightlife columnist who has been following the scene since 1977, said that over the past five years, he has noticed the City Council taking greater notice of complaints by neighbors around Backstreet and Club 112 about drugs and partying. "I am not opposed to 24-hour clubs, but perhaps they should be in a warehouse district where they're not bothering people." "When those two clubs opened in the '70s, Midtown was pretty blighted, but now there's a lot more residential," Lautzenheiser said. He's been fielding complaints of traffic and noise from residents of new condos and high-rises nearby. Randal Lautzenheiser, chairman of the Neighborhood Planning Unit covering Riviera and Backstreet, said the end of 24-hour partying was overdue. "We don't need government telling us when we can or cannot drink," said Michael Moody, 41, a regular Backstreet partygoer, as he nursed his final white Russian.
![atlanta gay bars for dancing cheshire bridge atlanta gay bars for dancing cheshire bridge](https://queerintheworld.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Felixs-Atlanta-1024x681.jpg)
Guards ushered confused, inebriated people out the door as the clock approached 3 a.m. Saturday night, Backstreet bartenders uttered the foreign phrase "last call" at 2:30 a.m., and deejays cut the dance music off at 2:45 a.m. closing time, which was a separate City Council decision spurred by late-night violence in Buckhead and unrelated to the late-hour clubs.
![atlanta gay bars for dancing cheshire bridge atlanta gay bars for dancing cheshire bridge](https://www.ajc.com/resizer/XmmmImlhrrTpj-4VWxWIs8dOBBM=/814x458/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/ajc/YPXDMUUOLKH47KKMHSTESCC43Y.jpg)
They also are complying with the city's new 3 a.m. Three of the clubs, Backstreet Atlanta, Club 112 and the Riviera, remain open for business but have lost their legal standing to serve into the wee hours of the morning. Turn out the lights: 24-hour clubbing is overĪ glitzy, rambunctious slice of Atlanta's social scene - "private clubs" that served liquor long after other bars had closed - has come to the end of a decades-long run.