Muted Mardi Gras: Closed bars, barricaded Bourbon Street

Kevin McGill/AP

4 years ago

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Coronavirus-related limits on access to Bourbon Street, shuttered bars and frigid weather all were expected to prevent what the city usually craves at the end of Mardi Gras season — streets and businesses jam-packed with revelers.

Parade float workers Travis Keene, left, and Joey Mercer position a pelican while fellow crew member Chelsea Kamm, right, looks on while decorating a house in New Orleans on Friday, Jan. 8, 2021. All around the city, thousands of houses are being decorated as floats because the coronavirus pandemic has canceled parades that usually take place on Mardi Gras. (AP Photo/Janet McConnaughey)

Parades and parties on Mardi Gras (Fat Tuesday) and the days leading up to the annual pre-Lenten bash usually draw more than a million people to the streets.

But parades were canceled and Mayor LaToya Cantrell recently ordered bars closed. Even bars that had been allowed to operate as restaurants with “conditional” food permits were shuttered for five days that began Friday. Take-out drinks in “go-cups” also are forbidden — no more strolling the French Quarter with a drink in hand.

Bourbon Street was to be blocked to automobile and foot traffic at 7 a.m., with access limited to residents, business managers and employees, hotel guests and restaurant patrons.

Some locals are still making the best of it, decking their houses like parade floats. A giant carton of popcorn, huge lollipops and a Paul Bunyan-sized ice cream cone are among the decorations on one two-story “house float” aptly titled “Snacking in Place.” Meanwhile, motorists can drive by an array of idled floats at New Orleans’ City Park.

NEW ORLEANS, LA – FEBRUARY 14: Vehicles line up to view Mardi Gras floats at the Float in the Oaks event in City Park on February 14, 2021 in New Orleans, Louisiana. Traditional Mardi Gras celebrations have been disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic, including the cancelling of all carnival parades and the closing of all bars in the French Quarter until Wednesday. (Photo by Jon Cherry/Getty Images)

NEW ORLEANS, LA – FEBRUARY 14: A vehicle drives by a giant alligator Mardi Gras float during the Float in the Oaks event in City Park on February 14, 2021 in New Orleans, Louisiana. Traditional Mardi Gras celebrations have been disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic, including the cancelling of all carnival parades and the closing of all bars in the French Quarter until Wednesday. (Photo by Jon Cherry/Getty Images)

Various estimates showed hotels were likely to be anywhere from one-third to more than half full — far below the 90%-plus bookings of most years. And city and state officials all but warned tourists away.

“If people think they’re going to come to Louisiana, anywhere, or New Orleans and engage in the kind of activities they would have pre-pandemic then they are mistaken and quite frankly they are not welcome here to do that,” Gov. John Bel Edwards said at a recent news conference.

Freezing or near-freezing temperatures were in the Tuesday forecast.

If the crowd control measures work, the scene will be in stark contrast to Mardi Gras crowds last year that were later blamed for an early Louisiana outbreak of COVID-19.

Parades also were canceled this year in Mobile, Alabama, which boasts the nation’s oldest Mardi Gras celebrations. There was no plan to close bars there, but some streets were to be shut down Tuesday to control traffic and allow for more outdoor seating and service at restaurants and bars.