A plan for a licensed sound system for the 420 cannabis celebration in Castle Park has been rejected. Each April stoners gather in the city centre park to smoke weed as part of a worldwide day to both celebrate cannabis and protest against its prohibition.
Last year thousands of people attended the event in Castle Park, with seven sound systems playing music throughout the afternoon and evening. This year, Bristol City Council received an application for a “temporary event notice”, which would legally allow setting up a sound system.
The “quite large PA” would play music from 12pm to 9pm, on the Old Market side of the park on April 20. Councillors at a licensing hearing on Thursday, February 27, were told of the police’s concerns about the application, which claimed only 250 people would attend the sound system.
Louise Mowbray, licensing officer at Avon and Somerset Police, said: “They want a PA system and dance music. 4/20 is an event in Castle Park and has been growing in size. Last year the police reckon there were 4,000 people in the park at 4pm in the afternoon. There were seven DJ stands, all unlicensed, and the police were still dealing with it beyond midnight.
“This TEN seeks to licence a sound system for the 4/20 event. They’re talking about 250 people only. I don’t know how they’re going to manage that and there’s no details about how they’re going to manage these numbers.
“Last year there were seven unregulated entertainment systems in the park, which adds to the retention of people in the area and stops people dispersing and going away from the area. Not to say there was any disorder or crime associated with it, but obviously with that scale of numbers there is the potential. From a policing point of view, we can’t endorse this.”
She added that if a fence was out around the sound system, the numbers could be more easily managed. The unnamed applicant did not attend the hearing to speak about his plans. Refusing the temporary event notice is highly unlikely to stop this year’s 4/20 event from going ahead.
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Despite the lack of regulation, the police faced few issues with previous 4/20 events in Castle Park, which tend to have a relaxed and laid-back nature. Although possessing cannabis is still illegal in the UK, smoking is widely tolerated in some parts of Bristol.
Green Councillor Fi Hance, chair of the licensing hearing, said: “We’ve decided to refuse the application on the basis that there is a risk to public nuisance, given the number of people applied for.”