Are maximum occupancy levels in the bars decreasing?

Here is a comment I recently received from “Robert” about the Cuff

Bill,

I was just curious if you know if there’s something weird going on at the Cuff.

I was there last night, and there was a line two-thirds down the block to get in. I was waiting outside for 45 minutes, which wasn’t fun given the chilly weather. Once I got to the front of the line, I found that card check/cover charge guy was deliberately “pausing” the line to throttle the number of people getting in. (He made me wait for two minutes once I got to the card check area.)

However, once inside at 12:15, it was empty (relatively speaking) for a Saturday night. No lines at the bars, lots of empty space in the disco area, and very few people on the back patio.

Is the Cuff getting pressured by the police or fire department to cut down on the number of people inside? Or, to be cynical, are they deliberately keeping people waiting in line to create the illusion that it’s full and popular?

Either way, it was not a great evening.

Very interesting. I would doubt they would deliberately prevent people from entering the bar unless there were some capacity issues going on. I hate having to wait in line at Madison Pub only to find that the place is not even crowded.

I imagine that the “official” capacity levels at bars are far less than many would think and rules and regulations are not designed to allow bars to pack people in.

You can look at one of two ways: either the city is attempting to prevent a dangerous overcrowding situation in the bars by rigorously enforcing capacity even on crowded nights or maybe the city’s administration is intent on doing what it takes to squeeze the nightlife out of Seattle which it sees as a thorn in the side of the entire city.