Politicians, along with police and other emergency services, want motorcyclists to cancel their Friday the 13th plans for Port Dover, reports CBC.
Port Dover, Ontario, hosts the biggest biker party in Canada on every Friday the 13th, rain or shine, summer or winter … well, attendance certainly drops off during the winter months, but the hardcore show up. The busier events see 100,000 visitors show up for the party in Port Dover, which has a normal population of 6,000. That strains the town’s emergency response resources at the best of times; with the coronavirus pandemic ongoing, officials want the partiers to stay away this year.
According to the CBC, a report from a municipal steering committee made of bylaw enforcement and emergency service personnel recommended “use all means necessary” to keep visitors away on Friday the 13th. They say that a large public gathering could lead to increased COVID-19 transmission, and make contact tracing very difficult.
It seems town officials think they’ll be unable to stop all bikers from attending the rally, though, so they’re considering allowing vendors, but restricting them to a small, easy-to-control area. Indeed, even though officials asked riders to stay away from 2020’s Friday the 13th in November, some riders did attend, even in the cold weather.
The first Friday the 13th in 2021 is still five months away, in August. Local officials seem to be planning for pandemic problems to still be around by then. And yet, judging by the comments in the CBC article, bikers are still planning to show up and party, no matter what.
