Brighton's famous Pride parade could be abandoned in 2012 to avoid a clash with the Olympics.
Organisers have said the parade and festival will not go ahead "as people know it" in the first weekend of August.
Thousands of visitors annually descend on Brighton and Hove for the Pride Festival, which includes a colourful parade through the city to Preston Park.
But Lesley Burn, Pride’s chief executive, said that because of the drain on resources caused by the London Olympics, there are fears a traditional parade may stretch emergency services.
She added that early discussions had already begun to establish what shape Pride 2012 would take.
Ms Burn told The Argus: "In 2012 the greatest show on earth is coming to our shores and it is just up the road.
“We really do not know what we are going to be doing yet. We may put it on at a different time, it could be earlier in the year.
“But whatever we decide we will look at whatever else is going on in the city at that time.
“We just need to decide how we are best going to celebrate with the LGBT community.”
Contracts for the event production and security, which are up for renewal this year, have now gone up online.
A notice on the Pride website says: “The contract period will be for four events, to run from 2010 to 2013 or 2014, pending a decision about the event in 2012.”
Superintendent Ian Davies, from Sussex Police’s operations department, said: “Pride has been very responsible and sensible about the Olympics.
“Pride is quite a significant planning and resource operation and if it was held on its traditional weekend it would be in the middle of Olympic period.”
However Supt Davies said officers were still anticipating lots of people will organise events to tie in with Olympics.
He said: “Pride has a huge impact for us and the city council so it makes sense if we can agree to another arrangement, such as possibly moving it to a different period.
“The organisers have taken a common sense approach to a major event.”
This year’s Pride parade and main park event will take place on August 1. It has been confirmed that Boy George will be performing a DJ set at 1.30pm.
The Argus, as ever, will bring you all the latest Pride news running up to the event in both the newspaper and live at theargus.co.uk.
No comments:
Post a Comment