A Business Improvement District (BID) initiative to make Bath’s streets even safer at night and to ensure late-night revellers get home safely will be increasing its staffing levels over the festive period.
The BID Night Marshal scheme in the city, which is managed and funded by the Bath Business Improvement District (BID), helps around 2,000 people during a typical week. Night Marshals assist people with taxi problems around Orange Grove and also ensure drunken behaviour does not get out of hand in the city centre.
Since August, internal figures kept by the BID show that early intervention by BID Night Marshals prevented the police having to be called out to 353 incidents. Similarly, medical attention administered by marshals ensured Great Western Ambulance Service was spared 58 journeys.
The BID estimates that 40,000 people have benefited from the BID Night Marshalls’ supervision and work since August.
Over the Christmas holiday, the marshals will be working extra shifts as the BID takes steps to ensure Bath is a jolly place in which to enjoy a festive night out.
For most of the year, the marshals are deployed on Friday and Saturday nights. Over the coming fortnight, however, they will also be on patrol on Thursdays and on Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve. On average there will be four marshals per evening, although on New Year’s Eve there will be seven marshals plus a medic.
The Night Marshals are part of the BID-run Nightwatch scheme, which enables licensees, police and CCTV operators, as well as the marshals, to communicate over city security issues by using smart radio technology.
Every pub, club or restaurant which signs up to Nightwatch receives digital radio equipment which connects them to the marshals, as well as to police officers and staff monitoring the city’s CCTV system.
Andrew Cooper, Bath Business Improvement District manager, said: “Throughout the year the BID Night Marshals do important work that ensures Bath’s night-time economy is able to prosper in a safe environment. Their work helping those who are enjoying a night out in the city is particularly important at this time of the year with thousands of extra people making the most of the holiday period.
“One of our main goals at the Bath Business Improvement District is making the city as attractive a place as possible for people to visit, whether by day or by night. The Night Marshals play a central part in fulfilling that goal.”
