The ban on glass bot­tles this Car­ni­val sea­son will go in­to ef­fect at 4 am Mon­day.

And al­though road-side ven­dors in the cap­i­tal city were al­lowed to erect makeshift bars as ap­proved by the Port-of-Spain City Cor­po­ra­tion late on Fri­day, May­or Joel Mar­tinez said, "The po­lice are aware and are very dili­gent in how they deal with bot­tles this year."

Speak­ing with Guardian Me­dia as he viewed the chil­dren’s car­ni­val pa­rade along In­de­pen­dence Square, Mar­tinez said this was an ef­fec­tive way to re­duce the work­load of med­ical of­fi­cials at the na­tion’s hos­pi­tals.

"Car­ni­val Mon­day and Tues­day…the hos­pi­tals do not need to have these ex­tra…peo­ple come in be­cause they were cut by a bot­tle or some­body be­came an­gry and the first thing they do is pick up a bot­tle."

Com­mend­ing the man­u­fac­tur­ers and con­ces­sion­aires, Mar­tinez ap­pealed to both ven­dors and cus­tomers to re­spect the law.

He said, "I want them to un­der­stand the val­ue be­hind why we are do­ing this."

Mar­tinez ex­plained though the idea was first rec­om­mend­ed some years ago, re­tail­ers and man­u­fac­tur­ers were giv­en some time to un­der­stand ex­act­ly how and what it would mean for their busi­ness.

He com­mend­ed Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Stu­art Young, Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Gary Grif­fith, and the Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Com­mis­sion "for step­ping up and deal­ing with it in 2020."

Ex­press­ing hap­pi­ness with the de­ci­sion to ban glass bot­tles over the two days of rev­el­ry, Mar­tinez said, "We want to make sure our vis­i­tors and our cit­i­zens feel com­fort­able. We re­al­ly want car­ni­val to be a fun-lov­ing and en­joy­able event."

The ban, con­se­quences

The ban on glass bot­tles will take ef­fect from 4 am on Feb­ru­ary 24, to mid­night on Feb­ru­ary 25.

Un­der the Car­ni­val (Pro­hi­bi­tion of Glass Bot­tles) Reg­u­la­tions, 2020—on­ly au­tho­rised peo­ple can have glass bot­tles dur­ing Car­ni­val.

Ac­cord­ing to the leg­is­la­tion, no one oth­er than an au­tho­rised per­son can "serve or con­sume a bev­er­age from a glass bot­tle in or with­in the vicin­i­ty of a Car­ni­val event in any pub­lic place" dur­ing the Car­ni­val pe­ri­od.

Au­tho­rised peo­ple in­clude any­one hold­ing a liquor li­cence un­der the Liquor Li­cens­es Act; any­one hold­ing a spe­cial event li­cence; a food ven­dor with a reg­is­tered food badge; a serv­er of a reg­is­tered Car­ni­val band; pub­lic san­i­ta­tion work­ers (Mu­nic­i­pal Cor­po­ra­tion, CEPEP or SWM­COL work­ers); and an em­ploy­ee of a man­u­fac­tur­er or dis­trib­u­tor of glass bot­tled bev­er­ages who is on du­ty dur­ing Car­ni­val.

Ven­dors and servers have been ad­vised to pour drinks in­to plas­tic cups or bev­er­age con­tain­ers be­fore serv­ing to cus­tomers.

Un­der the leg­is­la­tion, po­lice can seize your glass bot­tle and ar­rest you.

If caught with one in your pos­ses­sion with­out the rel­e­vant au­tho­ri­sa­tion, per­sons can be made to pay a fine of up to $1,000 or serve up to six months in jail.

Ar­eas Where Glass Bot­tles Are Banned  

Port-of-Spain, St James, San Juan, San­ta Cruz, Mara­cas Bay, Tu­na­puna, Arou­ca, Ari­ma, San Rafael, Mara­cas-St Joseph, San­gre Grande, Rio Claro, Ma­yaro, Ch­agua­nas, Cou­va, Freeport, San Fer­nan­do, Princes Town, Fyz­abad, Siparia, Pe­nal, Ce­dros, Point Fortin, La Brea, San­ta Flo­ra, Scar­bor­ough, Crown Point, and Rox­bor­ough.