One of the many restaurant-bars being opened temporarily to serve spectators at the Winter Games in Lillehammer, Norway, has a unique decorating scheme that reflects its more humble origins.
Toilet seats will dangle over the bar and pipes will decorate the restaurant ceiling in the restaurant-bar scheduled to open in a plumber's shop in a country where, like Utah, the sale of liquor is strictly regulated.Other temporary eating and drinking establishments are opening up in a paint shop, a hairdressing salon, the changing room at the local swimming pool, a car showroom, a florist's shop and a furniture warehouse.
But don't expect to see drinks served amid toilet seats, hair dryers, swimmers' lockers or in any other temporarily converted facilities if Salt Lake City wins the 2002 Winter Games.
Utah liquor regulators say the existing private clubs and restaurants licensed to serve alcohol should be sufficient to serve the hundreds of thousands of visitors expected.
There should be no need for temporary licenses to be issued - especially for bars decorated with toilet seats, said Earl Dorius, manager of the licensing and compliance division of the state Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control.
"I don't think we're going to have to resort to things like that," Dorius laughed.
Changes made to the state liquor laws in 1990 increase the number of liquor licenses available to restaurants and private clubs as the state's population grows.
Currently, the state can issue up to 270 private club licenses, a number that increased by two in December. All but four of the private club licenses have been issued, Dorius said.
However, more than 50 restaurant licenses are available, of the 420 that the state can issue. In addition, Dorius said, the liquor commission can issue special-event permits that last up to 72 hours.
The head of the Salt Lake Olympic Bid Committee, Tom Welch, agreed that there are already plenty of places for Winter Games visitors to eat, drink and be merry. "It's one of the strengths of our bid," Welch said.
"Remember, the entire population of Lillehammer can be seated in the Delta Center. Before the Olympics, they had two hotels and half a dozen restaurants," he said.
Norweigian officials realized that the restaurants and bars serving the 24,000 residents of Lillehammer weren't going to be enough to serve all the Olympic visitors.
Anticipating as many as 150,000 visitors daily during next month's Winter Games, Lillehammer officials have issued temporary food and drink licenses to boost the number of restaurant and cafeteria seats from 3,000 to 15,000.
Carl Roger Rud, who runs the plumber's shop that is being turned into one of the temporary night spots, told Reuter's news service that he and the other licensees are "just filling a need."
Critics of the expanded availability of alcohol told the news service that local authorities have bowed to the pressures of commercialism and sacrificed Lille-hammer's quiet traditions.
Alcohol is a sensitive issue in Norway, which has some of the strictest drinking laws in the world, according to the news service report. Like Utah, wines and liquor are sold only at state-run stores.