PHOTO BY DAVE COLE

The latest chapter in the never-ending story that is the South Side involves a polite request from Pittsburgh Public Safety: Perhaps we could stop conducting business in the middle of the night?

For a city that loves its bars, operation until 2 a.m. is more than a guideline; it’s something akin to a commandment, an inherent rule of life. On and around East Carson Street, however, it has become a problem; the flood of traffic that swarms the busy nightlife district each Friday and Saturday night becomes unmanageable at 2:01 a.m., when the bars simultaneously expel their assembled revelers.

The argument could be made that asking businesses to do less business is not the right approach to this problem. (The argument also could be made that the problem is overblown; as the Trib reported, crime is improving and businesses are doing OK, if not thriving, on East Carson Street.) But I think that this request is more than just an idea: I think it’s a litmus test for the quality, and the aspirations, of South Side bars.

Plenty of bars and restaurants do just fine without staying open well past the witching hour. In fact, the post-pandemic trend is for businesses to close earlier, not later. Hidden Harbor, the beloved Squirrel Hill tiki bar, closes at 11 p.m. on weekdays and midnight on Friday and Saturday. The Southern Tier Brewing outpost on the North Shore — another highly trafficked, nightlife-focused part of the city — never remains open past midnight. Right in the heart of the South Side, Carson Street Deli & Craft Beer Bar, a sandwich shop that also boasts one of the city’s best beer lists (and has a lovely beer garden), closes at 9 p.m., even on Friday and Saturday nights.

Evidently, it is possible to own a bar, make money and go to bed at a decent hour. Even on East Carson Street.

If the bar and restaurant owners on East Carson Street actually want to help the problem, it is entirely possible for them to change their business and operations — to move on from catering to the city’s youngest, rowdiest and/or worst drinkers. That’s not to say that the traditional neighborhood dives need to go all “Bar Rescue,” but this problem isn’t really owned by the traditional neighborhood dives. It’s owned by those places that are happy to host (and, frequently, overserve) problem drinkers and then want someone else to deal with the impact come closing time.

It also might not even require much of a change at all; the request coming from Pittsburgh Public Safety isn’t to stop serving hard seltzer and turn down the music. It’s just to think about maybe wrapping up at 1:00 or 1:30, thus preventing every busy bar from vomiting its occupants onto East Carson Street at the exact same moment.

A large part of this problem is cultural: As many business owners have noted, a sizable portion of the crowds that congregate on and around East Carson Street aren’t actually patronizing the bars; they’re just sort of hanging around. That problem won’t be solved quickly. But if the neighborhood as a whole wants to mitigate the damage, business owners need to come together with a cohesive strategy — and not merely throw their hands up and demand the right to keep making money at 1:45 in the morning.

It’ll be interesting to see which bars agree to the request and alter their services or their hours. You can assume those establishments are the ones with an eye to the health and welfare of the neighborhood and the city.

The ones that refuse to change? Maybe they just lack imagination — or perhaps they’re only in it for themselves.