Dear Editor,
Earlier this year, we purchased a lovely house close to the Lick nightclub after being assured that it would be closing, along with Bliss nightclub, and would not re-open. Alas, neither story was true, as we hear avid noise from both the clubs.
The horrific noise from 11pm to 8am (seven days a week) emanates at an ear-blasting range (in spite of double-glazed windows in our house). We are around 400 metres from either of the clubs and the noise permeates for a good few kilometres, to the utmost discomfort of many hundreds of residents and rate payers.
The many patrons to the nightclubs leave at various unearthly hours, in various states of inebriation, which they sleep off in the many hundreds of cars parked alongside the clubs and also adjoining the international school. Speaking to the owners appears to be negated by the clubs, whose interests seem to be paramount, over and above the interests of the hundreds of residents who pay large sums for the supposed joy of living alongside these clubs.
It appears repeated calls for the closure of the clubs, by the many discomforted residents and owners of the properties are negated by parochial interests from the nightclubs. What is more alarming is the neighbours around us who travel overseas during this period to avoid constant sleepless nights, due to the constant and pervasive noise. We appreciate that many young and often underage young people visit the clubs, but surely excruciating noise played in the “open air” all through the night should have restrictions?
Ideally, a petition to either close these “unrestricted clubs” or for the local authorities to amend the conditions of the operating hours to, say, 8pm to midnight, plus registered decibel levels, should be urgently appraised.
Many of the residents (both Portuguese and immigrants) suffer from sleep deprivation and from the unruly behaviour of the drunken patrons as they noisily leave the clubs throwing empty wine and beer bottles over the residents’ walls.
Portugal has long been seen as a conservative Catholic country, with high moral and religious standards. This has obviously been subjugated by the noisy club owners who appear to be impervious to either law and order, or to the many long-suffering residents!
KEITH BLAIR
Vilamoura
