[vidarh]

I live in Croydon (for those who don't know, it's one of the largest London Boroughs; there are 30 of them), and here there's huge numbers of police around the town centre all weekend. Last Thursday I was out walking around 10pm, and passed at least a dozen in five minutes when I walked past some of the bigger clubs, as well as an ambulance on standby, and that is fairly standard for the readiness here.

Most of the time they're just hanging around chatting to people, or making sure people are ok. With the added fun of making sure nobody gets run over when the clubs close and people spill into the road.

Despite the jokes (Croydon has a bad reputation; mostly undeserved these days), Croydon is about average for London boroughs when it comes to crime, and far better than Westminster (which has the biggest concentration of London nightlife).

Basically in boils down to whether or not the local forces choose to prioritise presence at night, since it's obviously more expensive.