"I'm on my way," responds Sgt. Mark Catto, one of the supervisors on this Friday night, as he floors the gas and his SUV barrels down View Street.

"So why is there a fight at McDonalds at 2 in the morning? It's not because there's a run on Big Macs," says Catto, an 18-year veteran officer with a commanding stature and a sharp wit.

Instead, it's the alcohol that drives the late-night debauchery characterizing Victoria's downtown streets on the weekend. Police say the fallout from excessive drinking and over-service in bars, from brawls to stabbings to public urination, consumes much of their time from 11 p.m. to 3 a.m. on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays.

Catto arrives at the McDonald's and the fight has been broken up, leaving a quasi-orderly lineup for food. It was a tame example of what Catto calls the "food fights," or the post-bar showdowns that erupt when people swarm the few eateries that are open after the clubs close.

On May 10, after bar closing time, a Victoria police officer broke his leg in three places when someone was pushed into him during a street brawl between 15 juiced-up guys outside Pita Pit restaurant on Wharf Street.

But this night is shockingly quiet, Catto says, although the loud voices, high-pitched screams of laughter and the off-beat clicks from a parade of high heels prove enough to keep the street people on Douglas Street wide awake.

About 10 minutes after the McDonald's call, a police cruiser speeds by on Douglas, sirens raging, heading to a call about a fight at the corner of Government Street and Pandora Avenue that also breaks up before Catto can rush over.

Earlier in the night, at 12:33 a.m., Catto rolls down the passenger side window and tries to get the attention of a man, whose head is cradled in his arms, holding up his slumping body against a bicycle stand outside the Sticky Wicket Pub on Douglas Street.

"That guy looks like he's had a few," he remarks.

"He's not going back in there, is he?" Catto calls out to the man's girlfriend, pointing to the bar.

"No, I'm done," the man slurs.

At 1:33 a.m., an undercover officer approaches Catto's SUV. He points to a black Cadillac parked on Courtney Street near Douglas and says it belongs to an associate of a gang member in Vancouver. Catto checks on it several times throughout the night but finds out later that the man didn't come back to the car until police were gone.

Police have been more vigilant since three people were shot in front of the View Street parkade last July after what friends have said was a seemingly minor confrontation outside Red Jacket nightclub. Philbert Truong, 20, was killed, and two other men injured. Somphavanh Chanthabouala, 22, and a 16-year-old youth have been charged.

At 1:56 a.m., the dispatcher asks Catto to help with an arrest. He hops out of the SUV and heads into the Irish Times Pub on Government Street. He and his colleague emerge with a man in his early 20s who is in handcuffs after he tried to snatch a bottle of liquor from behind the bar. Officers load him into an awaiting paddy wagon.

It's now 2:25 a.m., after last call at the bars, and a line of Kabuki cabs and taxis bombard the block in front of the pubs and nightclubs that make up the Strathcona Hotel as girls in short skirts and guys in polo shirts mill about.

A Kabuki cab driver leaves the area with four passengers dancing from the waist up as his portable iPod blares a Flo Rida rap song.

"Hey!" Catto barks at the driver. "Keep it down!"

The remaining people in the crowd aren't rushing to grab a cab but they aren't causing mass chaos either.

Catto offers a hypothesis as to why: On this particular Friday night, police received fewer calls for service for things like domestic abuse and break and enters. That meant patrol officers could park their cars outside the popular bars and send the message that they're watching.

Police spokesman Sgt. Grant Hamilton says there were 50 calls for service that night from 9 p.m. to 3 a.m. The Friday before, calls for the same six hour period were more than double, about 104. About 18 to 25 officers staff the weekend night shift, not always enough to make sure the rowdy bar stars behave.

"They come out and see us there and don't want to start a fight because they know they'll get arrested. We're glorified babysitters basically," Hamilton says.

Catto relates a potentially violent scene outside the Strathcona Hotel on May 15, when a patron kicked out of the bar pulled a knife and started a fight with the bouncers. All nearby police cruisers raced to the scene and arrested three people.

At 3:08 a.m., Catto spots a University of Victoria student who has emptied his stomach of the alcohol consumed earlier onto the sidewalk outside the popular pizza place Second Slice on Dougals Street. His friends hold him up and as Catto approaches, they tell him their friend can't remember where he lives.

"C'mon, you're not in trouble, you just need to sleep it off," Catto says to the student, who can barely hold eye contact, as he helps him into the police van.

On a typical weekend night, about 15 to 25 people are rounded up and sent to the police cells, or the "drunk tank" to sober up, Catto said.

A few minutes later, Catto yells at two guys sitting on the curb outside the pizza joint after they nearly get clipped by a taxi.

One of them, sporting spiky-hair, comes over to the car with a smirk. "Check his plates," he says, pointing to the cab driver. "He looks sketchy."

"He might end up driving you home later," Catto says.

"You might too," the man quips.

On this night, Catto does divert his attention away from the downtown core a few times . He drives down Store Street and surprisingly, not a soul is sitting on the steps of Street Link. About six people huddle in the planter box and window sills in front of neighbouring Chintz and Company.

The SUV passes Discovery Street, surveying an eclectic group smoking cigarettes outside Evolution nightclub.

Two motorcycles pass Catto in the opposite direction and without saying a word, Catto wrenches the steering wheel to the left and makes a U-turn, whipping after the bikers. As he turns the corner, he notices a passenger on one of the bikes is gone. He thinks she has hopped off because she wasn't wearing a helmet. He abandons the pursuit.

Catto then patrols along Rock Bay Avenue, the city's prostitute stroll, and then down through Vic West and Esquimalt, all the while the radio chatters with calls about youths drinking at Gonzales Beach. Even on a relatively uneventful night like this one, most of the officers are focused on the downtown core.

The city has flung out a myriad of ideas -- from forcing late-night eateries to close early, to having buses run later, to more taxis on the ground -- in the hopes of curbing the disorder. And Mayor Dean Fortin launched a task force this month that will have councillors cruising the streets at night and presenting recommendations by the end of the summer.

As Catto cruises through the streets in his SUV, one thing is for sure. The bargoers turn to watch him drive by.

Catto looks as if he's making eye contact with every one of them.