point taken- are we talking bollards at every cross street from 100-say 800 Bourbon?
The mass of humanity that you speak of ( and I too have been in where you are simply going where the crowd is going lol ) is really relegated to around the 300-700 block- now i havent been in over 15 years to Bourbon on a night like this ( NYE/Mardi Gras/SuperBowl ) so i dont know if that has changed since then.
But having at least at Canal and Bourbon ?