Londoners “reclaim the streets” at Notting Hill Carnival

The Notting Hill Carnival, a two-day celebration of West Indian culture that attracts 1 million revelers to West London each year, took place peacefully on Sunday and Monday, just three weeks after riots and looting rocked London and other cities in the U.K.

Police said they made about the same number of arrests as in 2010. Police made a total of 230 arrests, for offenses including drugs possession, public order, theft and assault, BBC News reports, and British Transport Police arrested another 34. In 2010, there were 243 arrests across the two days.

"For the fourth year there were no firearms incidents and reported crime fell by more than 31% compared to the same stage last year,” Chief Inspector Jo Edwards told the BBC.

The event was widely seen as a test of London’s Metropolitan Police Service after they seemed to lose control of the city during five days of rioting and looting earlier this month. The rioting, which spread to other cities, caused five deaths and hundreds of millions of dollars in damage.

Police had prepared extensively for the event after the city decided that canceling the carnival, which started in 1964, would send a negative message.

5,500 officers were on duty on Sunday, and 6,500 on Monday – 500 more than in 2010 – with 4,000 police on stand-by, Reuters reports.

Before the carnival began, police arrested more than 30 people they anticipated would cause trouble at the event, the Guardian reports. Officers were granted special powers to stop people and search them for drugs or weapons. The carnival also ended earlier than last year.

Kit Malthouse, deputy mayor of London, told the BBC that carnival-goers seemed to sense the world was watching. "This year a lot of the floats were on earlier, there was obviously a much bigger policing presence, you can sense a change in the atmosphere from previous years, in that people are kind of on their best behavior.”

Carnival co-director Chris Boothman told the Guardian that the carnival had allowed Londoners to "reclaim the streets." He said: "People have really come out to support the carnival, and it shows once again that London can put on large events."

Organizers estimated that five tons of chicken and 25,000 bottles of rum were consumed at this year's event, the BBC reports, while 16,000 tracks were blasted from 41 different sound systems.

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