WHEN it comes to drinking spots in Ballarat, it's been a case of evolution rather than extinction in the past decade.
While some traditional corner pubs have gone by the wayside others have been reinvented as nightclubs, cafe-bars or pizza joints.
Ballarat Australian Hotels Association representative Ian Larkin says about 10 hotels have closed in the city over the past decade but other watering holes have opened in their place.
Mr Larkin said it was easier to obtain a liquor licence than in the past.
Licence applications are granted by Consumer Affairs Victoria within the Department of Justice.
Within the 3350 postcode covering Ballarat and its inner suburbs there are 45 general liquor licences which cover all the hotels.
There are another two general licences held in Wendouree and two in Sebastopol.
Hotels are just one business stream selling liquor. In Ballarat there are 68 "on-premises" liquor licence-holders, which includes mostly restaurants.
And there are a further 16 full club licences in Ballarat held by an assortment of sports clubs.
Clearly, Ballarat is unlikely to run short of watering holes any time soon, but hotel numbers are a far cry from the 19th century when historian John Hargreaves noted there were 329 hotels in the city in 1872.
By 1943 that number had dwindled to 65 as changing times and the temperance movement took their toll.
Mr Larkin said while limited liquor licences were easier to obtain, the process for a hotel licence was more complex and prospective publicans had to complete a two-week course run by the hotels association as a requirement
to procuring a licence.
Keeping a keen eye on liquor licences in Ballarat is Inspector Ian Davis.
He says the major change to hotel operations in his time has not been closures, but operating hours.
Where hotels once closed at midnight some, usually those operating more as a nightclub, now are now closing at 5am.
He said a number of small hotels that had survived changing times were becoming more "family-oriented" with the atmosphere and meals offered while anti-smoking legislation would add to the all-ages appeal.
John Turner has been the publican at the Royal Oak Hotel for the past 13 years and has seen pubs including the Foundry and Southern Cross hotels close in that time.
Mr Turner said the Royal Oak, a childhood home for Cardinal George Pell, had existed since 1866 and he hoped it would survive a few more years yet.
"I think the appeal is there are not too many corner pubs left. We have no poker machines, no TAB, we are not a cafe, we are a hotel," he said.
He does not know how the anti-smoking legislation, which will ban smoking inside the hotel from July 1, will affect his business.