LEWISTON – Planning officials will try to identify neighborhoods around the city where nightclubs and bars don’t work, based on a meeting with city councilors Monday.

They will also consider creating a bar-friendly zone where nightclubs would be welcomed.

“There’s even talk of working with Auburn to identify some areas where nightclubs might work together, some place where our downtown and their downtown meet,” said City Administrator Jim Bennett.

Councilors and Planning Board members met Monday night to discuss ways to keep noisy nightclubs and bars away from the Oak Park Apartment building, an elderly housing development.

Councilors voted last week to suspend the entertainment permit for Club Adrenaline, a nightclub around the corner from the apartments. It was the second of two nightclubs along Park Street that bedeviled residents last summer and earlier this year. Police responded to dozens of calls from Oak Park residents, complaining of noise, drunkenness and rude behavior from bar patrons.

Councilors created a moratorium on new liquor licenses in the area in March, then denied a new liquor license that month for The Blue Elephant Bar at 37 Park St. That club shut down at that location, reopening in May on Lisbon Street.

Councilors refused to renew Club Adrenaline’s entertainment permit last week.

Now, councilors are looking for permanent solutions for Oak Park residents.

“I think it’s fair to say that their days of having to put up with nightclubs is ending soon,” Bennett said.

The planning board is scheduled to discuss the matter at the July 9 meeting. A zoning ban could include part of Lisbon Street as well.

“Part of the problem, from the residents’ point of view, is the parking garage,” Bennett said. “That upper part of Lisbon Street really could be part of the problem, too. Anyone that would be coming back from there to that garage could be disturbing those residents.”

The Planning Board is also expected to take a broader look at the city where bars are concerned.

“The idea would be to identify other neighborhoods where we could have this same problem, and fix it before it becomes an issue for those neighbors,” Bennett said. They’d also find parts of the city where bars could be welcomed.

“We’d have to have a community discussion about whether there should be entertainment zones,” he said. “They would kind of gear this kind of night life activity into a part of the community that would have less impact on residents.”