Street takeovers like the one Saturday in far north Fort Worth are hard to stop, but the city and police have had success by altering intersections in other parts of the city.

Fort Worth police received over 1,000 calls between November 2022 and April 2023 for street takeovers, when large crowds gather to watch cars spin donuts in an intersection. Fort Worth police said they spotted a silver Dodge Challenger doing just that at 10:30 p.m. Saturday at North Tarrant Parkway and North Beach Street.

After a chase involving multiple police departments, a police helicopter, and a brief pit stop at a QuikTrip, officers arrested five people near the Texas 121 overpass at South Riverside Drive, according to a Fort Worth police press release. Police said the said group responsible for Saturday’s event was involved in a series of similar takeovers in February in Austin.

Events sometimes spring up spontaneously or are organized on social media, and can be hard to track, assistant police chief Robert Alldredge told the Fort Worth City Council in May. Fort Worth has partnered with the Dallas police department to develop an intelligence network to keep track of the events, he said.

The city’s transportation and public works department has had success in east Fort Worth installing plastic raised pavement markings in intersections. These small reflectors can tear up car tires, and discourage people from doing donuts in the intersection, Alldrege said.

It’s not clear how widely this technique is being used. A spokesperson for the city’s transportation department did not respond to an email requesting comment Monday.

The city’s spectator ordinance, which fines people $500 for watching or helping to plan a race or takeover event, has been a huge help, Aldredge told the council in May.

“Whenever you put people in jail, they don’t want to come here. It’s an inconvenience. It costs them money,” he said.

One person was cited for violating the spectator ordinance at Saturday’s street takeover, according to the police report.

The transportation department is working with neighborhoods to install what it calls “traffic calming measures” like speed cushions to slow people down in neighborhoods. Roughly a third of the department’s traffic safety requests are for some kind of calming, according to a city report.

Neighborhoods can apply to have a speed bump or cushions put in their area. Transportation and public works is adding calming features to at least seven neighborhoods this summer, according to a city report.