A lot was different, and a lot was the same, at the 17th annual Lehighton Bike Night on Saturday.

The big difference was the location. This year it was held on the Franklin Township Fire Company grounds instead of around the Lehighton Park where it was held the first 15 years, or the Lehighton Community Grove where it was staged last year.

What was the same was, even though it was organized in just a four week period, it still attracted literally thousands of motorcycles.

Frank Potoczak, one of the main organizers, said he doesn't know exactly how many bikes were present. He said there were video cameras set up for the event which will help produce a fairly accurate count.

Potoczak said the Lehighton Bike Night was put together by an organization called Carbon County Entertainment LLC, which decided to host the event after former sponsors Lehighton Downtown Initiative announced on June 29 that the event would not be held this year.

Potoczak was a coordinator of last year's Bike Night and announced in December he was stepping down from the position.

The main coordinators for this year's event were Potoczak, Ty Poole, David Bradley and Charmaine Bradley.

Poole said this year's event was so successful that there is a possibility Lehighton Bike Night will remain in Franklin Township. He said besides thousands of bikes present, there also were many people who came in cars. Within the first couple of hours, about 3,000 motorcycles had pulled into the fire company parking lot, said organizers.

"I think it was an amazing turnout," Poole said. "Way more than anyone could have anticipated. We had only four weeks to put it together."

Bike Night opened with a Skill Run, sometimes called a poker run, with over 100 riders taking part. Poole said the grand prize winner of the event was Todd Zellers, who won $500 and donated $100 of it to the Franklin Township Fire company.

There were various biker games also conducted.

Potoczak said many of those attending Bike Night this year also attended and even camped out at a Vintage Bikers Movie Weekend held at the Mahoning Drive In Theater, about six miles away.

For more on Bike Night and a photo page from the event, see Monday's edition of the Times News.