However, The Terrace owner John MacDonald rejected that bars were serving "huge numbers" of intoxicated people and said most of the intoxicated people in town on Saturday nights purchased their alcohol from off-licences, such as supermarkets.
Mr Lequeux, who owns Mou Very bar in George St and St Omer in the Octagon, said that on Saturdays after about 11pm, bars in the Octagon and in other parts of town served "huge numbers of intoxicated patrons".
"Almost every single person that ends up in the Octagon after 11pm is intoxicated, so no alcohol, more or less, should be served after 11pm," he said.
While accepting that off-licences were part of city's drinking problem Mr Lequeux said bars were also a major contributor.
People who drank alcohol at home went into bars and the "bars double the effect or triple the effect" of the problem, he said.
"I go and grind coffee for the farmers market at 3am or 4am in the morning on George St ... [and the level of drunkenness] is disgusting."
Instead of allowing excessive drinking, bar owners should be taking a lead in trying to change Dunedin's drinking culture for the better, he said.
This meant patrons sitting down and having three glasses of wine or a few bottles of beer rather than "getting hammered".
"You can still have fun, you can be dizzy, but you are not going to get into fights . . ."
Mr MacDonald said the Liquor Licensing Authority and police did regular checks of bars and if they were serving intoxicated patrons, they would not get away with it for long.
It was a "nonsense" to say that bars were responsible for the problems caused by intoxicated people in the Octagon.
"There is no doubt that there are intoxicated people in the Octagon, but the vast majority of them aren't actually patrons of the bars."
Instead, most "pre-loaded" on cheap alcohol bought from off-licences, such as supermarkets or liquor stores.
Dunedin police alcohol harm reduction officer Sergeant Ian Paulin said bars were generally doing a "pretty good job" of not serving intoxicated people.
Sgt Paulin said he observed door staff in the Octagon on the Saturday night during Orientation Week and thought they were doing "a very good job" of vetting people trying to enter.
"I spent an hour actually observing them do that job and they were turning away quite a few people that were obviously intoxicated."
He agreed with Mr MacDonald that the high level of intoxication on the street was mainly caused by pre-loading.
