We must first fire Richard Sarles, Metro's interim general manager. The public transit system most responsible for moving bodies to and from the Rally for Sanity suffered a catastrophic failure that began early and continued to plague customers into the evening. By severely underestimating the rally's crowd size, stubbornly forging ahead with scheduled track maintenance and refusing to run more trains than usual, Sarles and his team showed how pathetically out-of-touch they've become. Customers who attempted to grin and bear it during the morning ride were rude and shoving their way onto overcrowded trains later to escape the madness. It came as no surprise that at least four people were injured during the chaos. This is inexcusable. And through it all, I did not once see a Metro security officer.Sarles should have personally took command of the situation today and ordered: (1) a suspension of the routine maintenance to clear the railway bottlenecks; (2) more trains into service to help ease the dangerous overcrowding; (3) more station attendants into service to help guide confused visitors, control crowds and supervise train operations; and (4) a stronger presence from Metro security, which was mysteriously absent during this crazed day. His staggering inability to manage today's issues is proof positive that he should be immediately removed from his position.
Also packing up their desk at this hour should be the point person at Comedy Central, the channel's parent company MTV Networks or owner Viacom, whoever was responsible for organizing today's event on the National Mall. The horrifically disorganized event failed on multiple levels of event logistics and crowd management, spurring many thousands of people to leave the area in disheartened exasperation or utter disgust. The problems people faced included, but were not limited to, inadequate or inaccurate directions on where to enter the event, a terrible underestimation of the space needed on the National Mall to actually accommodate the sizable crowd, plus an audio and visual setup clearly intended for much smaller crowds. There was no attempt to control the many people in costume who were climbing fences and walls for their own grandiose and self-serving purposes. And there was no discernible effort to accommodate people in wheelchairs, who unfortunately became trapped in the unmoving walls of misdirected souls.I imagine the event coordinator was under orders to do today's rally "on the cheap," but the whole scenario was an embarrassment to the network. And it was an embarrassment to D.C. that the city couldn't step up and help alleviate the situation. I weep for those who suffered this as their first taste of our nation's capital. We can do better. Please allow us the opportunity to prove it to you sometime.
After those two people are fired.
12 comments:
Not sure I'd call it a catastrophic failure as far as the rally itself goes. Comedy Central is not an event organizer. They should have hired one. They severely underestimated the complexity of doing something like this. This was a TV event, and from the televised portions, it looked like a success. That was their focus. My main concern? That everyone who atteneded will actually vote on Tuesday.
I don't think anyone imagined that many people would show up. How would they have known?
To be clear, the rally was no failure. It achieved its aims beautifully and garnered some wonderful publicity. But that was done in spite of the planning and transportation failures, which were spectacular and had to be personally experienced to be fully appreciated.
There were many indications that the rally would draw a massive crowd. Although unreliable, Facebook event page RSVPs were above 200,000. The Huffington Post bussed thousands of people from New York to Washington simply to join the rally. And repeated and free event promotions on "The Daily Show" and through social media made it clear to many that the final headcount would swell.
Could anyone have foreseen an audience of 215,000? I don't know. But let's not forget that this event was staged by a major media company: Viacom. This wasn't some grassroots effort by an upstart non-profit. Viacom should have been better prepared to accommodate the many people who joined (or tried to join) the rally.
At a minimum, Viacom should have offered better audio and visual setups, clearer directions and improved crowd management, not to mention some actual regard for the Americans with Disabilities Act. That's all part of the equation of hosting a safe and productive event on the National Mall.
Well according to the permit filed with the National Park Service, they only expected 60,000 people.
"A permit filed by Comedy Central before the rally said it expected 60,000 people"
via:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2010-11-01-rally01_ST_N.htm
I'm sorry it sucked for you. I got lucky, I guess. I rode into the city on my bike, got there by 10:45 and managed to snag one of the last patches of grass near the second jumbotron. I thought the comedy sketches were brilliant and the crowd lighthearted and happy. It was a total carnival in our slice of the audience. Just a different perspective for you.
I actually had to skip the rally after trying for 45 minutes to get on the train and getting pushed around far too much for my liking.
Let us not forget that Howard Homecoming and the MC Marathon was this weekend as well. This city was packed with visitors. How they went through with track works baffles me.
I could be wrong about this, but I'm pretty sure WMATA actually did run extra trains on Saturday. Yes, they probably should've done away with track maintenance, or at least limited it to one or two lines (but let's not forget that's still work that needs to get done and was probably scheduled well in advance of the announcement of the rally, which possible couldn't be rescheduled), but also that Metro doesn't have an unlimited budget: I believe (and again, I could be wrong), that they do rely on the sponsors of large events to help pay the budgetary costs when additional trains are needed. If Comedy Central didn't (they apparently only thought 60k were coming), that can hardly be considered Metro's fault, especially if Metro didn't have the money to pay for more drivers to come in and run trains.
It just seems kind of unfair to blame Metro for not being able to handle a crowd that was many, many, many times bigger than was expected by the event organizers: after all, wasn't that the event organizers job?
While Metro was crowded - I didn't go to the inagural, but it reminded me of New Years 2000 and the welcome home parade in '91 - most people were polite and well behaved. Comedy Central did underestimate - on a massive scale - the number of people who were going to attend. Don't know what could have been done there except for setting up more video screens and speakers. While I won't say I had a great time, it wsa too much of a mad house for that, I don't think it was as bad as you make it out to be.
But that's just one worthless opinion.
Totally agree that both Metro and Comedy Central dropped the ball on this one. I tried to go; was turned away from the Col Hts metro by people who said the station was too crowded to enter. Picked up the 42 bus at its beginning, and it was entirely filled after our second stop. (It was like being on a hipster field trip: at one point they tried to start singing 99 Bottles.) Walked from 9th and G to 7th and Constitution and got caught in the worst crowd I've ever been in; utterly jammed. I felt terrible for the people stuck in there with little kids, and can't imagine what it would have been like in a wheelchair.
We ended up leaving because the crowd was frighteningly dense and unmoving; it really felt very unsafe.
The view from my couch was magnificent, however.
We got their early (as advised) at the 7th and Constitution entrance (as advised on the rally website) and had no trouble finding a spot with view of the monitors and great sound. We didn't realize until later that people were upset with the set-up or sound. It functioned very well for those who arrived early.
Unlike the inauguration, whose date is known well in advance, the Rally to Restore Sanity occurred less than 2 months after it was announced. This means 1) that WMATA’s budget had already been set and 2) WMATA’s maintenance schedule had already been set. Could the maintenance have been deferred? Maybe… but without knowing the full implications of doing so, it’s pretty harsh to call for the GM to be fired.
Here’s the reality: Comedy Central wasn’t willing to pony up to put on an event of the scale that actually happened. Last week WABA wrote that Comedy Central wasn’t willing to fork over $3,000 for a bike valet on the mall. In the scheme of things, $3,000 is chump change. There’s virtually no reason to believe they would have been willing to pay substantially more money to get Metro to the service levels it needed.
As I had no problems upon arrival, I can only comment in agreement on the madness that was Metro Saturday.
The line for passes at the West Falls Church station stretched past the entrance to the parking lot around 10 a.m. With a Smartcard, one was able to bypass this nuisance, but I am sure it deterred many a tourist.
Instead of being "that guy" attempting to shove myself on an already packed train, I rode FROM WFC out to Fairfax, and then stayed aboard as it reversed back to D.C.
Now, here's the kicker. So many people had the same idea that my car, at least, was too full to accept additional passengers... AT THE FAIRFAX STOP.
Think about that.
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