For those of you who are intrigued about what happens in cities before the big shows
descend on them you'll find this article from the Royal Oak Tribune interesting. It is all about where residents and visitors will park during Arts, Beats & Eats, which is held on Labor Day weekend and draws 100's of 1000's of people to Royal Oak's downtown. Not only is the show promoter, Jon Witz, involved in the street layout, so is the Oakland County Executive, the mayor, the residents, the business people...this is a big deal.
- Who wins?
- Where will the show be this year?
- How much will the parking tickets cost?
- Who gets the revenue?
- What streets will be used? ...makes you glad to set up and get out of town with some fat pockets, doesn't it?
Residents defend festival parking: http://www.dailytribune.com/articles/2011/03/03/news/doc4d7054514fc76792252001.txt?viewmode=fullstory
Comments
I really enjoyed this article. I've seen first hand what 10 years, or so, of tweaking did for the Pontiac show. I'm sure that all the bugs will be ironed in a couple of years at AB and E.
I have a couple of comments though. !) I believe it would be a mistake to cut the shuttles down from 2 to 1 bus. If anything, parking at those sites and taking the shuttle should be encouraged. I drove by the one site on Woodward every morning on the way to the show and thought it was a good way to get to the show. It eliminated the need to drive around and find a space close by and it was easy to make the remote sites secure. 2) I'm not in favor of widening the space between the booths. That allows for a greater possibility of someone either stealing something from the back of an exhibitors booth or breaking something. The way to deal with this is to have an open walkway every 8 or 10 booths, like the State Street show does on North University.