Where are all of the people?
Advertisement
Text size: small | medium | large
Your View
Published: November 18, 2008
The “VIEW FROM ABOVE” photo in a recent News & Messenger must not have been taken during the Obama rally because I can’t find the people.
Ever since the Obama rally at the Prince William County Fairgrounds, We’ve been hearing about the “90,000” folks that showed up. I live close to the fairgrounds and have lived with the sounds of the
annual county fair every one of the last 30 years. The traffic is always snarled, on the two lanes of Va.234.
I’ve never minded that. What I don’t understand though is how did 90,000 people and the accompanying cars get in and out so silently? How did 90,000 people, during a rally like this, make less noise
than that heard during the county fair? I’m just curious.
One thing seems certain. If 90,000 people can be directed into, and out of, such a small area, in single file, in such a short time, then why can’t it be done in other areas such as the Nissan Pavilion? It’s
also a tribute to someone that 90,000 excited attendees, crammed into a small space, can hardly be heard outside the area. Or is is just possible, the estimate of 90,000 people, was just a “tad”
overestimated?
MAX GOODGION
Manassas
Page 1 of 1
Post a Comment
The commenting period has ended or commenting has been deactivated for this article.
Can't find what you're looking for? Try our quick search:
Reader Reactions
Posted by ( PWCDEM ) on November 19, 2008 at 8:56 am
As someone who was actually at the rally, I can assure there were a lot of people there. I didn’t count every single one, but the crowd estimate is not unreasonable. It took me about two hours to drive home, about 1.5 miles from where I parked. And, yes, the crowd was very well behaved and quite. Perhaps going to a rally where people weren’t insited to hatred of their opponents had something to do with it. It would be an interesting thing for Republicans to try at their rallies in the coming campaign.
Report Inappropriate Comment
Posted by ( No-Brand Hero ) on November 18, 2008 at 2:59 pm
Speaking as someone who was at the rally, I can assure you that there were a lot of people there. I won’t even begin to say that I could count them all, but I would not be surprised if the 90k figure was fairly close to accurate.
As to how they could be moved into the space, well, for one they didn’t use the fair ground parking, and it looked like they distributed the parking across the area (I walked from my home down the street, so didn’t see where people were being made to park). Everyone was basically made to enter the area by walking along 234 from the north or south for the last half mile or so. It was hardly single-file, in that the line (which was over a mile long) tended to be four or five abreast. At the end there were dozens of security checkpoints that kept people moving through at a rapid clip.
All in all I felt that the planning and execution of that portion of the rally was one of the better feats of crowd control I have ever seen.
In any case, I cannot speak to why the noise did not carry to the author’s ears, as the crowd (once inside) was incredibly loud, but given that it was actually quite quiet outside the grounds, it is understandable. I imagine the fact that the cars were not driving past all night, like they do when the fair is operating, was the greater contributor to this effect.
Report Inappropriate Comment
Posted by ( jVA ) on November 18, 2008 at 1:05 pm
Maybe they were all early voting for McCain and Palin so they could win Virginia.
No, I guess that’s not it.
Report Inappropriate Comment
Posted by ( rafaelva ) on November 18, 2008 at 5:19 am
I get the feeling that both rally’s, the one at the fairgrounds, and the one at the stadium were a “tad” over estimated.
It’s sort of like going to a big game at
Fedex, the media is calling it a capacity crowd, 92,000 fans. Well I went to one of those games, and yes there were a lot of people, but it looked to me that a lot of the “nosebleeds” were empty.
Report Inappropriate Comment