Anyone go to Manston?

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Anyone go to Manston?

Postby Mayfly » Sat Jun 22, 2013 6:20 pm

Apparently it was traffic chaos.
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Re: Anyone go to Manston?

Postby Sickbag_andy » Sun Jun 23, 2013 7:23 am

so some have claimed but I didn't find it too bad and it may not have been the organisers' fault.

I left my home (Rayne Essex) at about 7.50 am, picked up a friend (Andy) at 8.20 and were on the road to Manston by 8.30, we hit the queue about 9.50 about 1/2 mile from the monkton roundabout approx 4 miles from the car parks, we got in just after 11 am BUT don't blame the organisers unless you are absolutely sure about the reason for these quoted 5 hour delays...............
as we walked into the airfield virtually NOTHING was coming into the car parks, we had moved slowly but constantly but soon after we got in something must have happened which virtually stopped the traffic getting in for a while, I can only assume it was a breakdown or an accident. The traffic had been moving constantly albeit slowly when we came in.
The organisation wasnt perfect but by airshow terms it wasn't unusual, my only criticism would be that the stewards in the car park weren't very well coordinated and there was a lot of wasted space but that did not contribute to the delays.

Bear in mind that this is an airport that doesn't experience even 5% of this traffic on a normal day and the roads were never designed for it AS IS THE CASE WITH MOSE AIRFIELDS THAT HOST AIRSHOWS. Dont expect ot drive straight in because even with the best organisation in the world if the public roads arent wide enough for several lanes you will never get straight in to such events. We discussed this on the way home as Andy had read some of the posts about the traffic and couldnt think of a show where you drive straight in and straight out - if you did the show whould probably run at an enormous loss and would be a one off.

some people have said there was only one obvious route in but with hindsight and looking at a map there were other alternative routes and i'm sure cars were coming in from the East as well so with a bit of investigation an alternative was possible but without local knowledge I appreciate that this would be difficult to work out - alligators and draining swamps etc.

as an aside, there have also been compliants about the lack of twitter feed yesterday, I know from talking to people in the VV that they were trying to twit all afternoon but could not get a signal - I can verify personally that for most of the day the mobile network was signal-less so it wasn't down to the Vulcan team.
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Re: Anyone go to Manston?

Postby Mayfly » Sun Jun 23, 2013 7:51 am

I didn't blame anyone, just asking if it was as as bad as some say it was.

Funnily enough Waddington about 4 years ago asked people buying tickets if they were regulars and if not why had they decided to come to the event - most of the 'new' visitors said they couldn't afford to go away and were having days out instead. Combined with 558 returning I think that has started a new air show trend and more people go to the events than 5 - 10 years ago. They also had traffic problems that was their responsibility as organisers but wasn't their fault as it was the traffic management company and new routing dictated by the authorities.
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Re: Anyone go to Manston?

Postby Sickbag_andy » Sun Jun 23, 2013 7:57 am

sorry Pam, wasn't implying that you were.

I copied and pasted the text from my post elsewhere where somebody was seeming to do just that and felt that I should point out what I saw / experienced and the strange phenomenom of no cars entering the car parks soon after we had driven in albeit slowly. I very much doubt that the organisers put a barrier across the road but I'm sure something happened on the road outside to halt the traffic for a while
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Re: Anyone go to Manston?

Postby Mayfly » Sun Jun 23, 2013 8:07 am

I'm pleased we only live 15 miles/20 minutes from Waddington!!!!
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Re: Anyone go to Manston?

Postby Aceyone » Sun Jun 23, 2013 11:45 am

I was going to go but had to help put up a garage roof for someone ! so not sure whether to be pleased or not !I'm sure that if the show returns a better traffic management system will be in place . Living 15 mins from Biggin and attending practically every show from whenever I do remember the traffic problems were far worse some years ago than they were for the last dozen years ,it seems it took a while for them to work out that the main problem was not having enough entrances/exits ,Biggin is perhaps in a worse position in that the roads around there are busy anyway and some are very narrow ,last time I went ( the last show ) I wasn't delayed at all ( in or out ) BUT if a car had broken down ( or a collision ) then it would have been an entirely different story !
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Re: Anyone go to Manston?

Postby Lucas1860 » Sun Jun 23, 2013 1:51 pm

I have to say, as I am one who has dealt with traffic management, I do pull my hair out at events. There does seem to be a distinct lack of co-ordination. Private companies do not take the matter as serious as the police, Pam mentions Waddington, this too is now dealt with in the main by private companies, profit comes before service. Before the new regime started the exit from the show was fine, these days not so. I went to Cosford this year, no more. The traffic management was chaotic to say the least, people were still filing in at noon having been stuck in traffic.

I have been to airshows in Europe, never experienced an entry/exit problem.

This will be the downfall of such shows in the uk.
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Re: Anyone go to Manston?

Postby 10680 » Mon Jun 24, 2013 2:02 pm

After queuing for a while I went off the signed route and in from the North. No problem.
But I heard some people queued for six hours. Others gave up and walked in.
Lots of people already in though. So I don't know how many people overall. They were talking about 35,000.

A lot to do around the show as well and not just the usual suspects.

I hope they're back next year.

Edited to add

Just seen on this report

http://www.kentonline.co.uk/thanet_extr ... Kent-2332/

"Many have blamed poor planning and said organisers were overwhelmed by a reported 120,000 visitors in 40,000 cars."

That's an awful lot of cars/people!
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