15 April 2007

Better Co-ordination of Events

| jemmy
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I love hot-air balloons, there’s something magical about them. Quirky surrealistic shapes floating in the calm cool dawn, the notion of defying gravity in the most basic of ways, the unexpected way the burners’ raucous noise charges through the peaceful air, the sense of timeless floating, the absence of power yet the presence of grandeur. You find yourself thinking of drifting peacefully along above the anchored earth, absent from it yet still part of it, smelling the intense and sharp morning , watching the oblivious go about their normal waking routine. It pulls at you and it looks so slow and easy that it’s something you think you could almost do yourself (and someone has).

I jumped in the car this morning to go over and have a look at the hot air balloons in town for the yearly regatta. I was early, it was dawn, I wanted to see them inflate from their folds of material and see the burners charge up and watch that moment when they change from being part of us on the ground to lift off and become part of that unknown, up, up there.

Magic.

I couldn’t get there.

The Canberra Marathon is happening this morning and is around the lake. The entire circuit, Commonwealth Ave, Northbourne, the Parliamentary Precinct, is blocked to traffic with pedestrian access only. The balloons are on the lake shore in front of Parliament House, right in the middle of no access. There was no way for me to actually get to the area with the balloons. I would have had to find somewhere to park, I really don’t know where in that zone of very restricted parking, and walk a few kilometres there and then back. It could be done, but why should it be this way? Why wasn’t there an access route for people who wanted to go see the balloons?

Didn’t someone, the person who authorised the road closures, think? Didn’t the department that authorises the permits for both the events use its nous and realise it wouldn’t work this way?

It’s a broken record that we all play over and over, but why oh why is our public organisation so dishevelled? Why do we put up with it?

Why didn’t someone, someone or anyone, put their hand up and say, “This isn’t the best way to organise events and we should give the citizens the best way so let’s change it.”

We should give citizens the best way.

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we are already in the process of testing an upgrade to 2.0 Maelinar. It’s the plugins that we still have to test that give you buggers the extra features you know and love.

You should have seen the Night Balloon festival thing at Manuka oval. The event coordinators had the bright idea that 7000 people could queue to buy tickets, get into the oval, buy food/drink and take their seats in 15 mins…

Tommy – I’ve made a comment in the The Baloon Fiesta’s night spectacular thread, that I didn’t have a problem with the fact I had to wait – as like so many other people I had not pre-booked tickets for the gig … it’s not the organisers’ fault when they get double the expected crowd

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James-T-Kirk1:00 pm 16 Apr 07

lay -> lake …. When will there be an edit function for previously submitted posts?

James-T-Kirk12:53 pm 16 Apr 07

Only drain the lay a little bit, and use some of that space for rice growing. – That way, the housing would be fully sustainable.

Let’s not foget that other arm of the ACT government – the Parks people – who thought it would be a good idea to pick the entire time of the balloon festival and a few days eiuther side to conduct their fuel reduction burns, thus ruining the whole experience with smoke haxed skies.
Brilliant!!

You should have seen the Night Balloon festival thing at Manuka oval. The event coordinators had the bright idea that 7000 people could queue to buy tickets, get into the oval, buy food/drink and take their seats in 15 mins…

Next time I’m sure they’ll know it takes about an hour for that to happen.

Parks way westbound from kings avenue was still closed off at 10.30 am

VYBerlinaV8 now_with_added grunt8:58 am 16 Apr 07

As well as parking we could release some new land for higrise apartments that would cost $1million each, and be 50% government housing.

Of course it makes marvellous sense to hold an event at the precise position in Canberra where there is the absolute minimal parking avaliable, even at the best of times.

Lets drain LBG and turn it into tarmac so there’s ample parking for all Canberrans. You know it makes sense.

It’s all part of a ploy by our great leader to remove all tourist attractions from Canberra. Aparanty we’re getting the reputation as a place to visit.
First GMC 500, next Subaru rally and now the balloons (and I wasn’t the only one to notice that the lack of international balloons was to do with the fact that it isn’t worth their while for a weekend event on the other side of the planet)

The trick was to get in early (pre 6:30) and leave late…the running was supposed to be over by 8 but at 8:50 there were still large groups running about.

Hasdrubahl: Calling the authorities didn’t work. We complained to them weeks ago about it and the response was that it either wasn’t their problem (the marathon people), they couldn’t do anything about it (the balloon people) or they didn’t care (canberra connect).

Yep, I had the same experience. Also, in the absence of balloony fun, it wasn’t possible as an alternative to get car into Regatta Point/Cwlth Park if travelling northwards (and possibly south) over Cwlth bridge. Ended up taking guests to Black Mtn TOwer instead.

Given that the balloon people only got funding to do it over 1 weekend this year instead of 2 as previously, they must be thrilled at having their audience excluded. Bizarre.

You could call the relevant authorities….

Balloons.

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