Traffic-Trapped U2 Fans Might Sue for Missing Oakland Concert

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Pingafrita2000

The concert was great, but BART was a joke! They knew there was a concert and the managers at BART refused to extend BART Hours past midnight.. Everyone that used BART had to rush out 30 minutes early and miss 3-4 songs of the encore. BART Sucks and the seats and carpets are filthy! What kind of idiot would approve of putting carpets on a train thats exposed to so much foot traffic?

rckrgrrl

Why'd you "rush out 30 minutes early"? I rode Bart and I didn't miss a single song. At 11:45ish, got in the mass of people (yes, it was daunting) shuffling across the Bart bridge, through the fare gate, up to the platform to a waiting train. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy. Wasn't too keen with all the people on the bridge given my claustrophobia, but the drunk blonde behind me was making entertaining comments as we shuffled along.

notafan

you lost me at "Easy peasy, lemon squeezy"

No liberal tree huggers

These people and lawyers make me sick! Grow up. Take some responsiblity for your own actions. Think about it....6pm with weekday traffic...figure it out for yourself.

Joker Van

My heart breaks that the BMW and Lexus crowd weren't able to drive up to the front door and park. Tsk, TskTake public trans so maybe you'd actually vote for supporting funding for public trans, Tories!!! LiveNation & O.Com sent out an advisory encouraging & reminding the dumb phucks to do so since I guess they know the Tory crowd could care less about the enormous $40 parking fee.Mr. Attorney, you you gonna sue???? The traffic? but Thank you for reminding what idiot savants attorneys are! How about do something about anti-environmental Shoreline Amp & its car only access!!!!! or are you just interested in helping San Jose shut down Oakland!

SingleSpeed

I feel bad for people who missed the show, and sitting in traffic for 5 hours would stink. But don't blame U2, or anyone for that matter if you missed the show. BART stations have parking lots. It does not take much between the ears to figure when it is time to turn around and drive to the nearest BART station. I really don't see legal fault on anyone's part.

Axl

Typical lawyer crapola. If you didn't get to the concert on time it's your own fault. Next time leave earlier, perhaps even plan alternate routes. The average U-2 fan is old enough to act like a grownup. If you can't handle that get someone's Mom to drive you.

Rexx

A big-ass concert like U2, and we're suppose to feel sorry for you IDIOTS who didn't plan properly to attend a mega concert. Should have taken BART; should have left earlier. I hope you get zilch for your cry baby whining!

Solid Gold

My 60+ year old parents went to the concert on BART and had a great time. :) And they returned to the city with the festive crowd on BART at about midnight.

PissedOff

Trying to get onto a BART train - through a crowd of 69,000 people in less than 25 minutes.... Yeah right.

Guest

We left our seats at 11:40 walked to BART and was on a train at 12:05.

david

I got onto a BART train within about 30 minutes.

normanx

Seriously, you didn't take BART??? You deserved what you got.

Gabesingh

No traffic jams on the way to SF's Bicycle Music Festival!Saturday, June 18, 2011www.BicycleMusicFestival.com

Why be stuck in traffic when you could be drinking bike-blended smoothies and pedaling the 100% human-powered sound system with your new friends?F#%* traffic jams.

Blake

Even with Bart it took more than an hour to get out to the actual train!

david

Yes, when 70,000 people exit a stadium at the same time, how fast is that supposed to go? The reason it took you (and me) a while to get on a train after leaving the station (though it took me about 30-40 minutes, not an hour --but I'm a veteran of the Coliseum/BART shuffle) is because the bridge to the BART station is a fixed width, the station can only throughput so many people per minute and they can only move trains/people at a certain rate. Despite that, the system got us on our way. I was a little grumbly that night over the delays, but it was a great show, they really gave us our money's worth by playing until the VERY LAST minute that they could and BART took things in stride and held their operation open to make sure we got home by holding the last train.

solano

My wife and I were in that traffic coming from the North Bay. We took the Broadway exit after realizing we'd never make the show if we sat on the 880. Smart move. The city of Oakland was empty. We drove down San Leandro St. (via 11th Ave) and made it to the Coliseum in 15 minutes. WHY IN THE WORLD DIDN'T ANYONE ELSE DO THE SAME?!? Is Oakland that frightening to concertgoers.

Snoopynxs

The excuse of not living near a BART line doesn't fly. I live in Fairfield , nowhere near a BART station. My husband and I drove to the North Concord BART station to catch the train there(as we did for two previous U2 concerts held at the Oakland Arena) No problems at all from taking BART, we left home around 5:30, stopped for gas, food and cash for the bridge and still made it into the coliseum at 7:30. I even commented as we went throught Oakland that I was really glad we didn't drive because the freeway was a parking lot. Like others posts said, Hello, this is U2 playing, on a week night, with commuters driving home also. Most No. Californians know about the traffic in the bay area, especially on a week night. So you people who planned poorly, quit pointed your fingers at the police, the city of Oakland or even U2. You have no one to blame but yourselves.

Amybianchini

Maybe next time they'll show up early aNd be able to get a sneak peak during warmUps. Come on...it's u2. Did they really think they'd be able to just Pull in?

Cyd

Agree :). People shouldn't blame their own poor planning on The Traffic & parking... It was U2 & Lenny!!! HELLO! Going to be busy! Well worth it!

Amybianchini

Shouldn't these peopleBe upset with theOwners ofTheColiseum anyway? Sounds like they want U2 to do some personal apologizing. I guess next time they'll plan a littleBetter.

Cyd

Exactly- we had great parking and got to listen to Lenny warm up! Still smiling :).

SWC

We were there. I have been to a LOT of concerts. This was one of THE worst organized from a traffic stand-point I have ever seen. Not ONE cop or security to help with traffic. We were originally going to take BART home at night, and at 11:50 there were THOUSANDS trying to get out, completely jamming the exit bridge (keep in mind, the station closes at midnight). So, we asked a friend for a ride out instead. After sitting for 15-20 minutes waiting to get out, I got out of the car to see what the holdup was, and discovered a blockade in the pathway preventing cars from exiting. So, I took matter into my own hands and moved it myself. So ridiculous. No wonder police don't have "to protect and serve" on their cars anymore...

david

Yes, the bridge to BART gets choked with people, but it moves. I've been at the Coliseum at a sold out game that let out at the same time as an Eric Clapton concert and the access points to BART were choked with people but still moved. Yes, it took about 30 minutes to walk from the stadium into the BART station, but it wasn't that bad. I got on my train about 40 minutes after Bono left the stage. That was a whole lot better than driving. In the future, just park at Hayward or something --if you get stranded, get a 10 minute cab ride down to your car/station. Yes, BART should run a bit longer, officially, but I think they do that so that people will not dawdle and move quickly to their trains. If you knew you had an hour, you'd probably linger at the venue.

Cohnie

Can you explain what south bay people are supposed to do? We don't have a Bart station near us.

Melodie ThuThuy Nguyen

drive to Fremont or Millbrae and take the BART, that what we did and it took us the total of 1.5 hour to get there (from 5:30pm - 7:00pm)

guest

From what I read, the crush of fans waiting for Bart after the concert was dangerous. Try adding thousands and thousands more to that mess.

Poloughlin

This event is the equivalent to the Super Bowl. The people who waited until the last minute did not plan. There was a reason the venue opened so early. It's hard to believe these late arrivers don't read the newspapers/blogs. You don't get to be the best selling concert of all time by selling a regular amount of tickets.

I'm sure things would have gone well if all 69,000 had turned up at Bart stations!!

Bottom line, and Ron Little of the Event Management company has exposed this , Live Nation\Oakland Coliseum SOLD 69,000 tickets for a concert despite only being able to accommodate 45,000 people (If you allow an average headcount of 2.5-3 persons per car, and an extra 15-20,000 people on a BART system that is already dealing with Rush-hour traffic).

If they couldn't handle the number of cars arriving (which they clearly couldn't), then don't sell the tickets -- anything else is fraudulent and racketeering.

Oh, and to those that said "Leave Earlier"....2 points:

Leaving 3 hours in advance of a 30 minute commute should be adequate;

Leaving earlier would not have magically created extra parking places....it just meant that the fiasco would have started earlier.

david

BART moves almost 400,000 riders per day, mostly during commute windows. Yes, BART could accomodate 70,000. The one thing that overwhelmed BART was the World Series parade, but that was hundreds of thousands in addition to normal commuters showing up and also, the new folks didn't have tickets on hand.

SingleSpeed

Think Giants WS winning parade. Bart and Cal trans handled way more than the U2 concert.

Safariguy99

I'm in, if there's a lawsuit! Bad planning. Why should they get away with the money

U2freakdave

So let me get this right. If someone gets a flat tire and they have no spare they blame the colliseum or u2? seriously get a life.

BART?

Regarding the advice to use BART, I would completely agree if it weren’t for BART stating the following on their web page regarding planning for travel to/from the concert: “The concert is scheduled to end at about 11:30 Tuesday night, which should give fans plenty of time to make the short walk from Oracle Arena to the BART station before midnight. Getting to the station before midnight will help ease crowding because BART will have special event trains ready to get passengers on their way minutes after the final encore. BART service is not scheduled to be extended beyond the normal hours.” That last sentence is in bold.

http://www.bart.gov/news/artic...

Anyone returning to the Peninsula would have to be on the last train by 12:06AM, according to the normal BART schedule. Had the concert actually ended at 11:30, based on the expectation of the crowd returning to the station, a considerable number of people would have been left behind. Driving to an event would normally be a reasonable solution when one foresees not being able to get home by public transit.

Of course, as we saw, Tuesday was not quite reasonable.

A-

Wow. I think we found someone more entitled than Bono himself.

seamoore

Seriously people. Sold out long awaited show and you didn't have the foresight to know traffic would suck?! BART stops right there stupid.

nka2

and... STUPID.. no one said BART was adding extra trains past 12:01. thousands who did take BART left the concert early to not miss the last train. Read up Moron!

SingleSpeed

Give BART a little credit. They'll add trains for a big event, U2 is not the first big concert to be there.

david

BART's last train was 12:15, Bono left the stage at 11:47-48. BART ran extra trains (as they do for big events) and in fact, held the final trains to make sure nobody was stranded. In fact, BART waited so long that my train home was 40 minutes late. I always do BART to the Coliseum for big events because they've never stranded me and the nice thing about the concert, it started at 7pm, but I didn't get on BART until 6pm in SF.

Ramymoraisapussy

+1. take BART. not near BART? drive there. if the nearest one is too far, leave your house earlier. there's going to be traffic--regardless if there''s an accident or not on 880. some people are definitely not too bright. instead of suing for your money back. we should sue you back for being a moron.

Safariguy99

Yeah well. We don't all live on a Bart line. Stupid.

Guest

Then park your car at a BART stop and get on the damn train.

Safariguy99

Yeah well. We don't all live on a Bart line. Stupid.

Akit

Oakland Coliseum at full capacity for a Raiders game is 63,000. Can the parking lot even accommodate thousands of extra cars to U2's concert capacity at 70,000?

There was also a concern about the last BART train leaving northbound after the concert. But I'm not sure when the concert ended.

david

I'm sure the parking lots CAN'T accomodate 70,000 people, which is probably why they charged $40 for parking, meaning that, if you did the math, you could park one station away for free (Fruitvale or San Leandro) and for a 5 minute ride costing less than $2 each way, you could get in and out of the concert relatively hassle-free. When I heard about the $40 parking charge, the high cost did it's job, it ensured that I would not be driving or parking, I'd be riding BART --if I had, the traffic and exits would've been even worse than they already were.