A plan to ease the traffic

[mikeb]

Opening the carpark 12 hours earlier, but not the site, allows people to arrive via car at staggered times all night. Opening the carpark 12 hours after the festival opens would mean that everyone coming by car would try and arrive the second the carpark opened.

Edited February 28, 2010 by mikeb

[mikeb]

They are both doable. One acts as an incentive, the other acts as a punishment. Carrot not stick mike

Edited February 28, 2010 by mikeb

[paulo999]

Yeah I know that ... but what I meant is that having peeps arriving by PT on Tuesday is not sensibly doable because they can't (currently) get on site at that time so would be standing around outside that's all. Just not practical as things stand. HOWEVER, If you look back to discussions last July you will find that my very first suggestion was site open for PT on Tuesday ... wanna guess the reaction

[mikeb]

I'd be interested to read the thread. Got a link?

Edited February 28, 2010 by mikeb

[EasyUserName]

And they're not going to do that regardless ? My large sum of money says massive queues at 2000 hours on Tuesday ! It's not that different in reality and the queues are outside of peak normal traffic so not a significant problem to anyone other than those stupid enough to think that queueing for 'n' hours is somehow better than leaving 'n' hours later.

It's all swings and roundabouts in reality. There isn't an ideal solution other than banning cars completely and making Public Transport the only option - and that's simply not doable. My point is simply that allowing early arrivals by car is fundamentally wrong because it's positively encouraging the very thing that's causing the bl**dy problems and discouraging the very thing that can actually solve the problems There absolutely HAS to be a better solution to the problem that is allegedly trying to be solved than what's being proposed.

[Laura_Babs]

And they're not going to do that regardless ? My large sum of money says massive queues at 2000 hours on Tuesday !

[mikeb]

I think you are missing my point. Tuesday carpark opening early - it will only have the true die-hards. The gates don't open until the usual time. For example, I won't be there - what's the point? However, I will try and get there the usual opening time. Now, if the carpark was open 12 hours later than opening, I would of course be there - along with pretty much every one else in a car.

Edited February 28, 2010 by mikeb

[paulo999]

Public transport users will not be heading down to PGD to join the queues of car arrivals. PGA is right in front of them. It's their gate. It's impossible to get to from East car parks, and difficult to get to from West. And it's illogical for most people to try walking up there. The majority of the camping is in the south. Walking north to PGA makes no sense.

Mike - telling people, in your opinion, how shit public transport is going to be, is immensely dumb. The more people read stuff like this, the more convinced they will be that taking a car is the right thing to do.

Is that what you want?

[LusciousLucy]

Its ridiculous with all this overreaction to the car park and traffic jam issues and it is bloomin pointless. Last year was a f**k up that noone could have predicted and although some poor folk had a very horrible wait and experience waiting to get to site, we all know there are and will always be queues.

The queues seem much worse these days because of the unfeasible number of tickets sold now. The queues were not particularly bad in the early Noughties and tbh, werent bad in 07 or 08 really. We sailed in no probs even then.

There really is no need for anyone to waste their breath or argue like kids in a playground over a very manageable and unavoidable situation. Over half of the festival goers come in cars...cos a f**k load of people like arriving in cars cos its not as restrictive as public transport. The road based PT gets stuck in the traffic jams just as much as the those folks in cars do as well anyway.

Every single person that does attend IS selfish in one way or another that is for f**king certain at some point in some capacity during the festy weekend. The number one thought for most people is getting to the best camping site isnt it? The panic that seems to ensue once folks arrive in the car parks and the speed at which they unload to get the gates to get onsite is everywhere.

Suggesting staggered arrival times, if it ever went ahead there would be no end of threads with people stating how they MUST be on site earlier than other people and so on. YOu know it to be true

[Triton]

Travelling to Glasto by coach isn't as environmentally friendly compared to travelling by car as some seem to think.

You have to factor in the fact each coach has to drive to Glasto, then drive back empty, then on Monday return to Glasto empty, then return full. That's two trips with no passengers!.

You also have to take into account that most of the coaches have to drive a considerable distance from their depot to the first pick-up point, then drive to a handful of other pick-up points before heading to Glasto. Then on their return, they have to drop off at various drop-off points before returning to the depot. Quite a few extra miles on the road than if they drove straight to the festival and back.

Most people will need to use transport to get to the pick-up point in the first place, often these journeys will need to be made in taxis as it's not practical to get on a bus with all your gear, that's if buses are even running at the time you need to get to the pick-up point, a distance which may be considerable in some cases.

A 40 passenger coach does 10mpg (if that), a car 40mpg?. What's the average number of people in the average Glasto going car? I would imagine somewhere between 2 and 3.

When you take all these factors into account, the environmental impact of car vs coach isn't as black and white as some seem to believe.

If someone has more precise figures and wants to do the maths, it'd be interesting to see how they compare.

[johntrfc]

Travelling to Glasto by coach isn't as environmentally friendly compared to travelling by car as some seem to think.

You have to factor in the fact each coach has to drive to Glasto, then drive back empty, then on Monday return to Glasto empty, then return full. That's two trips with no passengers!.

You also have to take into account that most of the coaches have to drive a considerable distance from their depot to the first pick-up point, then drive to a handful of other pick-up points before heading to Glasto. Then on their return, they have to drop off at various drop-off points before returning to the depot. Quite a few extra miles on the road than if they drove straight to the festival and back.

Most people will need to use transport to get to the pick-up point in the first place, often these journeys will need to be made in taxis as it's not practical to get on a bus with all your gear, that's if buses are even running at the time you need to get to the pick-up point, a distance which may be considerable in some cases.

A 40 passenger coach does 10mpg (if that), a car 40mpg?. What's the average number of people in the average Glasto going car? I would imagine somewhere between 2 and 3.

When you take all these factors into account, the environmental impact of car vs coach isn't as black and white as some seem to believe.

If someone has more precise figures and wants to do the maths, it'd be interesting to see how they compare.

Edited March 1, 2010 by johntrfc

[mikeb]

Public transport users will not be heading down to PGD to join the queues of car arrivals. PGA is right in front of them. It's their gate. It's impossible to get to from East car parks, and difficult to get to from West. And it's illogical for most people to try walking up there. The majority of the camping is in the south. Walking north to PGA makes no sense.

Mike - telling people, in your opinion, how shit public transport is going to be, is immensely dumb. The more people read stuff like this, the more convinced they will be that taking a car is the right thing to do.

Edited March 1, 2010 by mikeb

[grumpyhack]

If you really want to take Green-ness to the extreme you wouldn't have a festival. Then you wouldn't get 200,000 people (incl punters, performers, traders & support teams) travelling there in the first place.

But even that one isn't simple. During the week of the fest, if it didn't take place, people would still be doing other things including travelling - possibly daily to work.

Once people are on site they generally don't do any car or PT transport travelling. So between the getting there and getting back the festival actually takes 200,000 people off the road for a week.

The round trip from my home to Glasto is about 160 miles. It will be by car because I'll be towing a trailer tent. We'll have three people in the car. If they weren't at Glasto they'd be working - all separately driving their cars each day doing an average of 40 miles a day. So 6 days x 3 people x 40 miles a day = 720 miles. A week in a field is therefore a net saving for us of over 500 miles.

All that said, it still makes sense to travel to Glasto as economically as possible.

[ICGenie]

All that said, it still makes sense to travel to Glasto as economically as possible.

[cejx]

So, in summary.

a. For cars, some kind of staggered entry system - tho how in reality this would work I am unsure. Those waiting for their wednesday 2pm slot would be surely waiting an clogging up the roads to get in early!

b. Increase the parking prices to say 50 quid a car - less desirable.

c. Reduce PT costs and increase routes - more desirable.

Live with the fact that there will be queues, factor in to your journey and get over it. Yes its fecking annoying for residents, but seemingly, they get the disruption over and done with in a day now. If you as a festival goer don't like it, then you have the option to arrive on thursday.

The festival is expensive. Folk want to get the most out of their money - so if they advertise the festival as opening at 8am wed, they can hardly expect - if they introduced a stagger parking system - those who for example get the 8am thursday parking ticket to pay full price.

[lord stradmor]

As there's extra camping areas this year, why not keep them empty for late arrivals?

One of reasons people want to arrive early is to get a good camping spot, and with so many twats taking up space in an unreasonable fashion, arriving after Wednesday means you are stuck pitching your tent in some pretty unedifying spots.

You might end up on the outskirts a bit, but for some that would be preferable to being ten feet from the longdrops/on a drunken twat access route.

[cejx]

As there's extra camping areas this year, why not keep them empty for late arrivals?

One of reasons people want to arrive early is to get a good camping spot, and with so many twats taking up space in an unreasonable fashion, arriving after Wednesday means you are stuck pitching your tent in some pretty unedifying spots.

You might end up on the outskirts a bit, but for some that would be preferable to being ten feet from the longdrops/on a drunken twat access route.

[mikeb]

If you really want to take Green-ness to the extreme you wouldn't have a festival. Then you wouldn't get 200,000 people (incl punters, performers, traders & support teams) travelling there in the first place.

Edited March 1, 2010 by mikeb

[maninkilt]

Basic Maths without the factoring in of the extra journeys to get to coach pick up points by both passengers and coaches themselves

Using 10mpg for a coach, with 40 passengers doing 4 trips of 100 miles

100/10 = 10 gallons of fuel used per trip

4*10 = 40 gallons of fuel used in total

40/40 = 1 gallon used per passenger

Using 40mpg for a car, with 3 passengers doing 2 trips of 100 miles

100/40 = 2.5 gallons of fuel used per trip

2*2.5 = 5 gallons of fuel used in total

5/3 = 1.67 gallons used per passenger

In order for figure for gallons used per passenger to match the coach would have to do an extra 67 miles

[ukslim]

Coaches may not be a slam-dunk in terms of CO2 emissions etc. But they're certainly an improvement in terms of road congestion.

I think if you actually wanted to encourage more people to use the coach, the way to do it would be to artificially push up the price of driving: charge more for car parking. Balance it so that 3-to-a-car works out at about the same price as those three people getting the coach. Maybe use the proceeds to subsidise train/coach travel.

On the other hand, why do anything? Car drivers complain about sitting in queues -- but most of them don't seem to hate it so much that they get the coach the next year.

[mikeb]

Which when you consider the fact that coaches will be taking a far less direct route (multiple pickups) is not unrealistic, if you also take into account the fact that untill the final pickup the coach will be running far less efficientlay per gallon/person public transport is not automaticaly the "better" option environmentaly.

Edited March 1, 2010 by mikeb

[maninkilt]

Could always extend the monorail to Castle Cary!

Edited March 1, 2010 by maninkilt

[mikeb]

Could always extend the monorail to Castle Cary!

Edited March 1, 2010 by mikeb

[maninkilt]

Ok, not saying that this would work but just to raise rhetoric;

What about making the whole thing public transport only.

All coaches arriving at staggered times, folks would only bring what they could carry which may help to stop the DISGUSTING scenes of discarded gear on the Monday, no problems with people driving back still tipsy and the festival starts as soon as you get on the coach.

The much larger infrastructure required for this would mean that there could be many more pick up points and as for organisation, coach / transport companies do it all the time, it,s doable.

What you think?

[ukslim]

Ok, not saying that this would work but just to raise rhetoric;

What about making the whole thing public transport only.