Freaknik 2010 (Atlanta, Avera: colleges, prices, airport)

[TakeAhike]

Originally Posted by tonygeorgia

The reason it became out of control is because the city didnt give them a permit for the local parks. If the city had given them the permits everybody would have been at the park instead of on the streets. I blame the city, if they are going to come anyway you might as well have them in the park verses in the streets, IMO

Aren't most City of Atlanta parks located in residential areas?

The city is just not designed for such an event. I can still remember the gridlock--all of I85 was included, Piedmont Rd, Lenox Rd, Peachtree of course and every secondary road, too.

[tonygeorgia]

Originally Posted by TakeAhike

Aren't most City of Atlanta parks located in residential areas?

The city is just not designed for such an event. I can still remember the gridlock--all of I85 was included, Piedmont Rd, Lenox Rd, Peachtree of course and every secondary road, too.

If the city is designed for the Olympics and that Sweetwater 420 Festival (people smoking "controlled drugs") it should also be designed for Freaknik

[tonygeorgia]

Originally Posted by johnatl

Sorry, Tony but I totally disagree. What park or parks to you propose to hold over 300,000 people? At its peak, it was that big. It became nothing more than a rolling party taking over and gridlocking sections of the city.

At its peak, things got so bad many restaurants simply closed down for the weekend. Lenox and Phipps both closed in the middle of the day on several occassions due to massive overcrowding. It started attracting an extremely bad element of "hangers on" that used the weekend as an excuse to do "whatever." Girls were getting attacked by roving groups of pigs. It became TOO big, TOO unruly.

I understand that some of you may want to romanticize something you've only heard of and never got to experience. Those of us who lived with it and were impacted by it have a different memory.

You either want traffic or not? If you dont want traffic tell the Braves to leave town. Tell all the people who come here for conventions to stop coming to Atlanta. Tell the airport to move to another city. You cant pick good verses bad traffic, either you want it all or none of it

[JPD]

Originally Posted by tonygeorgia

You either want traffic or not? If you dont want traffic tell the Braves to leave town. Tell all the people who come here for conventions to stop coming to Atlanta. Tell the airport to move to another city. You cant pick good verses bad traffic, either you want it all or none of it

Invalid comparison.

Freaknik is not traffic in the conventional sense, it is a street party in which people cruise the streets. The people in the cars during Freaknik are not going anywhere, they are just cruising.

That's a little different than driving to/from a Braves game or the airport.

[TakeAhike]

Originally Posted by tonygeorgia

If the city is designed for the Olympics and that Sweetwater 420 Festival (people smoking "controlled drugs") it should also be designed for Freaknik

I suppose so. I don't know anything about Sweetwater 420 but there were/are certainly plenty of differing opinions about hosting the '96 Olympics. Surely there is someone who would enjoy discussing that again, I don't/won't.

Any event that contributes to gridlock traffic is of questionable worth to me. There have been several major golf tournaments that fall into this category.
It's difficult to forget just sitting for an hour or so on a road that you typically use without problems.

[johnatl]

Originally Posted by tonygeorgia

You either want traffic or not? If you dont want traffic tell the Braves to leave town. Tell all the people who come here for conventions to stop coming to Atlanta. Tell the airport to move to another city. You cant pick good verses bad traffic, either you want it all or none of it

Ahem, none of those things you mentioned have EVER brought the city to her knees. The Olympics didn't even approach the level of Freaknik as far as bringing the city to a standstill.

Think what you will, I lived through too many of them. It got so bad that we (and countless others I knew) simply packed up and left town each year. Try being trapped in your apartment for 3 days, not even able to exit the property, and then tell us all how good for the city it was. It became nothing short of an annual disaster each April.

I personally hope we never live to see another one. There, I said it.

[AlGreen]

i'm not even an atlanta resident, and even i wouldn't be surprised if it caused some more chaos for the city

i'm sure there will be those folks that will hear "freaknic's back" and think it means they can act a fool again. you always have that ignorant bunch that ruins it for everyone

[JPD]

Originally Posted by AlGreen

i'm not even an atlanta resident, and even i wouldn't be surprised if it caused some more chaos for the city

i'm sure there will be those folks that will hear "freaknic's back" and think it means they can act a fool again. you always have that ignorant bunch that ruins it for everyone

Al, you were awesome at the first Music Midtown Festival. When you did the call-and-response portion with the audience, and the audience couldn't even come close to hitting the high notes you sang to us, and then you laughed at us...that was a joyful moment.

I will attend Freaknik if Al Green performs.

[BringBackCobain]

Originally Posted by tonygeorgia

You either want
traffic or not? If you dont want traffic tell the Braves to leave town. Tell all the people who come here for conventions to stop coming to Atlanta. Tell the airport to move to another city. You cant pick good verses bad traffic, either you want it all or none of it

This is a ridiculous comparison. The Freaknik "traffic", if you even want to call it that, was not only caused by people cruising, but also people simply parking in the middle of the road and getting out of thier cars to "party". And youre trying to compare that to people leaving a Braves game?

Ill go ahead and share my personal Freaknik experience. My older sister was at Tech in the mid-90s and I was hanging out with her during the day down there. We went to a gas station somewhere around Tech (cant remember where since I was only a kid) and we parked in front of the store. While we were in the store, the Freaknik crowd decided that this particular gas station would be a great place to have a party. A whole caravan got out and started dancing on the cars. They basically shut the gas station down. When we came out of the store, there were 5 men sitting all over my sisters car, and they wouldnt let us get in the car. Luckily, one of her friends lived nearby. We had to walk to her house to use her phone and call the police. Of course they were overwhelmed since this was happening all over the city. We were finally able to leave hours later, and every year since we made sure to stay in the suburbs whenever Freaknik came to town.

What I dont get is why college kids would want to come to atlanta for spring break. Atlanta is great, but it would be the last place id want to go for college spring break. if I wasnt going to the beach, I would at least go to New Orleans or Savannah or Charleston - places known for thier college-aged party scene. Even if youre too broke to buy drinks or pay a cover charge, having a party in the streets of Atlanta is a pathetic attempt for a spring break trip.

Atlanta is a business town, and Freaknik is probably the most destructive event that has ever hit the city in terms of lost business revenue (and im including the blizzard of '93), not to mention the damage done to the city's reputation.

[Iconographer]

Originally Posted by johnatl

Ahem, none of those things you mentioned have EVER brought the city to her knees. The Olympics didn't even approach the level of Freaknik as far as bringing the city to a standstill.

Think what you will, I lived through too many of them. It got so bad that we (and countless others I knew) simply packed up and left town each year. Try being trapped in your apartment for 3 days, not even able to exit the property, and then tell us all how good for the city it was. It became nothing short of an annual disaster each April.

I personally hope we never live to see another one. There, I said it.

Nor I; friends and I were swapping horror stories about Freaknik yesterday.
It's one thing where you've got heavy traffic and people in it are moving towards a destination; it's quite another when passengers simply turn off the engines and party in the streets. None of these stories are an exaggeration...it was that bad. The loss to local business was staggering, crime was rampant (although the unctuous AJC continued to underreport such activity) and the mayor did NOTHING.