So who else had a miserable commute tonight courtesy of Obama? (Houston: home, versus)

[Dopo]

I guess is the first time ever that traffic is bad on Friday during rush hour when is raining in Houston.
I was driving home at 5:30pm and on 92.9FM they were saying that his plane still hadn't landed.

I don't know why this thread reminded me of Newsweek

[Chicago3rd]

Grow-up. This happens in all cities when a President comes.....Now maybe paying attention to the news and figuring out new ways to get somewhere and maybe adjusting your schedule might have helped your trip time slim down a little. Have been stuck in SF because of Bush and PDX because of Clinton. It is called life....moving to a small town might be advised too.

[HtownLove]

Originally Posted by Chicago3rd

Grow-up. This happens in all cities when a President comes.....Now maybe paying attention to the news and figuring out new ways to get somewhere and maybe adjusting your schedule might have helped your trip time slim down a little. Have been stuck in SF because of Bush and PDX because of Clinton. It is called life....moving to a small town might be advised too.

Houston drivers are like bugs. they follow the trail of the bug in front of them. I swear, its a panic anytime something happens on the highway

[tstone]

Left the Galleria at 3:30, got to the house at 4:20. A little bit slow for a Friday due to the rain.

If this was a problem with the city, maybe you should be blaming the local govt instead?

[Kannadiga]

Good to know Obama is still capable of causing a traffic nightmare wherever he visits.

[marcopolo2000]

Originally Posted by texas7

Wow - 20 miles from downtown took about 3 hours. I'm a native Houstonian and have seen presidents come and go on these fundraising tours and this was the absolute worst I have ever seen in tying up traffic on every major freeway. What a disaster.

45 minutes was just to get out of the downtown area.

Something tells me you'd be miserable anyway

[MobileDave]

I drove by 45S at Dixie Farm around 6:30 and it was a parking lot. It stretched as far as the eye could see south. I don't think I have ever seen it that bad.

The reason it was so bad this time was because they had to shut down all of the given freeways twice. When he tried to land the first time around 4:30 they waived him off because of rain so they had to close them all again when he actually did land around 6:00.

[crone]

It takes us 45 minutes just to get out of the parking lot and onto the street at the ballpark, every night.

This was what Houston was like in the late 70's and early into the 80's. Giant gridlock everywhere. A broken down car on the freeway could cause a 2 hour delay. Houston was adding 10,000 cars a month or something staggering, with nowhere to put them.

Some folks decided we needed a fantasy demonstration project. Cars were going to get on 610 and simultaneously breakdown at every major freeway intersection at the on and off ramps. They calculated one could shut down the entire town for hours. Looks like there was a mini version of that last night. Looks like the cops don't know how to move traffic to me.

The secret service must have decided a helicopter was not in the cards for wherever Obama was headed. They are the deciders on travel.

[texas7]

Originally Posted by jasonamd

I would imagine that had to do more with his final destination as I-45 S itself was still open, unlike 45 N.

As far as the city doing a poor job with this...there isn't much that they can do. They have to close roads and have no option but to do it when they are told. I lived in Austin when Clinton came there a couple times and it wasn't any better with SH-71 and IH-35 being closed for a time during rush hour. At least when GW came for fundraising a few years ago he took a helicopter from Ellington to Sugarland and didn't have to close any major roads.

Understand but doesn't really matter if it is open, if police block people from access for hours. 45 minutes to get out of downtown is just insane (our downtown isn't that big). It was overkill in what they closed. Like I said, I've never seen such a complete mess when any President has arrived before to the downtown area from Ellington. They've always closed stuff for his safety but never made such a huge mess of things. Just glad that mess is over with and I finally got to my destination but not without lack of having to find a creative way home that took 4x my normal commute time. I think the city can learn a few lessons from an event like this and hope they manage to do it better next time. Hopefully the planners can take away something from this.

[texas7]

Originally Posted by Dopo

I guess is the first time ever that traffic is bad on Friday during rush hour when is raining in Houston.
I was driving home at 5:30pm and on 92.9FM they were saying that his plane still hadn't landed.

I don't know why this thread reminded me of Newsweek

His plane arrived in Hosuton at 4:35 (spouse works across from Ellington) but then remained in a holding pattern so the roads were closed in advance of this arrival and continued until he could get to his destination. This was the worst traffic has ever been on a rainy day when it wasn't flooding. It was equivalent to a flood day. Even the news stations televised scenes of the arrival (as they put it) "creating havoc for commuters" as several freeways were closed. May not have created havoc for all but for those who had to use any freeways connecting to that direction - it did. Maybe you have your own head one too many times as you can only see your own circumstances and not that of others. Like I said the city of Houston did an extremely poor job of traffic control with this one - they have had this scenario many times in the past and have never done such a poor job.