Yup, doing the batches is one of the good techniques. It wasn't always there though it's been with the gate for a while.Lord Of Ruin wrote: There are functional limits to how many lanes can effectively be operated before order and safety breaks down. Multiply that by the same issue being a concern at Greeters, at Gate, and finding plots in the dark in the city.
in other words....you're drinking from the hose and are real thirsty. One way to get hydrated fast is for me to turn up the hose. Another way is for me to give you a larger diameter hose (more lanes) at the same pressure. A third is to add a larger diameter hose AND more pressure. But now you've got another problem looming...how quickly can you swallow all the water without vomiting it back up? (that's the city itself.)
For the record, Gate runs 8 set lanes, and we have the ability to add up to another 4 realistically in crunch times. That extra space is usually used to accommodate issues like breakdowns, emergencies, etc The 8 lanes are typically running multiple crews in each lane; typically 4 vehicles more or less get searched and processed and released in a batch. Next four...
No event has a situation quite like BM, I agree. Most are getting people to parking lots, and then handle ticket processing after people are out of cars, which is much simpler. That being said, they are then able to handle vastly higher volumes than BM. I mean a football stadium can get 50,000 fans parked and in over an hour. I realize it's not the same problem as 20,000 cars. But to be clear, I was not saying that other people do what Burning Man does, but rather that in other environments where long lines develop, be they events, airport security, concerts etc. solutions are found.Bradtem, you keep mentioning other events. Can you cite an event that searches all vehicles, must take individual tickets, is a camping/living space event, and lets the participants choose their own space to set up in....and that does it all much better than BM? Did you know other festival send people to BM to find out how to fix their issues by copying some of our methods?
That said, Great Smokey Mountains takes 45,000 visitors on the average single day in June, what BRC handles in a week. With an average of 17K/day at the Gaitlinberg entrance. And of course higher than that 45,000 on the weekend days. Of course that is easier because that park is free. Grand Canyon is not free -- they are collecting cash at the gate and handing 21,000 day average in the peak months, I don't know what the peak day is. Only a quarter stay overnight. They don't feel the need to search. Stadia do search, at least some of them, but it's on foot.
If you want to see places where vehicles are searched all the time going into places as mundane as a shopping mall, Israel is the place to go. Personally I don't know how they live with it, but they are used to it, and they're also very good at it so they make the traffic flow.
I would have no willcall at all, because I would move to electronic ticketing. Aside from no willcall it also means almost no ticket fraud. This is hardly new of course, most of the events I go to these days use electronic ticketing, and I believe in the future we'll see a lot more use of wireless electronic ticketing using smartphones in many venues. (I think you can do it over bluetooth, you don't need NFC which is still rare in phones.) There are variations of electronic ticketing which actually could push people to stay in their lanes, though for now I haven't seen anything that can do this, and traffic engineers have tried hard.I'm curious..what are those other better run events that hae solved the problem? Maybe a handful of us can go there and glean some hints.
Wanna know how simple it would be to cut the processing time/line in half, at least from a Gate standpoint?
- All vehicles must have all spaces within them able to be reached by an arms length...let's say 30". If any part of the vehicle is not reachable by a person easily getting that close, the entire vehicle is turned back to Reno to remedy. Anybody that's processed through in a car or small SUV will attest to how fast that is.
All vehicles hold up tickets as they get to the sorting kiosk. No tickets in evidence, they're routed down the loopback down the highway. Go fix it somewhere else.
Move willcall/boxoffice into Gerlach, Nixon or Reno. Anywhere but the event.
All drivers must remain within the vehicle once they leave the highway. Turnoffs/loopbacks to the highway will be placed along Gate road. If you exit your vehicle, your vehicle will be sent back down the highway to try again.
All vehicles must stay within their initial lane until they reach the sorting kiosks unless directed otherwise by LEO or Gate staff. We catch you lane changing, and we send you back down one of the turnouts to the highway. Try again from the back of the line.
LoR
Another question you may know the answer to. If I wanted to do two different gates that were very distinctive -- one general, and the other express only for people during the first day with a special card who have done some basic training and have electronic tickets -- what would stand in the way of making a 2nd gate at one of the 12 mile entrances? I know that one of them has to stay open for the public to get to the playa road, but I know that a modest amount of BRC traffic does use this. What would you feel stands in the way of that? Yes, I know that some yahoos would ignore all the signs saying "Special electronic tickets only, if you don't have one you're going to be turned back and wait 3 more hours" but I think they could be managed.
(Dogs are also used but the playa is not a great place for them.)
