You've just got to love total incompetence. What better way to start off a day than to have to deal with a stupidity of such a magnitude that it transcends the normal bounds of mere frustration and anger and morphs into something so horrible, that it actually becomes laughable.
Such stupidities are generally quite rare. Sure, there are many utterly stupid things we all encounter on a daily basis. The jackass running 9 miles per hour below the speed limit in the left lane during rush hour while yapping away on his/her cellphone; oblivious to the mile long traffic jam they have created. The lazy mouthbreather who can't walk the extra 20 feet to put their shopping cart in the return slot; who instead shoves the cart into an empty parking space where it can block a spot AND potentially ruin someone's paint job if it decides to roll away. The turd brain who buys $600 worth of groceries and decides that it would be best for everyone if they avoided the regular checkout line and instead plugged up the self-checkout for the next 45 minutes. The parents who buy their kids "Wheelies", then turn them loose unsupervised in grocery stores/malls/home improvement warehouses. Buffalo fans. The list is endless.
But regardless of the ensuing frustration and anger, those are still just your everyday, garden variety stupidities. I'm talking about the collossal stupidities. The ones that are so monumentally stupid, words escape you. I found one of these on Friday. I'd heard rumors of its existence, but I hadn't encountered it yet. On Friday, all that changed. It's taken me two whole days to get to a point where I can talk about it. It has to be the stupidest, most ignorant phenomena in all of Wake County. It is: The RBC parking/traffic plan.
I've taken the opportunity to create a graphic of this nightmare:
Yep. It took an hour and 7 minutes to get from the intersection of Wade Avenue and Edwards Mill Road to a parking spot. AN HOUR AND SEVEN [edited for decorum] MINUTES!!! IT IS LESS THAN A MILE AND IT TOOK AN HOUR AND SEVEN [edited for decorum] MINUTES!!! THERE WERE 20 [edited for decorum] COPS STANDING ALONG THE ROAD WITH THEIR THUMBS UP THEIR BETTER ENDS AND IT STILL TOOK AN HOUR AND SEVEN [edited for decorum but rhymes with "trucking"] MINUTES TO GO LESS THAN A MILE!!!
I swear to god, if you had a team of civil engineers, a group of NASA scientists, and a herd of mentally retarded Rhesus Monkeys all working together (or against one another; take your pick...) for a year on a plan to f*&ck up the arena traffic pattern, they couldn't have done a better job of it than those imbeciles at RPD did Friday night. Seriously. Whoever came up with that brilliant traffic plan should be fired for gross incompetence and wanton stupidity. Then, he/she should be held up for public ridicule as they are run out of town forever. That plan was about as smart as a football bat. I don't know who makes up the Raleigh event traffic planning group, but I've got a pretty good idea:
What is really amazing is that I've been a ticket holder since before the lockout. I've been to well over a hundred (if not hundreds of) games. I've gotten there late for sold out games. I've gotten there late for games where they are giving out some free chotchke and every Ebay reseller within 150 miles has showed up to stock their online store. I've been through 12 Stanley Cup playoff games and 4 finals games; yet I have never (I repeat) NEVER seen the traffic mishandled as bad as what I saw Friday night.
You'd think that the city of Raleigh would've learned something about how traffic works by now. You'd think that they would've learned something from the fiasco 2 years ago where we got 1/4 inch of snow and the same unprepared/oblivious batch of idiots froze up (pun fully intended) and did nothing while the entire city gridlocked for 14 hours. But obviously, they remain as willfully ignorant as ever.
I know it does no good to complain to RPD, as they don't care. They've got sticks, guns, pepper spray, and immunity from traffic violations, so why do they care if we get pissed? And the Hurricanes/RBC just tell you that it's the RPD in charge of that and they can't help. But it's time that somebody over at Gale Force Holdings/RBC Event Management grew a pair and told the RPD to get their sh*t together before their incompetence starts running off their paying customers. They can't just keep burying their head in the sand. Simply put, there's a lot of people who just don't have the patience/commitment level to pay $200 for tickets to an event/game; arrive just outside the arena an hour early; and then have to wait in traffic unnecessarily for an hour to go half a mile; and then have to pay $8 more to park half a mile away from the arena, and then end up arriving 20 minutes late and miss part of the game/event; etc., etc.
Seriously. They need to get back to the pattern they used 2 years ago that worked so well. Otherwise, they are going to start losing fans. I love hockey and I love the Hurricanes. I love being at the arena for a live game. I have no immediate intention of giving up my tickets. But if this is the way they are going to keep running traffic at the RBC, I'll be reconsidering my decision to remain a ticket holder. I'd much rather be at home watching the game on television than sitting in a traffic jam (wasting $3.30 a gallon gasoline) listening to Chuck Kaiton butchering Slavic surnames...
