The purple tunnel of doom

"Maybe it's a metaphor for how foreign policy advisers to the Obama campaign feel -- thrown out into the cold, shunted into a dismal and dank tunnel, abandoned without any communication, and ultimately locked out of the show."

Add field staff to that list.

I have to say I was put off by the tone and length of this post. Sure, it's disappointing to miss out on the ceremony because of inadequate planning and insufficient security personnel, even if "attending" would have meant in practice standing on a cold, crowded lawn watching a television screen. And all the more so for those who worked and campaigned for Obama.

*But*. 1.8 million people in downtown DC for the highest-profile mass public event in the US in years, and the "casualty" results are 750 treated for minor injuries, 30 children lost and successfully returned to their parents, a handful of minor crowd disturbances, a stray passenger on a Metro track, a rogue backpack that turned out to be harmless, and 4000-6000 ticketholders stranded for several hours in a line that dead ended, denying them entry?

I don't want to minimize your inconvenience or disappointment, but in light of what could have gone wrong (I'm not talking about the truly awful possibilities, more about mid-level mid-sized risks like crowd stampedes, false terror threat alarms triggering evacuations, etc.), it went pretty well.

Just a proposal for a little more perspective, and a little less entitlement.

I would like to second aerdrie here. I was also a purple ticket holder who got to see and hear absolutely nothing despite waiting out in the cold for several hours with thousands of others.

I myself have a small comparatively small beef: I live in DC, I got my ticket through a family friend who worked the campaign, and I arrived at 8am rather than 4am or something. My pain is small compared to many.

But this was unconscionable, and what's worse the authorities continue to lie about it. First, they said that everyone got in. Now they say a few thousand, but quite frankly I find estimates of less than 10,000 laughable, and at least 20,000 more believable. The latest excuse is that they over-ticketed and not everyone could get in.

Bullshit. Google has helpfully published satellite photos of the inauguration, and you can plainly see that the purple and silver areas are in fact sparsely populated. Compare: http://venturebeat.com/2009/01/20/pictures-president-obamas-inauguration-as-seen-from-space/

and the map of the staging areas here: http://www.demconwatchblog.com/diary/446/inauguration-map-and-ticket-information-released

An unconscionable lack of planning and organization. I was crushed, and my heart goes out to those who devoted long hours over years to the campaign and/or came thousands of miles for what should have been a magnificent day, a day they helped make and were literally shut out of.

we were stuck by the fence next to 1st and Constitution. after stupidly walking past entrance. We sat there for 2 hours collarbone to collarbone until we finally -- out of desperation -- left to see if we could figure out what was going on.

We got lucky and got in after almost being crushed as we squeezed into 10 ft. wide opening. One woman next to me fell down as she went through.

The problem was that the Capital Police only had one small gate for thousands and it wasn't physically possible to process the number of people waiting. What were they thinking?

They (and we) are really lucky that someone didn't get hurt. I almost brought my seven year old and really thank the stars that I did not as it was dangerous for small children and elderly people.

I was there in the purple tunnel. Infact I am the one facing the camera in this picture! I would have gladly stood in the back by the monument if I hadn't mistakenly thought that because I had a ticket I could get in. I would like to thank all the people in their cars who turned their radios up and rolled their windows down so we could at least hear the speach.

Late this evening, Sen, Dianne Feinstein, who chaired the Inauguration Commission, issued the following statement:

"I have just spoken with Mark Sullivan, Director of the Secret Service, and I have asked him to convene along with the U.S. Capitol Police, all law enforcement and other parties involved in planning for this Inaugural to conduct a prompt investigation into two serious incidents that have been reported. These reports have prompted great concern by members of the Inaugural Committee, including Senator Bob Bennett, and by Congress in general.

The specific incidents include the report that a decision was made to cut off access to Purple and Blue standing areas, which meant that a large number of ticketholders could not reach their designated areas.

I am also aware of the incident involving the 3rd Street Tunnel, where thousands of people were stuck for several hours and apparently without any law enforcement presence.

There may have also been other irregularities, but I have heard enough to know that something went wrong and we need to find out what happened. Mr. Sullivan has indicated that he will provide a full report.

I would encourage people who have direct information about these incidents to contact the Secret Service, in addition to contacting the Joint Congressional Committee for Inaugural Ceremonies at feedback@jccic.senate.gov."

This was posted at the political site TPM here:
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/2009/01/mea_culpa.php

Hope this will help you guys get some kind of justice. Please send the picture of the tunnel and emphasize how potentially hazardous this situation was.

Sorry this has been a bit late in writing. I am suffering from an inaugural hangover that NO hair of the dog will alleviate. Back track to the early hours of the am Tuesday the 20th (4:30) to be exact. I had laid out all my layers the night before. Loaded my pockets with only essentials...camera, trail mix, kleenex, 2 packs of therma cares and 4 packs of hand and foot warmers. Armed with enough gear to give Mt. Everest a go, I grabbed a quick muffin, a banana and some gatorade and began to hydrate so I would only need one possible pit stop. I headed out the door and walked 29 blocks in the chilling cold to the beginning of the line for the purple ticket holders. A line that even now at 6:00 stretched back over a mile through the car tunnel that goes under the mall. As I started walking to the back of the line, I found myself fighting a bit of claustrophobia trying to keep my mind from thinking about all of the the possibilities that could happen to 150,000 people lined up through a mile long tunnel (picture the buried alive scene in Kill Bill). The other thing I noted, was that there were NO security people anywhere to be found. Up top...there were hundreds of military personnel and road closures. As I took my place in line...I befriended a beautiful young couple who had traveled from NY by bus to get to DC. They were filled with the same hope and excitement that filled us all that morning. As we stood, and stood, and stood, the line was moving painfully slow. It did give all of us a chance to talk and get to know one another. This magic of talking to so many people from so many different places, backgrounds and ages was the same magic I felt working on the campaign. The spirit that Obama was able to instill in an entire nation, a nation badly in need of inspiration. By this time there was a bitter chill in the air, about 23 degrees with a wind chill of...cold. The young girl next to me was complaining of very cold feet so I took out my extra foot warmers and gave them to her. In the 60's, people shared drugs...for this event...foot and hand warmers. We had gone about halfway into the mile long tunnel, all 150,000 of us and it was starting to get alarmingly close to kick-off. There was a woman and her 3 kids in front of me who was starting to doubt the process but was trying to hold it together for her kids sake. Feeling that the group around me (and myself) could use a bit of a pep talk, I said, "don't worry guys...this is Washington DC, they are so used to doing this, they have handled the masses before and do it better than any city in the world, they are organized and we WILL get in." The woman thanked me and offered me an apple slice. A moment later...the longest loudest version of if your happy and you know it filled the tunnel, it was incredible. Did I mentioned that on the other half of the tunnel, emergency vehicles and VIP black SUV's would occasionally drive by the line with sirens blaring at 60 miles an hour...that did a lot for the nerves!!! By now...I had an extreme amount of anxiety standing in this tunnel but tried to hold it together. Finally after what seemed like hours (4 to be exact) the end of the tunnel was visible and the line was moving. The familiar Yes We Can was now the chant of the hour as all of us breathed a sigh of relief, fresh air and natural sunlight. All of us were just happy to be out and could see the Purple VIP gate in site at about 100 yards. As I got within about 50 feet of the gate...I was greeted with a verbal kick in the stomach. People were yelling, "they have closed the gate...they are not letting anymore people in". Impossible I thought. I have a Purple ticket...a ticket from Nancy Pelosi...they must mean the general gate. As I pushed my way up to the gate...this nightmare had become a horrifying reality...I had taken a week off work, paid a ridiculous sum of money for my plane ticket, woke up at 4:30 in the morning, walked 29 blocks in freezing temperatures, stood in a dingy, dirty, mile long tunnel for 4 hours with 150,000 other people packed in like sardines trusting only the good in people, and fantasized about this moment for the past 2 and a half months only to be turned away at the gate??????
There was no one there to talk to...not one cop or soldier as no one wanted to bare the brunt of this brutal reality. I thought about scaling the fence and thought better about getting shot. It was now about 11:15. The end of the mall (Lincoln Memorial) with a possible entry was 4 miles away with no taxi's or subways that wasn't an option. This can't be real....this is a bad dream. The reality set in all at once. I slumped into a sickened ball. Washington let me down, the presidential inaugural committee let me down and I could not make the disconnect that Obama too...had let me down. I began to walk with tears streaming down my face away from downtown. I could hear the trumpets sounding from the marine band as I walked. My tears turned into rage and back into tears. My stomach was in knots. Even worse, there were no cabs or subways to get me out of town so I walked (and cried) the15 blocks until I finally reached the cab zone. I had the cab driver take me back to the house I was staying at in Georgetown. My head was splitting and my stomach was in knots. I made it back to the house in time to here half of Joe Bidens swearing in. As I sat in my room watching the TV I realized I was not really listening, even as Obama was being sworn in I did not hear or see anything. My head hurt, my body was exhausted and my thoughts...stinging with hurt and disappointment. Halfway through the terrible poet, realizing that I did not want to stay in DC thru Thursday, I called Virgin airways and asked if they could get me on an earlier flight. I explained what had happened and was on the 5:15 flight back to San Francisco. I fell asleep before the plane took off.
After sleeping for almost 13 hours last night, I can tell you that I am still not fit for human consumption. I'm angry and my heart hurts and I need some time to sort through it all. I feel I let us all down...as so many of you were living this dream through me. I can't even turn on the TV as it is just a brutal reminder of the day that wasn't.
There were many people who didn't get in with me yesterday including the woman with the kids and the couple from NYC. In the tunnel we were comrades and to all the Purple pass holders who didn't get in...we now have earned our purple hearts. Keep living your dreams because when you lose your dreams...you die.

Again, it sounds as if planning and organization for this particular entrance failed, and that's a shame - and should be studied and turned into a lesson learned. And Senator Feinstein's apology seems appropriate.

But - I have a dear friend, an Obama campaign worker, who wasn't able to use his purple ticket because he's deploying to Iraq shortly and was denied travel permission (too close to departure date). Others couldn't afford the bus fare. Again, I'm not saying those who got stuck in line don't have a legitimate beef and a painful disappointment to get over - just that I expect a little more perspective on what "sacrifice" and "hope" mean on a site like Foreign Policy.

did you poopie your pants too?

We had 4 purple tickets. Traveled from Florida. Lots of expenses for hotel and food. Stayed in the cold for 7 hours - on First street. No TV. Only heard the 21 gunshot salute. That's it. We support Obama 100%. My expectations for traveling were crushed in an instant when we heard the gunshots. I realized that we did not see or hear anything else. Thousands of people left disappointed by the lack of organization. I still can't believe it.

I hope that all of you that got shut out contact the inauguration committee members as well your local congressmen to let them know how miserably they failed. There is no excuse for people who showed up in plenty of time with a valid ticket to not get into the event. NO EXCUSES! I did not personally experience this horror but my step-daughter did. She volunteered full time for two months for the Obama campaign before becoming a paid staff member during the fall, and was rewarded with the dreaded purple tickets. She got there before 6am and waited in the bitter cold. There were no "event staff" to assist in any manner. In fact, the police officer was asking the crowd what the deal was. Nobody knew anything. This complete failure can only be attributed to those in charge, and in this case that is the inauguration committee members. They are responsible. Please contact them and let them know how miserably they failed. You can bet i will!

I was a blue ticket holder and got denied after 5 hours of waiting. I am an online journalist, and wrote my account of our nightmare, complete with video of the fiasco. Check it out: http://www.examiner.com/x-2347-Latin-America-Travel-Examiner~y2009m1d22-The-Obama-inauguration-the-blue-ticket-fiasco

Try a military order deploying you to Iraq, photocopied on purple paper.

Your suffering doesn't amount to crap. Grow up and get some perspective.

mra12, this sort of trolling works a lot better when your side wins the election. It's a bit hollow now.

But what's particularly important here is to note that the exercise was conducted with Bush's Homeland Security. And the people coming to the inauguration probably seemed to the crowd control police to be the same as the ones they managed at the antiwar demonstrations for the past 5 years. Of course they weren't helpful.

This may be our first example of the bipartisan process breaking down inside the administration. Republicans at all levels of the administration may try to sabotage Obama's projects.

The high-level appointees can be replaced. But how can GOP saboteurs at lower levels be rooted out? They have claimed that government is inevitably ineffective and useless, and they are in a position to make it so -- while a nonrepublican is in office.

It doesn't work to run the US government as a spoils system, and it may not work to run it otherwise.

The DC crowd control outside the mall gets an "F" We stood in line from before 5am until 10:30am when it became painfully clear we would never make it through security! In fact, we never saw the security gate, period

My daughter and I boarded the second trail that left the Glenmont station, got off at Judiciary Square as instructed. We arrived on First street before 5am and got in the purple ticket line…it didn’t seem long because when the sun came up a few hours later we could see the banner “Purple Gate” only a few blocks in front of us.

Around 8am it became evident there was no crowd control. Tens of thousands of people were entering First Street near the purple gate entrance and walking to the end of the line. At this point we were in line for 3 hours+, the line was orderly maybe two people wide and positioned against the curb.

Shortly thereafter, people walking to the back of the line were blocked and the street began to fill as more and more people kept pouring in. Around 8:30, the street was full of people and no one could move…Very Dangerous! Human nature being what it is and people not being able to get to the end of the line…they simply turned around. Now the line to the purple gate was 50 people wide instead of two. This caused tempers to flair as you can imagine, there was no violence but the occasional use of the F word was heard. Honestly, what were these people to do? A kind of amnesty was granted and we all anticipated moving to the gate together.

The gate was scheduled to open at 9am and heck, it was only 3 blocks ahead of us, I still believed even though thousands of people just cut in line we would all get through the gate. At 9 am, we started to move. An hour and a half later, we were close enough to the purple gate to realize something was terribly wrong. There was a 15’ high fence in front of the purple gate completely sealing off access. Where our tickets indicated we would access the security area, the line turned left went up a block and turned back right again. The line was still 30 people wide everyone was asking questions…no one could help. Many times a private citizen would stand atop a barricade or lamppost and try to direct the crowd…to these people…thank you!

It’s almost 11am and there are thousands of people still in line. The line stretched as far as the eye could see in both directions. We waited about 30 minutes longer to see if the line would move, it did not. At this point, I grabbed my daughter and we walked away, to go home. It took awhile to find a metro station that was open; we found China Town and took the red line back to Glenmont.

I can only estimate the purple side as that’s where we were, there were easily 15,000 people with tickets that could not get in. If the crowd hadn’t been in such a peaceful state of mind…this would have turned out to be a very ugly day.

We met so many people that worked on the campaign that could not get in either...others that traveled 1,000's of miles to be there...I’m very sad for them. Knowing how excited we were to get in, we traveled only a few miles. I cannot imagine the disappointment of African Americans that traveled across the country only to be turned away. Even disappointed and dejected everyone I saw behaved very well, I am proud to be part of this group…it was bitter sweet for many of us but an incredible day!

Officials have said –

“All tickets were honored”
“Everyone with a ticket got in”
“More people showed up than expected”
“Because people wore bulky clothing there was not enough room”

These comments are incredibly insensitive and offensive. This event was truly once in a lifetime…there were 100’s of people in their 60’s and 70’s standing beside us. Somehow, everyone that was shut out need to be recognized and made to feel included, or at least respectfully acknowledged.

Only now are we starting to hear the truth as to what went wrong.