Gran Fondo Giro d'Italia road closure chaos

ripplyuk

Has anyone else had problems with this? I was stuck for hours trying to find a way home today and eventually gave up and parked on the roadside for almost two hours. I've wasted such a lot of petrol. We've had other events with all the local roads closed but they've been very well organised and distributed information to all local residents. This was just chaotic.

I had checked previously and worked out how to get home and avoid any of the route closures but they obviously don't stick to the plan! The marshals didn't have a clue about the area so they kept directing traffic to the wrong place and basically just going round in circles. The road I was trying to use wasn't even listed on the route but no one was allowed down it 'just in case'.

One family were desperately trying to get to the international airport but were already late for their flight. They'd been directed from one checkpoint back to another with nobody knowing where the right crossing point was. This was after them being at the official crossing point, listed on the website, which they were also refused at.

Other families took to parking up on the road and walking home with their young kids, which seemed a bit dangerous as their were support vehicles, police, ambulance and obviously hundreds of bikes flying along it.

Is this event happening every year? I just hope they can get things organised better next time.

screwedagain

We live just off one of the main gran fondo routes in Belfast. To be fair it was slightly better organised than last year but still a bit of a shambles.

We got a flyer through the door a few weeks back telling us that there would be road closures in our area, the problem being the 'detail' on the flyer was nothing more than the approx 1:1 million scale map that was also on their website. Now this map is useful for seeing generally what part of the province is affected by the event, but it was completely useless for local residents to determine what local access was being provided, what turning restrictions there would be, if a road closure meant a complete closure or just lane closures etc etc. We even emailed the organisers earlier in the week to ask these things and never got a reply.

As a result we spent an hour and a half on a return trip that would normally have taken 20 minutes, due to driving where we thought we would avoid the cycling routes completely only to find various access routes blocked, right turns onto otherwise accessible roads restricted, wardens and psni officers not knowing what streets didnot have alternative access from other directions etc...

So the information provided would have been useful to warn someone from, say, ballymena planning a day trip to the mournes but completely useless for someone who has the audacity to live right in the thick of the cycling route trying to plan their day around it...

I could go on and on,I do like seeing these things being organised and attracting tourism etc, but the supposed increased effort at notiying residents just came across as a bit haphazard.

Hopefully all participants had a good day though!

donnac2558

In car with friend(she is a care assistant and I went with her for the lunch run. Only one lunch and we nipped into Lidl), anyway coming down Grand Parade ambulance lights flashing. Cars pulled aside to let past, yet at the bottom police stopped it to let the riders continue!!!:mad: We were both outraged as some poor soul could have died by the time the let it cross.

ripplyuk

donnac2558 wrote: »

Cars pulled aside to let past, yet at the bottom police stopped it to let the riders continue!!!:mad:

:eek:

OMG! That's shocking. It's one thing to be inconvenienced but delaying an ambulance is just unacceptable.

Tammykitty

The cycle race is a nightmare. I had to leave home at 9.30 to get somewhere I had to be at 12 (and should have been a 40 minute journey).


I got no letter about it this year, but knew it was on so looked it up in advance.


It was also a shambles around the "timed cut off point" in Hilltown, this was detailed as an aside on the map, but the route from Hilltown to Castlewellan wasn't actually marked on the map as a route as the road wasn't actually closed, but there was serious delays on it

guiriman

We live about 400 yards from one of the main Belfast routes, had to cross the 'controlled junction' at the top to the Castlereagh Road around 14:30, probably got through it quicker than if the lights had been working.

Zola.

Bloody cyclists eh?

Rats of the road

craggie

Zola. wrote: »

Bloody cyclists eh?

Rats of the road

The cyclists themselves weren't the problem, it was the organizing shambles. The crossing points around Ballynahinch were closed at 0700, 30 minutes before the cyclists even started! The 'organisers' claim the closures were well signposted... they weren't.

jenheiffer

Zola. wrote: »

Bloody cyclists eh?

Rats of the road

That's when they're not trying to mow down pedestrians on the pavements.

tara747

Funny how you never see threads like this about the NW200 or motor rallies...

Tammykitty

tara747 wrote: »

Funny how you never see threads like this about the NW200 or motor rallies...

If I lived beside them I would be complaining about them too.


I don't think its fair to people living on the routes to close roads for 3 to 4 hours or more.


A number of events in my area were changed due to the race - church services and masses were cancelled, car boot sales cancelled.


Is there any compensation for shops or businesses forced to close during the road closures?


The NW200 is even worse - closing roads from 9am to 7pm on race day.