An anecdote: Back in 1995, my folks and I took a bus trip tour through Europe. Our first stop on the continent was Amsterdam. We arrived at the hotel on a Saturday night after a day of riding on the Channel Ferry and riding on the bus. Being exhausted, we all just turned in for the evening. The next morning, after the bus was loaded up, we went to see some landmarks of the city before getting on the road again. We were told by the tour director that there was both a Rolling Stones concert and a big soccer victory celebration last night.
What we saw was a city that seemed to have suffered a nuclear attack. On this quiet Sunday morning, there was trash littered everywhere. The lighter pieces of paper scrap skittered along the ground, propelled by faint breezes. There were no people on the streets. Presumably, the residents of Amsterdam were all in doors suffering a collective hangover. It was quite an image.
This is what I thought I might see coming into downtown this morning.
In actuality, it doesn't look that bad or all that different. There are still a number of tents and temporary structures up, including one of those big, portable grills you haul behind a truck with a sign that says, "SOUTHERN BBQ CHICKEN HERE". But other than that, no big deal.
Of course, my end of downtown is a bit away from the stadium, so it may still appear to be a wasteland on that end. But it'll get cleaned up quickly enough. The excitement is over. The game is over. And the people are leaving in droves. Jacksonville will go back to the sleepy town it has been, with maybe a slight increase in downtown activity. NFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue has already stated we may get the Super Bowl again in another ten years. But, my fellow residents, go ahead and rest up for a couple of years before working yourselves up into a frenzy again. It's time we took a vacation.
2 comments:
I stayed out of the center of town during the weekend, so I haven't seen the impact. On Thursday night I drove to Birmingham, and it took two and half hours to leave Duval County. I found that very ominious, but after that, I haven't had any trouble driving around. My wife and I took advantage of the spookily quiet streets during the actual game and were able to run some errands. Perhaps our road system wasn't as taxed as I feared that it would.
On Sunday afternoon, I saw various people in the business park/hotel district of Southpoint standing out on the street holding up signs saying "I need tickets". But the signs were obviously professionally printed and mass-produced. Was it some sort of reverse-scalping scheme? I figure that any group coordinated enough to come up with signs like that would be consider buying tickets before arriving in Jacksonville.
Your blog's coming along nicely, BTW. You put out quality posts every day, even though your readership is low. It's that kind of dogged commitment that will eventually bring traffic your way. Perhaps you should like to other posts that will bring on trackback pings, or participate in blogging symposia. I've seen you blogrolled on middle-to-low ranking Lefty blogs. I'm surprised that that hasn't brought you more links already.-- David P.
Thank you for compliments, DP. I may indeed do some more linking to other posts that I like.
Funny you should mention driving around. Mrs. Mosley and I made a trip to Walmart at about 6pm last night. We had been putting off return an item because Mrs. Mosley hates how crowded it can get there. But when we went last night, it was the calmest we had ever seen a Walmart. Quite refreshing.
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