Jan 0916
Obama Inauguration: Warm and Intimate on the Web, Totally Locked Out in the Cold in VA
January 16th, 2009
I’m excited and fascinated by next week’s Inauguration. And I’m relying on the Web to keep me up to date with the festivities.
- I’m following the Presidential Inaugural Committee (PIC) (@obamainaugural) and loving the YouTube contest, the news about the inaugural activities, and the updates about various balls.
- I’m following the DC Government on Twitter (@Inauguration_DC) and appreciating the news about road closures, tips from the National Park Service, etc.
- I’m impressed with the Web site of the Presidential Inaugural Committee, especially the blog. I have enjoyed reading about the rehearsal and the stand-ins, the concert at Lincoln Memorial is going to be fabulous, and the videos from Barack and Michelle Obama were a nice touch.
- The PIC’s Flickr account is full of beautiful photos of DC and the preparations for next week’s events.
- I plan to be part of the Facebook crowd watching the inauguration live and updating my status when the new President is sworn in.
For the first time ever, I feel like I’m getting an insider’s view of what goes into an inauguration and know about a lot of the activities. The blog and photos especially are creating an intimacy to the event that I did not think possible, considering that hundreds of thousands (millions?) are going to be here next week.
However, I am more than disappointed, okay even angry, that Virginia will be virtually cut off from DC next week. With roads and bridges from Northern VA blocked, and metro sure to be in gridlock, how is someone like me supposed to participate in person next week? I had hopes of attending a ball, but gave up after I heard that bridges would all be closed. Come on, couldn’t the PIC have organized buses and car pools?
I guess I’ll participate in this inauguration virtually. The few people working at Matrix Group on Tuesday will either watch the inauguration from outside City Hall in Alexandria or watch the inauguration live on CNN from our conference room. Oh well. At least we’ll be warm and we’ll have water and pizza, which is more than most people on the Mall will be able to say.
January 17th, 2009 at 12:55 pm
Actually they do have bus service from Alexandria. Although I’m sure that will be about as fun as taking the Metro.
“Metro is also running 23 special rapid bus corridors to take thousands of people to the National Mall on Inaugural Day. Metro’s rapid bus pathways will begin at Landmark Shopping Center and Skyline Center and end in Washington, D.C. at C Street, SW, between 14th and 12th Streets, SW.”
As I understand it they also are allowing taxis into D.C. from Alexandria.
January 17th, 2009 at 1:15 pm
Brad, thanks for this great information. I have been following the blogs, news announcements and tweets and did not hear about the bus service and taxi access! Thank you!