[Georges]

Familiar with the area as our Daughter went to college in adjoining Bryn Mawr. Very highly dense and expensive area. Do have one out-of-box idea. Very near there is an equestrian facility where the Devon Horse Show is held (Devon, PA). When we competed, we trailered in for the day, but high-end facilities like this usually have space for the big Featherlite horse RVs. They might rent you a space. A little bit north is the giant “King of Prussia Mall” with an expansive parking lot. There is also a Walmart listed as “ask to park” in the area.

[glen]

I believe there is a mall in the area, perhaps Franklin Mills was the name.

We wanted to do some shopping there but we also wanted to park there. This is 15 or 20 years ago so none of this may be worth anything. We went to the manager’s office and explained what we wanted and gave him our business card which had the bus on it.

He accompanied us to the security office where they had a bank of monitors, incouding one that was aimed right at our bus. He explained to the security man there were parking for the night and the security man said he would make sure our bus was part of the rounds the night folks would make. Then he took me to the kiosk where bus drivers get a coupon book for free coffee, sandwiches, and entry to a lounge area, plus Di got a coupon book for specials around the mall.

My point is to ask and you may be surprised. Needless to say Di went out of her way to make his courtesy very profitable.

[Tom]

Liam/Jon,

Thanks for the information. If I was just passing through a Walmart or shopping mall lot might work. But I intend on arriving on the 3rd of June and not leaving until the week of the 17th.

We may have found a campground, Quaker Woods in Quakertown PA that might work out for us. The facility is about 40 miles from the event area and an estimated 52 minutes car travel to get to work daily. We sent them an email requesting some information on their accomodations yesterday. I’ll post the reply when we receive it.

[Tom]

Glad you found something. Just be aware that rush hour traffic at the I76 interchange as you head south can be brutal.

[Archived]

Liam,

Thanks for the heads up. Fortunately I’ll be in a courtesy car for the commute to/from work, not the bus.

I am familiar with heavy delay locations. In 2007 the open was in San Diego, we drove I-5 through LA on the way to Oregon; 2011 the open was in Washington DC, the 2012 open was in San Francisco. This year Philly. If the interchange is delayed I’ll hop off at Conshohocken and pick up Route 23 south.

Traffic is what I do for a living. Its amazing the places I go where I could make significant improvements if there was some local cooperation instead of infighting.

In 2007 I needed some changes at one traffic signal. I asked San Diego for help accomplishing that. The signal turned out to be in DelMar not SanDiego. I asked SanDiego to speak with DelMar. No, they don’t speak but you can call them. What’s up with that? OK, so I called on my way home from Raleigh NC to Southern Pines one afternoon. I spoke with the Public Works Director. After I introduced myself he launched into a 20 minute tirade about how I didn’t know anything, especially about California; that NC only has two lane roads; ad nauseum. I then advised him this intersection served Lot M, “media;” that I was working to keep sports reports from saying great things about the Open and ending with the crappy traffic in DelMar. He immediately changed his tune, put me in touch with his contract signal maintainer and we did good things that worked beyond my time there. There is more to the story but I’ll save it for another time.

[Greg]

Will……Delmar may have some rude or un enlightened folks, but the beach front eaterys are fantastic, which I am sure you found out.

[Archived]

Roger that Rodger! We find good eateries where ever we go for the Open. We also find good people and others that pose technical challenges.

For example, here is the rest of the story. While watching DelMar’s problem intersection one afternoon a California surfer dude in a late 1960’s Mustang made a right turn off the coast highway and just kept turning right. Jumped the curb and threw rocks all over. A lady was walking her dog and looked at me. I immediately told her, “He’s not mine!” She acknowledged that she had seen me yesterday watching the signal and traffic. She had a British accent. I went across the road and looked at the signal from a different perspective, that of the pedestrian. Well bottom line there was another enhancement (phasing changes) I identified that would not impact pedestrain or intersection safety but would provide a significant reduction to intersection delay times. The lady came back past and we spoke of our common British heritage, my mother was a WWII bride. I described my enhancement to her. She thought about it as she watched the intersection and then asked me, “Can you stay here for the next council meeting?” I suggested it would be much more effective for the council to hear the suggestion from one of their constituents instead of someone from North Carolina!

[Bryan]

I manage Air Traffic Control automation programs and I looked into expanding into traffic management (intelligent highways, Personal Rapid Transit, etc.) and all of the complexity you mention scared us away in the end. Just too hard.

BTW, RT30 into the city is called “The Main Line” and is a very affluent area with beautiful “old money” gothic style homes, Bryn Mawr (one of the country’s prettiest gothic campusus) and Haverford Colleges (where they play cricket) and the cricket club (where they play tennis). There are many nice places to eat and shop and we really enjoyed driving around appreciating the architecture. There is even a “Usonian” home built by Frank Lloyd Wright hidden away just off 30.

If you like pizza, the best kept secret type place to eat is “Peace of Pizza” which make all sorts of interesting loaded pizzas.

Have fun!