Anyone else have the privilege of being late for the game because of DART? We left in what we thought was plenty of time (1.5 hrs before kickoff) but didn't anticipate sitting on a non-moving train on the way there. All we heard was "sorry folks, we're waiting for traffic to clear ahead of us so we can start moving again". We sat in the tunnel by City Place for 15-20 mins, and again stopped on the track just prior to Deep Ellum for a long time. I bailed at Deep Ellum (when we finally got there) and took a cab the rest of the way. My buddy stayed on the train and I still beat him to our seats. His train wasn't allowed to de-board at Fair Park, they made everyone get off at MLK. Getting back was even worse. The line exiting fair park was insane. We eventually did what a lot of other folks did, ride the other way to MLK and get on the northbound train there. Watching the news this morning there were stories of it taking people 3 hrs+ to get home via DART. Nice idea Dart, poorly executed. Next year we'll probably just drive like we usually do.
DART had an opportunity to really sell themselves as a reliable means of transportation. Sounds like they completely bombed.
I actually had the complete opposite experience -- I guess it all depends on when (and maybe where) you tried to ride the train. We parked at Mockingbird Station at 8:15, hopped right on the next train, and were drinking beer at Fair Park less than 30 minutes later. After the game, we walked out, bought a funnel cake, waited in line for 10 minutes, and were back at Mockingbird Station 20 minutes later. Sorry to hear others had significantly worse experiences, but it was easily the best experience I've had getting to/from the Cotton Bowl in my several years of attending the game.
We had to wait on my friend who was on a train that was stopped for a while as well. I left my wife to wait for him (we had his ticket) as I went into the game (with another friend we brought to the game). They made it by OUs first field goal, but considering he boarded the train before 9am, this never should have been an issue.
We had no problems getting down there, of course we didn't wait till the last minute either. We boarded at victory station around 7:15 or so and after about 20 minutes we were walking through the gate. After the game the lines were very long and we decided to catch a cab.
Had to get a cab after waiting for 45 minutes at a station. This was from just before 9 AM to almost 9:45. It became clear the DART was not going to work. We lucked into a cab.
I bought my ticket at 8:45 at the Park Lane station, and got into the stadium as we were lining up to kickoff. I thought the stadium was going to be 1/3 empty from the lines I saw. On the way home (7ish), we waited in line about 20 minutes and had about a 20 minute ride. Even had a seat. Not bad at all. My issue with DART's approach is that they didn't install four lines instead of two. If you are going to run a line to Fair Park, the main reason for doing that is to make it to (1) the Fair/this game and (2) concerts. That means you are going to have tons of people all trying to get there at the same time. I know it will sit empty a good portion of the time, but you knew that going in. DART is still trying to sell this as a viable mode of transportation, and yesterday didn't help.
From the DART website: - A special message to our customers - For lots of our customers months of planning and preparation by DART staff paid off with a smooth ride to the State Fair Saturday morning. But unfortunately, that wasn't the case for many of you. We know you were disappointed and we were too. Although trains were added and more staff and volunteers were in place in anticipation of the big crowds, we did not get many of you to the game on time. Post-game waiting was exceptionally long. We apologize to our customers who were inconvenienced. We are already working to give you a better experience at next year's game. Thank you for riding DART.
That's a different tune than what DART was singing earlier today. They pretty much said user error was the problem. I'm glad someone over there is working on the problem.
Hey, we were on the same train. My group left Gatalyn Park at 7:20 am too (first car). 40 minutes later we were walking through the gates into Fair Park. The ride back that evening was even faster. The Red Line was running just fine.
We got on the Lovers Lane station at around 8:15ish we were at the fair 25 min later, no problems. It seems the people that had th most issues waited until the last minute to take the train. If you had waited until 9:30 to go to the game and drove you'd have a heckuva time getting to the game on time. DART isn't the problem it's people procrastinating.
Think the main mess was the Green Line. Seems like the people who took the Red Fair line had no problems.
My complaint is a little different. I caught a ride with a friend who had a great parking pass (gold lot). the traffic getting in to the fair was bad, as expected. What made it that much worse was train after train stopping all the foot traffic and car traffic. What made this even more frustrating was that all of the trains were nearly empty. Dallas PD also really dropped the ball on directing traffic near the park IMO. The intersection at Parry and First/Commerce relied entirely on signal lights. Cars would run the red light to get past the intersection and then traffic from the intersecting street could not enter. Add to that all of the pedestrians and it became a mess quick. That said, i saw a calvary of motorcycle cops on their way in just after we cleared the gate. I can only assume that they were there to help with traffic. But back to the original point, it sounds like DART failed the public at the transit stations along with making congestion around the Cotton Bowl worse and more dangerous.
With it also being the last weekend of the fair, I figured that it would be a nightmare the closer it got to 9:00 AM. A lot of people like to wait until closer to game time, its no different than having to wait in traffic pre-game in Austin if you aren't tailgating. Other than some congestion on Walnut Hill due to the Komen race, it seemed to go pretty smoothly. Even better was when they let people on the trains with tickets to the game go in through a side gate rather than suffer the lines through the main entrance. I just hope they keep working on it. As an aside, it didn't seem like anybody had to pay anything. I felt stupid for having dished out money.
The 11 o'clock start time is what ****** it up. With a later game, attendees would be staggered throughout the morning and afternoon, and the gametime rush would be much less. A college football game at 11 am is downright criminal anyways.
I am still wondering where those people that didn't make it until half time were supposed to be sitting at. It looked full to me at kickoff
As others have said - too few trains traveling far too slowly. We started at Pearl at 8am. After watching one MLK-bound train go through full to the gills and standing on a full platform and not seeing another train for a few minutes we decided to hop on one going the other way. Took that to West End (Green Line 2nd stop) and then waited what seemed like 10 minutes at least until another MLK-bound train came through. Got on this one, although we were some of the last to fit (meaning the Green Line trains were filling up at their very first station, Victory, so everyone else down the line was f-ed). By the time we got to the Fair Park stop it was nearly 9am and EVERYONE was getting off. So even though I would have preferred going to MLK and get off, we got off at Fair Park. Big ******* mistake, as that took us another 15-20 minutes to get in the fairgrounds. If they are going to be dumping thousands more people at this gate who used to probably use some other gates due to parking, they need a bigger entrance. After the game we walked around the fair until about 6:45. Walked to the front gate and were SHOCKED to see the long lines for the DART. We walked out and decided to either ride it the other way to MLK or get a cab. Train got there pretty fast, no one on it going to MLK, so we hopped on it and rode it down one stop. Got back on the next one and then filled up at the Fair Park entrance. That whole ordeal took us about 15 min (from front gate to MLK and back) and the people getting on said they waited 90+ minutes. I would not have made it that long at all. On that train back to Pearl (only three f'ing stops) we had one of the aforementioned delays at Deep Ellum. Lasted only about 10 min but pretty much everyone on the train agreed that this was our last time on the DART. I was really excited about this and it was a total flop.
