Worst-case scenarios don’t play out; officials pleasantly surprised
The prelude to an extraordinary celestial event was nothing out of the ordinary, officials said Monday.
The Arkansas Department of Transportation said its traffic cameras showed a slight increase in vehicles Sunday, with traffic on the network of state-maintained roads about 10% higher than volumes on a normal Sunday.
Local officials braced for disruptions on Highway 70 east, one of the main approaches into Hot Springs, on Sunday, but there were no reports of gridlock.
Garland County Department of Emergency Management Director Bo Robertson said downtown had the highest concentration of people who had gathered in anticipation of the eclipse.
“It looks like there’s a lot of folks enjoying downtown Hot Springs, but as far as the traffic issues that we were told we may experience, we haven’t experienced those yet,” he said. “We’ve been checking the ArDOT traffic cameras as well, and we’re not seeing any congestion anywhere on those cameras. Faulkner County, Saline County, coming up from Texarkana, it looks pretty normal.”
Hot Springs City Manager Bill Burrough said by 3 p.m. most of the people on Arlington Lawn had left. The Majestic Hotel site was also a popular viewing spot.
“Anywhere where there were open lots we had a lot of people,” he said.
City offices were closed Monday, but the emergency operations center at Central Fire Station on Broadway was activated. Burrough said the city was going to man the EOC through this morning, but by Monday afternoon they were planning to stand down before 5 p.m.
“It’s all been fairly orderly,” he said. “I would liken it to a Texas-Oklahoma spring break.”
The city worked with the National Park Service to close the mountains that frame downtown. Its intracity transit department ran shuttles to and from the locations. Traffic backed up on Fountain Street Sunday when visitors departed the Hot Springs Mountain Tower.
“As they came down they all wanted to turn left and caused traffic to get blocked back up Fountain Street,” Hot Springs Public Information Officer Courtney Kizer said.
Burrough said left-hand turns from Fountain Street onto Central Avenue were prohibited, with southbound traffic rerouted north and around the fountain at the
Central, Whittington and Park trisection.
“Our biggest concern was traffic,” he said. “We knew we were going to get a lot of people in the downtown area. Just being able to get traffic moving back and forth through downtown was a big concern.”
Kizer said vendors setting up tables on downtown sidewalks Sunday and Monday was also an issue.
“If they do not have a permit they have been asked to relocate,” she said.
First responders reported no issues communicating downtown on the Arkansas Wireless Information Network, the interoperable platform used by hundreds of federal, state and local agencies. Spotty coverage had been an issue during previous mass gatherings.
No disruptions to the cellular network were reported. The fire department didn’t ask T-Mobile, its cellular provider, to bring one of its truck-mounted cell towers to supplement the network.
“Service appears to be great,” Kizer said.
Call volumes Saturday and Sunday at the county’s 911 Communications Center weren’t out of the ordinary.
“There wasn’t that much that transpired,” Roberston said. “We had geared up with adding some folks to the shifts and going with 12-hour shifts. Fortunately, we didn’t see an influx of calls. The people are here. They’re just not making more calls for us is my hope.”
County Judge Darryl Mahoney said local officials were told to expect as many as 150,000 visitors.
“Overall, the numbers are not anywhere what we were told to expect,” he said.
The Environmental Services Department worked over the weekend to empty the county’s three transfer stations. The county takes its trash to the Saline County Regional Landfill in Bauxite. Mahoney didn’t want the drivers on the road Monday, giving them, along with the county’s other nonpublic safety personnel, the day off.
“We tried to keep everything off the street we could, and we accomplished that,” he said. “I think most of the locals have done the same thing.”
Mahoney said he was fine with the smaller-than-expected inflow of visitors.
“It’s been good for the economy here, but I don’t think it’s what we anticipated,” he said. “And that’s OK. If we get through the day without any public safety issues, that was our goal.”
Burrough said cloudy skies forecast for Monday may have affected turnout. Visitors he spoke to over the weekend said they were decamping to areas where the forecast was more favorable for viewing the eclipse.
“They came to Hot Springs, but they were leaving (Sunday) morning to go somewhere north so they could see it,” Burrough said. “They were afraid they were going to get cloud cover here.”
Burrough said whether it was a crush of 500,000 or a fraction of the anticipated inflow, the city was prepared.
“I’m really proud of all of our departments that had a role,” he said. “They were well prepared for the event.”