The Mighty Mac Disappointment of 2017

The Mackinac Bridge

This year, Betsy and I made plans to walk the Mighty Mac on Labor Day.

My friend Vicky joined me for my Labor Day vacation in Michigan (a trip we had been planning for over a year), and since she's a runner, I suggested she might want to check out the early morning run over the Mackinac Bridge before the walk begins on Labor Day.

Vicky's bridge run went well, but, unfortunately, our bridge walk was a different story...

Due to recent terrorist attacks, the Department of Homeland Security made the decision to shuttle all walkers across the bridge in certified shuttles (i.e. no passenger car "shuttles" allowed on the bridge).

troopers were busy directing traffic at busy intersections near I-75

cars parked EVERYWHERE-- and it appeared most people carpooled

Unfortunately, the shuttles only provided space for about 25,000 walkers to participate in the bridge walk. We were not among the 25,000 who were allowed to participate during the allotted time. When the shuttles stopped running, we were still over 1/2 mile away from the shuttle pickup location, part of an incredibly long line of thousands of want-to-be-walk-the-bridge-participants.

In the words of the officer who delivered the news to our section of the waiting crowd, we didn't "make it":
"Folks, not everyone is going to be able to walk the Bridge today; I'm sorry, but you're not going to make it."

on our way to the back of the line at 8:54am
(after inching our way through traffic/parking/walking since 7:45am)

There were hundreds of sad, frustrated, disappointed Michiganders last Monday morning. And, if they were like us, they woke up between 4 and 5am in order to drive up to the bridge well in advance of the 10:30am final start time for the five-mile walk.

I am very thankful for our troopers and so many who worked to ensure the 70th annual bridge walk was a safe event, however, it was definitely sad not to be able to walk the bridge. I was anticipating another fun walk.

Instead of walking the bridge, we wound up walking a few miles not on the bridge (there were a few thousand vehicles parked EVERYWHERE as you can imagine...), and eating beef pasties from a shop in downtown Mackinac City.

To try to ease our disappointment and make the most of a bum situation, we drove to Petoskey State Park, and spent some time at the Lake.



P.S. And I would just like to publicly say the news report I read referencing "No more than 10 complaints" does not seem like an accurate assessment of the State's major fail on Monday! [I'm pretty sure James was not standing in the same line I was standing in...]