Traffic controll seems to be something very few towns do anymore. Some overmight towns used to block off strees and only let the registed vehicals pass through to get into campgrounds.That cut out the non-registered and the gawkers, people either from town or nearby out for a drive just to see what it looks like. Also kept the local troublemakers out, at least with their cars.
As long as you find a way to towns to meet or pick up riders that does not involve the bike routeI really don’t care where drivers go. As far as leaving after you get in, You probably run the risk of losing some of that space to others and just getting in and out of some of those places probably takes quite a bit of time. We have 3, the baggage truck goes from camp (between 8-9 am) to store to camp and that’s it. The other leaves early, goes to camp and puts up signs, tape, and waits for baggage truck. 3rd belongs to the mechanic and usually goes to meeting town. Sometimes those 2 can make trips around town, esp. when we are not close to things like in Webster City, Marshalltown and Cedar Rapids which were all a couple miles or more from downtown at private residences.

Posted 9 months, 3 weeks ago ago #269214

dbkguy:
Still, no one has given me a good reason, why a vehicle pass is needed.I see no benifit in having one.

Anyone?

How about HONESTY?

RIDE RIGHT

Posted 9 months, 3 weeks ago ago #270139

Oscar, there is no reservation process. Prior to the ride I would advise your driver to study each overnight town’s web site and print out the maps provided that show the camp grounds, vendor areas and dinner locations.

RIDE RIGHT

Posted 9 months, 3 weeks ago ago #270248

Thanks for the info, Sandaltan and Steve.

Posted 9 months, 3 weeks ago ago #270264

I didn’t have a vehicle pass in 2010, was unable to camp with the vehicle basically anywhere in town (everyone were registered riders, however). So be it, lesson learned, get a vehicle permit… Got it.

2011, just me so latched onto a much larger team with a bus. (Best way to do RAGBRAI by the way)

2012, same team two years prior, HAD a vehicle pass and it was checked…sort of….Not to let us in but to keep us out. Multiple towns redirected us to the “vehicle RV campground.” These campgrounds amounted to tree-less, shade-less, service-less wastelands. We had a small truck with our gear and camping. We were NOT in one of the hundreds of A/C’ed RVs who are completely fine with wasteland camping.

Ultimately we ended up parking somewhere in town, reasonably close to the better campsites (that were meant for tents), and hiking in… making the vehicle pass completely useless all week. We literally had someone with RAGBRAI tell us that we “cannot park there nor camp here.” Mind you, we were parked on a street with ZERO no-parking markers and we were registered with the event, trying to camp with the rest of the registered participants. I told him to either to try to get the police to tow me from that completely legal parking place (side street, not marked as “no-parking” at all, other cars parked along the road just as we were) or to please leave me alone.

The way we saw it was that we were ALL registered riders and payed MORE for the luxury of NOT getting to use any of the campsites that were even REMOTELY comfortable for people without the luxury of an RV.

Moral of the story:
* I hate that people ride RAGBRAI unregistered.
* I am HAPPY to pay a little extra to bring a support vehicle along with me.
* At the end of the day, it’s a free country. You are welcome to drive your vehicle/park wherever you are legally allowed to, regardless of the event going on around you.
* 2012 proved that a vehicle permit for non-RVs was more of a burden than a luxury. Total waste of money and caused many logistical problems but solved none.
* 2013 may be completely different if the RAGBRAI folks help overnight towns understand how to properly manage their campsites (see 2010 as an example).

All in all, this year was a lot of fun for us. The heat and vehicle pass did not contribute to that fun.

Posted 9 months, 3 weeks ago ago #270515

Maybe the question should be “Vehicle — Is it really needed?”

You know, I keep coming back to the fact that this is a bicycle ride.  Despite the obvious resemblance these days, it still is not the Tour de France where you need to have a team car with spare bikes, an on-board mechanic, and a support crew to hand water and food out the window to you.  If you feel that you need this in order to do the ride, maybe you should look for a different ride.  I understand some of the fund-raiser rides like the old AIDS rides used to do it that way; you didn’t even need to provide a tent.  Just show up, pay your money, and pedal; everything else, including pits stops every ten miles or so, was furnished for you.  Or you can join up with one of the for-profit charter groups like PBV or Bubba’s Pampered Pedallers — but better add about $500.00 to your budget for suce a service.

Personally, I look at RAGBRAI as a return to a somewhat simpler, perhaps more primitive week.  Even at a cost of $150.00 for the week, this is not a connisseur’s ride across Iowa.  All you really need is your bike, a tent, a sleeping bag, a couple changes of clothes, an old US Army O/D duffel bag to put it all in, and some money for expenses such as food and drink.  Leave the TV, the La-Z-Boy, the king-size bed, the caterer, and the air conditioning at home.  Then you don’t have to worry about getting shunted off to a WalMart parking lot or parking in a residential neighborhood (and incidentally usurping the resident’s parking) to spend the night.  You’ll be able to join the crowd at the main campground area near where the Register trucks drop the baggage.

And just for the record — most of the main camping areas are huge open areas such as fairgrounds, HS or college football fields, local ballfields, or other open rec areas.  One year in the distant past — RAGBRAI IX in Mapleton, I think it was — they even shut down the local airfield and we were camped on the grassy area surrounding the single runway.  There’s not a lot of trees or shade available on a football or baseball field or alongside a runway; and with somewhere between 10 and 15K riders looking for a nice, comfy, shady place to set up camp, unless RAGBRAI figures out a way to somehow pick up and move Yellowstone Park to each of the overnight towns it’s not likely to change anytime soon.

-”BB”-

Posted 9 months, 3 weeks ago ago #270528