August 22th, 2001 Meeting Summary
-- see also the July meeting summary
The Workshop's David Doxtater (President and technical head) and
Chris Easterday (marketing head) were on hand to discuss the event. David
declared the 2001 WOMAD to have been a big success, with attendance similar to
last year. Attendees gave mostly positive feedback WOMAD-UK was
happy, musically it was a success. He praised King County Parks as being a
good organization that was very easy to work with in staging the event.
Traffic was not a problem this year. Chris reiterated that The Workshop
had just 3 months in which to prepare and produce the event.
Bill Illi, who has played a key role in representing the
neighborhoods affected by noise issues, has written an long letter to Redmond
mayor Rosemary Ives detailing sound complaints. There were serious noise
issues this year. As usual, bass sounds were the biggest problem.
Deborah Churchill, from the City of Redmond, recounted that Redmond received
LOTS of complaints on Friday; 50+ calls in 20 minutes. She reported that
noise from WOMAD could be heard inside the Town Center movie theater!
David reported that there were, in fact, problems with the sound
on Friday. These were addressed overnight, and both Bill and Deborah
confirmed that things were better on Saturday. The weather compounded
problems, as the overcast and moist air allowed sound to travel further than
under clear skies. Thus, neighborhoods several miles away heard WOMAD for
the first time this year (sound will bounce off the clouds and back to the
ground).
David also reported that sound never exceeded Seattle sound code
limits. They tried very hard to react to complaints during the course of
the festival. They were not aware of the magnitude of the complaints
immediately, as those complaints were coming in to the City.
David stated that they were in the process of compiling on-site
and off-site noise data gathered through their extensive monitoring. He
was going to try to graph some of the data geographically. The Workshop
was to send noise analysis to FOMP before or by the next FOMP meeting.
As far as future WOMAD events, David expressed concerns that
noise complaints could force WOMAD to relocate. The Redmond City Council
were reported to be concerned, and the mayor was reported to be working on the
problems. The Workshop is committed in a very real sense to try to cope
with the situation. Beyond technical sound issues, they will be working on
community notification and communication. They will also try to do an
economic impact study next year.
One thing that will be in place next year is a task force
consisting of representatives from the City of Redmond, King County Parks, and
The Workshop, which will be able to respond immediately to sound complaints.
It was mentioned that King County and the City of Redmond might
want to revamp noise ordinances.
Norah Gaynor presented a preliminary 2002 special event
schedule. The schedule was pretty similar to the 2001 schedule, although
some things are still very much in the air. One thing was the possibility
of shifting WOMAD a week earlier to July 20-22. Also, on the tentative
schedule, she listed the Luis Pulau Festival for August 17-18, immediately
before the NEC Golf Tournament parking. This is the same scheduling of
that event that she proposed at the June meeting, where strong statements of concern
were expressed concerning the timing. The aforementioned NEC Tournament
will be held at Sahalee, and the spectator parking will be at Marymoor (as it
was for the PGA event several years ago). The event runs August 19-25,
with actual competition on Thursday-Sunday. 10,000 cars per day are
expected for the final four days, fewer cars earlier in the week for the
practice rounds. During that parking event, the best time for park
users to visit Marymoor will be midday.
The lake platform "dock" replacement (actually,
reconstruction as a new pier) has been put on hold due to permitting "questions"
that have arisen.
These notes were made by the
webmaster, Michael Hobbs, and they do not constitute an official record of the
meeting. They may have inaccuracies and omissions. If anyone has any
complaints about the content of these notes, they should direct them to Michael
Hobbs at fomp@marymoor.org, and he will endeavor to
correct them.
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