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‘Dead’ standstill: Concertgoers left reeling after Star Lake traffic snafu

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Courtesy of Laura Martinka

Fans of Dead & Company waited in standstill traffic for several hours for the concert at The Pavilion at Star Lake Monday.

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Courtesy of Jennifer Grocé

These concertgoers parked along the road and opted to walk more than two miles to The Pavilion at Star Lake.

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Courtesy of Jennifer Grocé

Dead and Company concertgoers parked vehicles on the ramp from Route 22 to Route 18 Monday.

Alyssa Hummel bought her boyfriend tickets in October to see Monday’s Dead & Company concert at The Pavilion at Star Lake, but they never even got into the parking lot.

Hummel spent $400 on the tickets as an anniversary gift.

“He has never seen them live, and since this was their last tour we were thrilled to go,” Hummel said.

Dead & Company played the Hanover Township concert venue as part of their final tour. Hummel drove almost four hours from her home in Front Royal, Va. She said they left about 1:30 p.m., thinking that would give them enough time to find their seats by the time the show began at 7 p.m.

“Unfortunately, we had no idea what a mess the Pavilion at Star Lake venue is,” Hummel said. “We hit traffic around 5:15 p.m. We were only 3.5 miles away from the venue.”

After two hours, they had moved only a half-mile. Hummel said the GPS was predicting another hour and 40 minutes to move the remaining 2.5 miles.

“We saw many people parking dangerously on the side of the highway, walking miles to the venue,” Hummel said, including elderly people and families with young children.

“We considered taking a risk and parking as well, but considering we were four hours from home we didn’t want to take the chance of being towed.”

At 9 p.m., as they finally came up to the parking lot, Hummel said a police officer waved them away. They attempted to loop around to another entrance, but got the same response. Hummel said when they explained they had tickets, the officer said there was no parking available.

Phone calls to Hanover Township police and The Pavilion at Star Lake were not returned prior to Tuesday’s deadline.

Hummel described her and her boyfriend as “furious” for getting turned away, and wondered how there could be no parking available for ticket holders.

“Come to find out, no one was directing parking, so a ton of space was taken up by bad parking jobs. They were letting people in with no tickets, so those who actually spent hundreds of dollars on tickets suffered for it,” Hummel said.

The venue posted to its Facebook page Monday morning advising concertgoers to arrive early.

“We are expecting large crowds for Dead & Company with heavy concert traffic,” the post read.

As of Tuesday afternoon, that post had accumulated more than 450 comments, most of them describing a very similar experience to Hummel – hours spent waiting in standstill traffic, people parking their cars on the highway and walking, and a parking lot filled with tailgaters and others who did not have tickets to see Dead & Company. The post was taken down later Tuesday.

Hanover police did make multiple arrests at The Pavilion Monday evening.

Michael Koppinger, 27, of Cary, N.C., was arrested for selling counterfeit Dead & Company merchandise. According to the criminal complaint, Koppinger had a table set up in the venue’s parking lot. Police seized stickers, T-shirts and hats from Koppinger’s display. Police charged him with a misdemeanor for trademark counterfeiting.

District Judge John Bruner sent Koppinger to the Washington County jail on $40,000 bond.

Parker Berman, 23, of Aurora, Ill., was also arrested at about 4 p.m. Monday for selling marijuana at the venue. Police wrote in a criminal complaint that he had more than $12,000 cash in a backpack.

Bruner also sent Berman to the Washington County jail on $40,000 bond.

For Hummel, her experience not seeing Dead & Company was the worst she has had with a concert venue.

“It was also just so unsafe it was scary to see. If there would have been an emergency, there was no way to move,” Hummel said.

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