"Other than that, the day was magnificent."
/When I left the course at halftime of the Lakers-Celtics about an hour after the Woods-Els-Westwood group had finished at 7:30, I noticed the first long line of the week for the spectator shuttle buses. From there, reader Cardinal shares this horror story:
I just got home from the opening round. I got into line for the shuttle bus at 7:19 tonight (players were still on the course) and got into my car at 10:07. The line to even get on the bus was more than two hours. Although the crowd was remarkably well-behaved under such circumstances, people did start booing and yelling. Extra cops were brought in for crowd management. There would be gaps of 10-15 minutes between buses (yep, that's right, generally only one bus was available for spectators; when the buses did arrive infrequently, they were used for the volunteers -- understandable priority, but deplorable disorganization). The USGA finally just put out boxes of candy and bottled water, which the crowd passed around. Extra emergency lighting was set up, as we were still in line after dark. I assume the USGA expected most people to be in their cars before dark, as the overflow parking lot was completely dark (no lights were turned on). As no one had cell phones, we could not contact anyone about being delayed/late. All in all, it was the worst showing by the USGA in my experience (4 US Opens).
Other than that, the day was magnificent.