There’s no harm in preparing for the worst, especially if the worst never comes.
9NEWS reporter Noel Brennan and photojournalist Anne Herbst packed an SUV full of camera gear, camping equipment and enough food and water to support a newsroom.
Needless to say, they may have over prepared for their trip to Glendo, Wyoming, where they’ll be covering stories about the eclipse.
Despite projections of bumper to bumper traffic, Noel and Anne cruised up Interstate 25 and encountered only a few slowdowns along the way.
They expected to reach their destination late Sunday night and had their fingers crossed that they wouldn’t encounter a parking lot at the Wyoming border.
CDOT said Sunday that I-25 was busier than normal, but not by much. The stretch of interstate from Fort Collins to the Wyoming border typically sees 4,500 cars per hour.
On Sunday, 4,800 cars per hour traveled the section of I-25. Noel and Anne made a stop in Johnstown to talk to travelers heading up to Wyoming for the eclipse.
“This place is like wide open west country,” Andrew Lawn said. “I expect to see wild horse herds out here by comparison to what I’m used to in New York.”
Lawn and his wife, Kristi Vaiden, flew into Denver from New York Sunday and started driving to Casper, Wyoming. The couple lives about 15 miles west of Times Square. They know traffic. Real traffic.
“This is nowhere near traffic!” Vaiden said with a laugh.
Coloradans like Paul LaRive admitted that the trip north on I-25 wasn’t nearly as bad as ski traffic gets on Interstate 70.
“There have been a couple places where it locked up for a bit, but I think my average speed has probably been around 55,” LaRive said.
The population of Wyoming is expected to double on Monday thanks to the influx of tens of thousands of visitors hoping to witness the eclipse in the path of totality. As bad as traffic gets, Andrew Lawn and his wife know it can get worse.
“Even if the population doubled it’s still only a quarter of what we face normally in New York,” Lawn said.
