Arriving at Lockn'

Some great questions. And to answer all of these great questions: We don't know! lol. I think most of are are pretty terrified at the potential traffic situation. I think i'm the one that you quoted, so I'll do my best to help you understand what I was thinking. Let's say they end up only selling 25-30,000 tickets by the time the fest gets here. Pretty much everyone I've talked to that is excited about the fest is upset with the late gate time, particularly considering the show start times. Let's assume that AT LEAST a thousand people show up in the middle of the night. My guess is closer to 3-5 thousand. Given that each car is, on average 15 feet long, and that there is about 5 feet between cars. This gives us as much as about 2 miles of cars and as little as a mile. Now, by 7 or 8 in the morning, I have to imagine anywhere from 10-20,000 people will be chomping at the bit to get in. From what I can tell on the map, the fest entrance is RIGHT off the highway. Therefore, any traffic jam will be on the highway. I just can't see this sitting well with law enforcement. I feel like after a mile or so of stop dead traffic for potentially hours, they will step in an make Lockn open the gates, if they have that power (for safety reasons). So, my guess (and this is very much only a guess) is that by 5 or 6am they will start filtering people in to avoid a giant mess.
When I said that I'd sleep in my car if I had to, I meant just that. There will be cars lined up with nowhere to go for potentially hours at a time. I can't imagine it being a problem. Worst case, I leave my windows and somebody comes pours cold water on me to wake me up, lol.
Thomas Nelson Hwy has two lanes going each direction. I imagine there will be a huge line of cars in the right lane waiting to get in, but that traffic will be able to flow on the left side.
Again, take all I've said with a grain of salt. I am not familiar with the area, only what I can learn from google maps. Maybe only a few hundred people will show up early and we'll all be stuck waiting until 9am. But we'll certainly be able to set up our campsite and settle in before the shows, unlike the poor saps that show up late. Then again, maybe 20,000 people show up by 9am and it's an absolute clusterf***. Only time will tell. Either way, fill up your tank before you get too close, have some good tunes and plenty of smokes, and maybe even a good book to read. I imagine if traffic is still long enough and there is light, some sack games and the like will break out. So get out and meet your neighbors, start the good vibes early.

My husband and I will be arriving around midnight or 1 also... Really wanna know what's up with waiting in line

Strength in numbers. I hope a crowd forms and they open early. They may just say 9 am to keep everyone from coming in on wed. Just a thought.

My original plan was leave early Wednesday and get there in time for the 4pm VIP gate opening. Since they changed the VIP to 9am Thursday i'm driving from Louisville KY to Charlottesville Wednesday and staying there for the night, getting up early thursday and heading to the site.

I can only imagine the traffic nightmare off of RT.29.  However, if response from Lockn' is lacking perhaps contacting the VA Police in the area and just ask what their plan is for traffic?  If we all know then we can all get in without any problems.  I, for one do not look forward to sitting on the side of the road waiting to get in.  The VA State Police MUST have a plan in place.  I think they would appreciate Lockn' people asking to avoid a catastrophe.  We'r not getting any info from the Festival peeps so we must take the initiative on our own.

The good part for us is the state police. They are used to getting 100,000 into the Richmond Raceway twice a year. I am pretty sure they will work to get us all in on time. Actually Lockn is the same weekend as the Nascar race in Richmond. Can't wait till next week.

Yeah I agree.  There is no way they will watch the sun come up on miles of cars and refuse to open the gate. My guess is they will have it open at sunrise at latest. I actually took a nap on the interstate a month ago. There was a a big wreck and traffic was at a complete stand still for two hours. After about 45 mins, like 2am everyone started cutting there cars off so I rolled the windows down and leaned the seat back took a nap. When the traffic started moving, the sound of all the cars starting up was my alarm. I think they are just saying 9am just to have even flow of traffic. I will be coming from Knoxville too.

more Knoxville family!!!

I guess that's at the heart of what I'm wondering, too.  Why would they not just turn people away - possibly even with a combo roadblock/turn-around point?  I'm just curious because I've never done anything like this.  Not worried, though - I'm pickin up some sweet vibes off this fest.  It'll all work itself out and we'll be Cheesin' before we know it! 

Our plan is to leave Nashville around 2 p.m. Wednesday at the latest. We booked a hotel 30 minutes outside of Arrington and will hopefully be in line by 6 a.m. Thursday morning. We're doing car camping so I'm hoping for a good spot since it looks like it'll be a long walk no matter where you are, but with everyone arriving early, I'm not so sure where we'll be in the mix of things.

That's a good point about the size. Also, let's say there's a total of 30,000 tix sold. At least 1/3 of that will be day passers or people who are staying off-site which means they won't be the ones in line early Thursday morning.

Hey, guys, About an hour and 15 minutes from where I live is the AllGood Festival. It's about the same amount of people (around 30,000), but as long as I've been going we've always been able to pull right in with absolutely no waiting in line. I feel like this shouldn't be any different, unless the crew makes grievous errors in directing people to camping then there shouldn't be any problem with getting in. One thing that I think is strange though is that the car camping is on the opposite side of the venue from the entrance which seems a little poorly planned.