Onslow

[davidnclare]

Originally Posted by General C.R Dewet

I agree with Hedd, the real reason is that the rally site is located on the main trunk road to Mid Wales and most of the population of the West Midlands are having one last trip to the sea side before winter. Little anyone can do regarding the amount of traffic on that road, with the possible exception of holding the rally on an available weekend in the middle of December!

You can get a week in Spain cheaper than a weekend in Barmouth.

[ethel]

We travel from Preston to Onslow with our Burrell tractor on its transporter and 6 berth caravan hooked behind. This rally is a good enjoyable weekend for us and now we know the run of things we hang on with loading and leaving site till later, this year we left in pouring rain about 8 pm. The bug bear for me is getting my caravan and engine from the engine line down to the wagon, and we have realised now that you might as well just wait till about 6 pm before starting this manourve, so we take tea in the caravan, pack up, and wait till the weight of traffic has gone.

Onslow is no different to any other annual event and surlely if it wants to survive it must change a little each year and also introduce specials such as the Tanner display. Obviously not every change will suit everybody, however judging by the weekends attendance and above reported problems which in the main are all due to its popularity it looks to me like the committee has got the formula about right.

Every rally has its problems and there other rallies we attend where traffic queues form at the end of the event when everyone wants to leave at the same time, however this problem isn't unique to steam rallies , go to a big pop concert, sporting event or agricultural show and you will expect to be in traffic.

What I want to say in summary is that it is very easy to critisise the organising of the event but I wonder how many people offering criticism would be prepared to give their time to help improve things. Therefore I would like to offer a big THANKYOU to Edward and the committee for all their hard work in putting on this event for us to attend and long may it flourish.

[rustexpert]

I have found with more than one trip to get away from Onslow; I couldn't really do it all on the Monday evening. The best thing to do is sit tight and watch the chaos as everything else trickles out, assist as necessary with the breakdown of the show or towing by which time the light is fading; stay over until the Tuesday morning when traffic is minimal and I find the morning rush hour/business traffic in proper daylight is less problematic than doing battle with the holiday returners in fading light.
The problems this year were that it continued persisting down all night which didn't improve field conditions at all and the toilet providers were a bit keen taking all of them from the working field camping very early on the Monday evening; which the better half wasn't too happy about.

[Mine Explorer]

Originally Posted by rustexpert

I have found with more than one trip to get away from Onslow; I couldn't really do it all on the Monday evening. The best thing to do is sit tight and watch the chaos as everything else trickles out....

....stay over until the Tuesday morning when traffic is minimal and I find the morning rush hour/business traffic in proper daylight is less problematic than doing battle with the holiday returners in fading light....

....and the toilet providers were a bit keen taking all of them from the working field camping very early on the Monday evening; which the better half wasn't too happy about.

Yeah, they start herding together the thunder-boxes on a Monday night - but if you're prepared to walk, the proper flushing site loos are still functional for a while on the Tuesday morning.

Dispose of any rubbish on Monday night, because bins and skips dissappear sharpish, and the water main gets turned off at some point Tuesday morning so standpipes and the site loos can be dismantled (which can be a pain if you're busy trying to fill an engine at the time!)

Oh, and don't plan on a lie-in on a Tuesday either - there are tractors, front loaders, bin lorries and steam engines moving around from very early o'clock!
...In the case of lowy loaders heading for 'Dorset they can start running up air tanks and hitting the road at exceedingly early o'clock in the small hours.

[rustexpert]

I haven't seen the thunder boxes rounded up on the Monday evening before; not that it is a massive problem, that's what the chamber pot is for - when the thunder boxes are unfit to use. Fair play at Onslow they keep them in really a good state.
It is usually quiet on the Tuesday morning; tractors, lorries etc. I find don't disturb me. When the show is on usually somebody is cranking up the briefcase genny or revving motorbikes at 6.30 a.m. arrrrgggghhh!

[International Steam]

Originally Posted by davidnclare

Ian 'an hour or so' It is more like three hours.

The family next to me outside the beer tent had taken two and a half hours to get in, presumably that was a common experience for those arriving at the same time as them. They obviously thought it worth the wait, others may not have been so happy. Certainly those with children who are the future of shows like this and the hobby in general.

As I said in one of the earlier posts, online ticket = instant admission once you are actually parked up on site. I don't know how the event is advertised, I live in Gloucestershire and heard about it by way of mouth originally but this should be plugged. I repeat, THE WEBSITE IS PATHETIC, I can't even find the rally opening and closing times on it, I found 09.30 on a general visitor attraction site using Google. It looks to me as if all that has been done to it this year apart from adding the online ticketing is change the dates. No mention of special attractions like the Tanner Reunion.

I assume lack of volunteers is the reason why more ticket selling points are not added.

Is it the same reason why the event is not run over three days like Welland and South Cerney who got good crowds on a Friday this year? Or is the Bank Holiday Saturday traffic even worse?

[Mine Explorer]

Originally Posted by International Steam

The family next to me outside the beer tent had taken two and a half hours to get in, presumably that was a common experience for those arriving at the same time as them.

I'm afraid I couldn't comment on the delays for visitors to get on site, but from what I've heard nothing would surprise me. The queues have been horrendous for years, but I'm afraid reports of queues of over 3 hours for exhibitors to leave the site on the Monday night are just plain rubbish - I do have experience of that. The rally doesn't finish until 5pm, so clearly no exhibitors would dream of trying to leave before then, and the queues had all vanished before 8pm - I drove out myself at 7:30pm with nothing in front of me at all.

THE WEBSITE IS PATHETIC, I can't even find the rally opening and closing times on it, I found 09.30 on a general visitor attraction site using Google. It looks to me as if all that has been done to it this year apart from adding the online ticketing is change the dates. No mention of special attractions like the Tanner Reunion.

I'm slightly surprised by this comment, the website was totally redone at the end of July and although I accept the point that the Tanner Reunion wasn't mentioned (at the point I was involved in giving feedback on it I wasn't aware of the reunion myself - a bit of a vicious circle that one I suppose! lol). However, rally opening times were readily available on there.

The front home page only gives the rally dates, the gate opening time is shown on both the "About the rally" page and "The Society" pages (in the column on the right hand side). I can't remember if it was also shown on the "Buy Tickets" page as that has now expired and doesn't bring up anything.

Here it is on the right hand side: "Gates Open - 9.15am":




The website even has a copy of the arena timetable to view as well, so visitors can plan when they want to arrive/depart based on arena activities:



The "Where's the rally" page gives a text description of how to get to it, a SatNav postcode location for it, and the obligitory Google Maps map pin view as well.




When I go looking for an event website the only points I'm interested in are

• What date is it?
• Where is the showground located?
• What time does the gate open?
• How much is admission?

All of those key points of information can be found on the Onslow website, if not on the front page then just one click away, and when the site only has 5 pages none of which are nested, it shouldn't take many seconds to tour the whole thing.

Unfortunately there are some events who fail to say when the gate opens or how much the admission is, then have seemingly thousands of pages to wade through before you can say for certain that this key information ain't there!

I assume lack of volunteers is the reason why more ticket selling points are not added.

Is it the same reason why the event is not run over three days like Welland and South Cerney who got good crowds on a Friday this year? Or is the Bank Holiday Saturday traffic even worse?

Personally I have no idea about those details, but I can't see it being a particularly popular suggestion to make the Saturday a rally day as well. The current situation allows exhibitors chance to arrive on site and set up without necessarily needing to book annual holiday entitlement from work, or rush around on the Friday night - especially important if they're coming some distance. The traffic situation into Mid-Wales isn't good all weekend, so adding an extra day wouldn't avoid that. The queues on the A458 further along at Newtown were already backing up a couple of miles at lunch time on Bank Holiday Friday.

[Mine Explorer]

Originally Posted by rustexpert

I haven't seen the thunder boxes rounded up on the Monday evening before; not that it is a massive problem, that's what the chamber pot is for - when the thunder boxes are unfit to use. Fair play at Onslow they keep them in really a good state...

The toilet quality is pretty good IMHO, and for those prepared to walk, there are proper flushing toilet blocks located near the beer tent. Although I didn't spot them this year, there is usually a shower facility in that area as well.

They were just going round emptying the elsan disposal points in the campsite areas when I left the site shortly before 6pm on Tuesday, by then there weren't any caravans/tents left in the camping areas, so there are still facilities for emptying 'the bucket' until late on to save taking it home.

[Wallisboy]

There was a shower facility our lot were using them

[International Steam]

I'm slightly surprised by this comment, the website was totally redone at the end of July and although I accept the point that the Tanner Reunion wasn't mentioned (at the point I was involved in giving feedback on it I wasn't aware of the reunion myself - a bit of a vicious circle that one I suppose! lol). However, rally opening times were readily available on there.

The front home page only gives the rally dates, the gate opening time is shown on both the "About the rally" page and "The Society" pages (in the column on the right hand side). I can't remember if it was also shown on the "Buy Tickets" page as that has now expired and doesn't bring up anything.

Here it is on the right hand side: "Gates Open - 9.15am":



Apologies for this, a classic case of not seeing what is in front of me. Either that or I assumed that where there was a 'drop down' menu which appeared when the mouse hovered over the top item, clicking the top would not produce a new page.

And as I said before, including a note about the exit arrangements would have been a very good idea. Last year we went on both days, on the second day we did a huge circuit of the back (south) of the car park away from the main road and coming along the west fence to get into the Welshpool Lane. That worked well. We saw the writing on the wall this year and made sure we left just after 14.30 because it's a long drive to and fro as we live in deepest Gloucestershire.