Philadelphia will test a new traffic plan after Black Friday’s Bears-Eagles game

In news that should concern anyone who has ever tried to escape the South Philly Sports Complex without aging 7-10 years in the process, the city of Philadelphia announced it will be testing a new traffic pattern after Friday’s Eagles–Bears game.

Sounds great but if you think that means you’ll get home faster, you probably drank too much on Thanksgiving.

According to the city, this brand-new strategy is supposed to create a quicker route for fans trying to get onto the Walt Whitman Bridge and I-76 East. The secret weapon is a modified flow along Darien Street from Pattison Avenue.

New Traffic Pattern Following Bears-Eagles Game on Black Friday

The city also said the Walt Whitman on-ramp will not be accessible from Packer Avenue at 10th Street. Pretty wild that the exact place everyone normally goes after Eagles games is now illegal, right?

Drivers are urged to follow directions from police officers, which is great, because nothing calms an angry Eagles crowd trapped in a parking lot after an Eagles game like a vague hand wave from someone trying to direct 40,000 people through a bottleneck designed for 300 vehicles.

If you’re parked in lots Q, R, V, W, or X, which is basically the Hunger Games region of the Linc, you won’t be able to use Packer eastbound at 10th. Instead, your remaining options are Broad Street, Darien Street, or Front Street, otherwise known as:

• the road everyone is already trying to use
• the road nobody has ever heard of
• the road where you will actually spend the next 45 minutes staring at brake lights

The city calls this an “exercise to improve lot exit time” and look, I’m always down to do anything new but maybe I would have tested this at literally any other time than after an Eagles game on Black Friday.

Either way, it’s almost like the city is admitting they have no idea if it will work and are just praying that this will work. In the release, they even said that “your patience and feedback are appreciated” which is a fun sentence to aim at Eagles fans after a freezing Black Friday game that has serious implications on seeding in the NFC playoffs.

If you’re heading to The Linc Friday, good luck and Happy Thanksgiving.

Cheers.

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