The Roanoke Tea Party has reserved a number of buses, both for an overnight stay and for a up-and-back day trip.

The day trip is scheduled to depart Roanoke at 5:00 a.m. on Saturday 9/12, returning here by approximately 8:00 p.m. The cost for that trip is only $30. At this point, there are only 58 seats left for the day trip.

The overnight trip will leave for DC at 10:00 a.m. on Friday 9/11, returning home on the evening of 9/12. The cost for that trip is $150, which includes the bus fare, hotel room and subway into the city for the March. The cost will be lower if you will be traveling with a partner with whom you can share a room. There are only 34 seats left for the overnight stay.

You can see all the details on these two bus trip options here. If you would like to reserve a spot on one of these trips, please contact us right away!

All the information about the 09.12.09 March on Washington is available online.

The goal of this March is to “take the Tea Party Movement to Capital Hill.” As their web site states:

Our message is that governments at all levels have been spending way too much money. The federal government is especially guilty of this, as they pile up the debt, deficits and unfunded liabilities. They are taxing, borrowing or printing money with no end in sight. This madness has to stop, and that is why we are demanding that they stop the wasteful spending and stop burdening taxpayers with more debt.

This protest is about defending our liberty, and about restoring our Constitution by reducing the size and scope of the federal government.

We created this flyer with all the details about the two bus trip options. If you know of a place where it might be appropriate to post a flyer – or someone who might be interested in this information – please download the flyer, print a few copies, and distribute them as may seem proper.

Download the Roanoke Tea Party 9/12 bus trip flyer

We also have a flyer that briefly outlines what The Roanoke Tea Party is all about. Again, if you can think of anyone who might be interested in joining our group, or perhaps a bulletin board where it could be posted, we invite you to download the flyer, and print as many copies as you need.

Download the Roanoke Tea Party informational flyer

Thanks for your help!

The 09.12.09 March On Washington is a grassroots, non-partisan event designed to give average citizens and taxpayers an opportunity to express their disgust with out-of-control spending by our federal government. We believe that both of the political parties who control our Congress are to blame, and we need as many people marching with us as possible to show the people in the government who really runs this country.

We have a bus leaving on Friday afternoon for an overnight stay, and two leaving early Saturday morning for an up-and-back trip. We have kept the costs low to allow as many Roanoke Valley residents as want to go to travel with us.

The one day trip is only $30, and the overnight stay $150, which includes a hotel room for Friday night. If you will be traveling with a companion with whom you can share a room, the cost will be lower for each of you. We will all meet at the march and walk together, so there is no need to be concerned about being left behind.

We still have room for a few more day trippers, and really need some more for the overnight stay. Won’t you march with us – and bring a friend?

If you have already signed up for one of the bus trips, please carefully check the details here, where meeting times and parking instructions are listed.

We still have room for additional travelers on our overnight trip, leaving Friday afternoon and returning Saturday evening. Our block of rooms at Hilton Hotel in Springfield has expired, but you can contact them and see if they will still honor the rate they had offered our group ($99). If you can book a room, the bus trip alone will cost $40.

Please contact Michael Mixon (540-793-3277 michaelmixon1@cox.net) to reserve a space on the round trip bus.

If you would like to caravan up with the buses on Saturday, you can meet the group at Tanglewood Mall Saturday morning at 5:00 a.m. and follow them to DC.

Here’s a YouTube video that shows time lapse images of the march from a traffic camera in downtown Washington.

Hats off to all of you!

Erik also put together a live action video he shot on Saturday, seeking to answer the big question “How many people were at the march?”

View of the 9/12 March on Washington crowd from the top of the Capitol Building

Here is an image taken last Saturday (9/12) from the Capitol Building in Washington that puts the lie to absurdly low turnout estimates.

Does that look like 50,000-70,000 people to you?

If you hear anything from our opponents about an “official estimate,” that is a false claim. That number came from the DC Fire Department, who has no official status of any kind regarding estimates like this.

DC Metro rail ridership for that day tallied 437,624 riders, almost 250,000 above average. Bus fares were also up by about 100,000.

The people who were there know the truth.

Here is an interesting observation that comes from Kenneth Happel, via the Heritage Foundation web site.

I was the medical coordinator for the event. I believe that there were at least a million people there and a million and a half would be my best bet.

I don’t know where the “official estimate” quoted as 60,000 comes from. The event permit, and Chief Lyles fire department resource allocation, was based upon 50,000 (because we couldn’t prove more beforehand)and that number of people was supposed to be contained in the central section of the west lawn between the sidewalks extending from the freedom and grant statues.

I counted the crowd entering Penn. Ave. to determine how many first aid team people were needed and where. I made my count at Freedom Plaza after the police radio had indicated that the front of the march had reached Capital Circle. I used the following method. We counted the number of people stretching across Penn. Ave. from curb to curb for a distance down the street of ten feet. That number was divided in half (assuming that there were variations in how tightly people were packed)and multiplied by the number of ten foot intervals from Freedom Park to Capitol Circle. At 8:00 the count was 200,000. I inserted a medical team at that point and when it reached Capitol Circle the whole avenue had filled again and I inserted my team. So at about 9:30 the total attendance from the march was, conservatively, about 400,000. The avenue continued to pumo in people fopr another two hours. So I estimate about 600,000 came through that route.

There was also a very large stream that filled the whole street from the train station to Capitol circle and people that came on the underground said that it was simply packed with people coming out at the protest site (both these flows were not part of the march).

The National Park Service published its estimating method in USA Today, when they provided an estimate for President Obama’s inaguration. That method estimates by filled area.

The west lawn (all three sections were filled solid with little space between people)the shoulders around the building and the area directly around the reflecting pool is 240,000 by the NPS estimating method. The mall from the reflecting pool to the cross street before the Washington Monument is 940,000 according to the NPS. The first section of the mall nearest the Washingon Monument was reserved for the NAACP’s Family event. Our folks, at the height of the event, stretched from the cross street before the NAACP event all the way to the relfecting pool and were packed. I would guess that its 4/5 of the 940,000 or 750,000 people together that’s a million. Then there was the area from first street to third street (third street goes to the train station). First street was so crowded the police had to clear it. The crowd also filled most of the area around and between the museums on each side, with the greatest density in the half of the mall nearest the reflecting pool. You could easily add another half million with these two areas.

That’s how I came to an estimate of one to one and a half million.

Under no possible stretch of the imagination or should I say contraction of the imagination were there only 60,000.

Here’s a report on last week’s 09.12.09 March On Washington, from Roanoke Tea Party member Sherry Hearn, along with some more photos from the march taken by Tom Mealy.

Photo from the 09.12.09 March on Washington

September 13, 2009 –  Washington was great!!!  There were wall-to-wall people.  The mainstream media will play it down as usual.  ABC did not even put it on my email headlines this morning. We did not get as much attention from them as “Elton John Wants to Adopt Ukrainian Child”. (N0 comment necessary) or “Saudi Minister Undergoes Surgery in US”.  Why did he not get surgery in his own country??  Could our system be better than his??

We chose to drive to DC to accommodate our grandchildren. There were so many people they had to close down the streets into the city. The Metro was jammed, and we were fortunate to get out because we left early before the rally was over because we had children with us. There were people there from all over the US.  When looking from the base of the Capitol steps down the Mall, there was nothing but people.  We could not even get close enough to see the stage area. It was very encouraging to see so many and to feel the support that was obvious from everyone.  We had to stand in line for about an hour just to buy tickets for the Metro. Locals on the train said they had never seen this happen before.

The press did carry the story about 10,000 at a rally in California.  That was nothing compared to the crowd in DC. There must have been 300 on each of the Metro cars. There were 6-7 cars per train that ran constantly all day long.  One train we figured carried 2,000 every time it left the station. That happened about every 15 minutes. At this rate, it did not take long to get to 100,000 people coming in from five different directions. This continued all day. In addition, there were 450 busses parked in the bus lot in Fairfax, one of only many at the end of each line.  Many charter busses took their passengers straight into the city.

We were packed like sardines on the train, and we did not even get to train station until 11:30.  People started arriving on the mall at 7:00 AM and were still arriving when we left the mall area at 3:00. However, the closeness was OK as we had opportunity to talk to those around us who were just as frustrated at this government as we are.  We even sang songs as we rode Metro into town. There were citizens from every state, many having flown in for the rally.

Standing at the foot of the Capital, we could see just throngs of people from the steps all the way to Washington Monument and side-to-side from the Smithsonian to the Botanical Gardens- just wall-to-wall people. The news reports locally said that Homeland Security was taken off-guard at the vast number of people. Streets were blocked into the city, and there were many delayed schedules on the Metro. There were very few police, but there were no incidents of unrest or rudeness.  These were just law-abiding citizens, very polite and friendly. They were especially nice to our babies, Joshua and Samuel, and helped us maneuver the stroller to get on and off the Metro as well as to make our way into the crowds. Their remarks were all similar, “Look at the babies.  That’s why we are here.” Maybe we should have “rioted”. That would have surely gotten the media’s attention.

There were TEA Parties all over the country yesterday.  So we were not alone in our protests. We took pictures of the creative signs displayed- all hand made.  My favorite was one that said “Welcome Back, Carter”. One man’s T-shirt said, “Since when did a Moral Wrong become a Civil Right?  It doesn’t- Read the Bible.”  Many were in support of Joe Wilson and felt he had provided the best response to last week’s speech.

The media can stifle reports of the event, pretend it did not happen, down play the numbers, but America will not stand for that very long.  We know the truth and our voices will be heard.  Just wait until election time.

Sherry Hearn