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City preps for Dean squeeze
BY RACHEL KIPP
Among the complicated logistics of staging the three-day James Dean Fest at the Marion Municipal Airport is coordinating traffic from thousands going in and out of the venue from June 3 to 5.
"We're having this big open space that needs to be safe for everybody," John Goldstone, executive producer and CEO of the event, said.
In addition to screenings of the Marion-born and Fairmount actor's three movies and a new documentary, the James Dean Fest will also include car shows and art exhibits. Main Street Marion is putting on a three-day event downtown, the Community School of the Arts is staging an original show honoring Dean and Gas City is holding a carnival during the same weekend.
There will be a circular tour during the three days that will take visitors to all the James Dean sites in Marion and Fairmount, Goldstone said. A shuttle bus will also run between the airport and downtown events.
A team from the Marion Police Department is working with festival organizers, the Grant County Emergency Management Agency and the sheriff's office to plan for the event, Deputy Chief Dan Day said. They also will soon be contacting law enforcement from other county agencies for help.
"We're going to be doing traffic control and security," Day said. "They will have event security there, which is a private company, to take care of some of the lesser issues, including parking and ticketing and that kind of thing. We will be more for upper level type of security."
Police will patrol the airport on foot, golf carts, four-wheelers and bicycles, Day said. No road closures are expected, but traffic may be stopped as police control departures from the airport at the end of each night.
Organizers have asked the Federal Aviation Administration for permission to close the Marion airport during the event. The James Dean Fest will pay the airport a fee intended to compensate for losses, Goldstone said.
Those losses could be substantial because airport employees will not be selling any fuel or performing flight training or maintenance during the festival, airport manager Andy Darlington said.
"We're doing our best to keep our pilots updated but there is really not a whole lot of information to give them at this point," he said. "Nothing is set in stone about how things are going to work. We told them the days we're going to be closed, but how much access they're going to have to their planes and hangers during that week, we just don't have a lot of news for them right now."
Darlington has been calling airports in Anderson, Muncie, Kokomo, Indianapolis and Fort Wayne to inform managers there about the expected closure. Airport employees will get paid vacation during the event, although Darlington expects to be on hand.
That weekend also coincides with high school graduation activity at Marion and Mississinewa High Schools. Officials from both schools said they have informed students and families that the James Dean Fest will be in progress.
"We'll send out a letter to the seniors the first week of April where we talk about all the events and we're going to mention that in there," Mississinewa High School Principal Lezlie Winter said. "They haven't announced exactly what they're doing for James Dean yet so we don't want to overreact until we know for sure what's going on."
Originally published 04-08-2005
Source: Chronicle-Tribune
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