On a Friday afternoon -- and the one before Thanksgiving, at that -- Washington is a quiet place. The few people on the streets are the ones heading home. Everyone else is avoiding the cold. Federal security officials stand on the corners, as usual, pacing back and forth while their earpieces remain silent. Despite all that's rocked America over the past few months, downtown Washington, at least today, is almost like a ghost town.
But behind closed doors, Secret Service and DC police have been scurrying all week in preparation for the biggest weekend Washington has even seen, which is just eight weeks away. First the number tossed around was half a million, twice as much as the city usually accommodates during the huge July 4 celebration on the National Mall. Then it ballooned to a potential one million. Then, virtually overnight, speculators adjusted the number: four million people, the Washington Post reported this week, would descend on Washington, demanding -- not asking -- to see a piece of history. (The Secret Service won't reveal how many people it is planning for, but says numbers have been part of internal discussions).
Secret Service met early this week with security representatives on Pennsylvania Avenue, the 15-block route on which the new president will travel in the parade following his swearing-in. They said that the numbers are still unknown, but there will be expecting more people than they've ever dealt with before. The usual plans for inaugurations include shutting down several blocks around the capitol, the mall and Pennsylvania Avenue. This year, that won't cut it.
What they haven't prepared for, it seems, are the emotions of people. Inaugurations are usually happy occasions, and the euphoria following Obama's election has certainly led many more people than historically average to want to witness his swearing in and the festivities throughout the weekend. But the mall can only hold several hundred thousand spectators. The parade route can only take, at the very most, a quarter of a million. If even half of the 4 million people projected show up in Washington, intent on seeing a piece of history, the majority could be denied. And if they're stuck -- in the bitter cold -- behind security gates blocks away with thousands of people pushing behind them, the scene could easily escalate as disappointment could give way to anger.
The secret service, working with DC police, says that it will have things covered. "We've dealt with inaugurations before," a Secret Service spokesperson tells NEWSWEEK. "We're still in the planning stages on this one, but yes, we can handle what's coming."
