A rock music fan says he was stuck in a three-and-a-half-hour traffic jam on his way to Download Festival. The disgruntled man, who travelled to Donington Park from Leeds, said he faced long delays near the A453, just off the M1, by the Moto services yesterday (Wednesday, June 7).
The campsites and campervan field for the annual rock festival opened at 12pm on Wednesday with the entertainment starting today (Thursday, June 8) and running until Sunday night (June 11). The festival is sold out with 100,000 people expected to attend the mammoth four-day event to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Download.
With so many rockers heading to the venue close to the Derbyshire border, motorists faced big delays on the M1, A50 and A42 yesterday, with some buses running up to three hours late. Speaking to Yorkshire Live, the man, who asked not to be named, said: “I’m sitting in standstill traffic near Download Festival.
“The jam started at 10.50am on the M1 at J24 [for Kegworth] and I’ve managed to do 1.1 miles in three-and-a-half hours and I’m still not at the festival site. It’s chaos.
“There are people driving the wrong way up roundabouts and people wandering along the dual carriageway, peeing openly. It’s like they haven’t planned for anyone coming by car at all.
“I’ve been doing Download for 10 years and it’s by far the worst I’ve seen it. They’ve put an extra day of music on this year but kept the five-day entry day the same as before so all 100,000 people are turning up at once.”
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