Push practice was scheduled to start this week, but just as teams were charging up their flashlight batteries and telling their new drivers that it’s “actually kind of fun,” Sweepstakes had to put a hold on things.

Apparently, the city has decided to take a closer look at the late night road-closing permits this year and they’re not sure they like what they see.  The issue is that the road closure is informal during push practice and cars are allowed to come and go as needed – relying on students to keep everything safe and orderly.  This has obviously been the system for years and years without any problems, but tradition is apparently not always persuasive if you are in the business of road closure permit issuing.  This long-standing compromise of semi-closed roads isn’t ideal for teams or for the poor grad students leaving campus after midnight, but it’s a very functional compromise.  We can’t do without push practice, and I doubt everyone else would be happy with fully closed roads 5 nights a week.  Sweepstakes is working hard with the school, CMU & Pittsburgh police, and the city to get everyone comfortable with a plan.  I really hope that all parties can find a non-bureaucratic solution that doesn’t require additional expenses for sweepstakes and logistical headaches for teams.

Sweepstakes chair Chris Shellhamer notified teams today that push practice would hopefully begin after spring break (11 days from now), but that that would be the soonest it is likely to be sorted out.  We’ll keep you updated here.

11 thoughts on “Push practice delayed indefinitely pending city review”

  • Not ideal, but why not just move push practice to weekend mornings before free rolls. The roads are already closed for sweeping and you could get in an hour of practice for a hill.

  • Interesting comment, Anonymous, but I don’t think that’s any kind of solution. For starters, teams are normally out at push practice 5 days a week for an hour or two, so getting the same amount of practice in 2 days a week would mean starting 4 or 5 hours early. I don’t think pushers, mechanics, or especially drivers could survive doing buggy from 2-9am.

  • Sam’s right. Also, practicing once for a long time would be less helpful than practicing a many times for a shorter period of time. I for one would also prefer to avoid driving for hours, especially on no sleep, which is probably what would end up happening with that kind of schedule…
    I hope this all gets sorted out soon so we can start push practice. I’m glad Sweepstakes is working hard to get it going. Thanks!

  • It’s not so much the students/faculty with their cars that are ever really a problem, it’s the shuttles that come and often disrupt PP for 15-20 minutes at a time because often times they come staggered instead of all at once. The roads are barricaded (end of maggy mo and schenley at Hills 2 & 3) and cars are made to go around (which is easily done) so it is only cars that are leaving that cause any sort of “safety” concern and they are held up until a team let’s them out and let’s subsequent teams know that a car is coming. I have also never heard of anyone getting hurt because of a car hitting a pusher/mechanic/driver/anyone having anything to do with PP. The only problem is that some cars leave their lights on as they are pulling out which blinds the drivers. What amazes me is that CMU/Pitt cops still come up from the wean/porter parking lot and then are confused as to why it’s barricaded as if it hasn’t been that way for years. Why don’t they worry about the conditions of the roads themselves rather than this permit which has worked for years. If it ain’t broke don’t fix it.

  • I’m with most people here that the current push practice setup works pretty well.

    On one hand, there is occasionally some miscommunication between teams and a car is let on Hill 5 when a team is still rolling on 4. This is potentially a problem but so long as teams are aware of where their buggies are going the worst that happens is a pusher has to stop mid-hill and make sure the car is stopped.

    However, I will point out that there were a number of times in the past couple of years when cars did get on the roads at the same time as buggies-the time that the guy who was drunk/high went through the Maggy Mo barricade, under the parking lot gate and onto the Cut/Mall comes to mind-that having the roads “officially” closed wouldn’t solve. I’ve had cars that decided that the barricades didn’t apply to them and tried to go around and kept trying even when barricaders got in front of the car.

    Basically, what I’m saying, is that anytime you’re sharing space with cars there is some risk but it’s not something that a more official road closure will necessarily solve.

  • Andrew Carnegie says:

    A large donation from the school to the PGH Police Benevolent Fund would probably fix the problem …..

  • The news is official! Push practice is back on! The permits should be arriving “early next week”

  • Anon Coward says:

    Aw, that’s too bad. You all nearly got to sleep well enough to exercise responsibly on your own time and practice transitions at rolls—now you’re stuck doing push practice again!

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