Um, help?

With only Incubus putting out any album of note yesterday, there was no need for a Tuesday's releases blog. And since Incubus is, you know, a bad band and all, no need to rip them more than I do in Friday's Weekend.

But you know what there is a need to rip? The Arena at Harbor Yard. Let's not even talk about The Who show last night. I'm sure all that attended had a great time. But, I would venture to say that 50 percent of people missed The Pretenders totally or partially. You know why?

Because this venue is the absolute worst to attend for a crowded show. I've been to a ton of places, nothing even comes close.

The Arena at Harbor Yard is really a beautiful venue, a smaller arena with good sound, comfortable seats and very good sightlines. Unfortunately, the city of Bridgeport isn't ready to handle a venue of its size. When you get off I-95, you're greeted with ridiculous amounts of traffic. It took me 90 minutes yesterday to drive less than a half-mile. Re-read that sentence, please. Ninety minutes.

The traffic to get to a parking spot is excruciating. And last night, the city ran out of parking for the venue, forcing folks like me, who got off I-95 15 minutes before the show began, to find a spot somewhere in the city. One police officer was waving cars on ... to nowhere. That's right. After a garage closed, he just kept waving folks on ... right back onto 95.

And I want to talk about the cops. Look, I've got nothing against them; more than 50 percent of my family are police officers. But, I have no idea what they think they're doing whenever I go to the Arena. At least seven of them line the half-mile horseshoe that cars have to travel to get to the venue. They wave on cars, yet travelers also have to abide by the lights. So what's the point? It makes things so much worse.

The city chooses to close the street that would send cars right to the venue, more than likely for traffic purposes. But another real problem is that last night at least five folks were selling bootleg T-shirts in the middle of the streets, creating even more of a traffic jam. Cops were literally five feet away. What did they do? Nada. And I'm also not sure what the two on horses and one a Segway (really, a Segway, like Gob!) were doing, either.

All in all, my point is that if you're going to erect a complex the size of the nice one they got in Bridgeport, you must have the infrastructure to handle it. I'm sure the venue's great when it's only 2,500 people seeing a Sound Tigers game, but when more folks come, it's plain ridiculous.

Maybe I should have left my apartment at 5 p.m. to drive the 20 minutes to Bridgeport.