Mackinac Island (pronounced Mack-in-aw) is famous for being at the confluence of Lake Superior and Lake Michigan, its natural beauty and its motor vehicle ban. This restriction was lifted last week to allow Vice President Mike Pence to use an eight-vehicle motorcade to drive from the Island’s airport to the Grant Hotel to address Michigan’s republican party.
Many where offended, declaring that if the vice president needed that much security in order to attend a conference on the island then he shouldn’t have attended. None seem bothered with Pence surrendering his First Amendment rights in order to avoid the threat of assassination. Here
What? No Marine 2 available?
I used to live in Michigan, and have been to Mackinac Island. I imagine they were pissed at Pence. They take their lack of progress seriously there.
I’ve been there only 3 times and years ago, but it seems to me that there were, on back roadways, some service vehicles like pickup trucks. I’m almost positive I saw a truck or two. Like do they not have EMT’s on island who need to get somewhere on island fast? 8 miles circumference LOOK here’s the fire truck http://www.cityofmi.org/fire-department-22/
Remember all the media complaints about Obama’s vacation traffic jams?
crickets
No one pays any attention to leftest offense tirades. They have yelled wolf so many times the world has gone deaf. Remember when the word “Racist” used to mean something? No more.
Mackinac Island is located at the confluence of Lake Michigan and Lake Huron. There is no “confluence” between Lake Michigan and Lake Superior.
Boo fuckin’s hoo. What a bunch of pussies.
Haven’t been up there in years. For the record, The Detroit Free Press is Left-Wing junque. The Detroit News is Right-Wing. Even though the state went for Trump in ’16, it’s still home to TONS of Communist-Democrats. 2020, God Only knows.
Besides, it’s cold up der.
There was actually some msm moron talking about how this would definitely affect Trumps re-election. Right.
I can just see the voter next year saying well I was going to vote Trump but then Pence got an exception to drive on the island and I thought to hell with these SOBs, this is the last straw, I’m voting for the socialist that wants to destroy the economy, prevent me from eating meat. tank my 401k and take my guns away.
Was driving most of the day and was listening to WJR am. People from Michigan and Mackinaw Island itself have no beef at all with this. The Mayor of Mackinaw said it was no big deal. They do have ambulances and fire trucks there so its not like the island isn’t designed for traffic. They have construction trucks all over the island during the off season and vehicle ferries that service it. There’s also a airport. The vehicles were ferried over where they made there way to the airport to pick up Pence who flew in and then from there to the destination and back in reverse order. Didn’t even cause a hiccup on the island.
They had to have the motorcade for security reasons. They only used eight. Mackinaw has a police force but think Mayberry if you’re wondering what its like. State police were also there but it had to be a nightmare for secret service being a tourist spot and no telling who comes and goes.
All the comments about Mackinac Island’s vehicles are correct. I’ve been there several times and have a good friend who worked there every summer during college. They have all kids of vehicles, emergency, road maintenance, construction, etc.
They do have a year-round population. Wanna bet that they use a snow plow so emergency vehicles can get where they need to?
Claudia, they sure didn’t put the blacktop in with horses but they do try to keep the vehicle traffic to an absolute minimum during tourist season. In the winter after freeze over they take all the old xmas trees and use them to make a snowmobile highway to mainland by drilling holes in the ice and using the trees as markers. I remember seeing a film documentary on PBS not to long ago about wintering on the island. Might be searchable to anyone interested. Can’t remember the title of program though.
Liberals bitch because the air to clean to breathe!
This is eyeroll-worthy.
They wouldn’t have said a word if obama was in a car on the island.
Don’t make any excuses, don’t say your sorry to these people.
Just tell them to
GET FUCKED
So motor vehicles are banned (except those that aren’t) to preserve the “pristine beauty” of the island, and yet there is a friggin’ AIRPORT there! Hello! Are the airplanes horse-drawn too? Give me a break.
Never been to Mackinac Island. But I do clearly remember the first time I rode my motorcycle across the Mackinac Straits Bridge in early 1990s.
Riding north i made at least 3 rest stops along the way – where chatting with people about my destination, and intention to ride over the bridge each time I got responses that went something like this — “My gawd, you’re not going to ride that motorcycle across the bridge, are you? A car got blown off that bridge a couple of years ago. You better not do it.”
By the time I got there I was half afraid to do it. As luck would have it, it had just started to rain with gusty winds just before I got there. The outside lanes are cement, the middle lanes metal grating. Didn’t look to bad, I figured I’d ride across staying on the solid lane. Only to find a maintenance truck on that lane wasn’t moving. It was parked there, and I had to ride across on the giant cheese grater. It seemed the better choice to stay on the metal rather than risk the front tire get caught on the raised ridge between metal grating and cement lane. It’s a long way down to the water, best to not look down. Keep thinking “I can do this” if you think you’ll crash, you probably will. Rode all the way across the UP in a pouring rain the rest of the day heading to Oshkosh. I’ve ridden across two more times since then. The last time north to south, sunny day but quite cool, in July. And my electric vest had stopped working.
Anyway, it was a friend who worked for Dornier Medical who told me about the island and the bridge after going there with his wife that inspired me to ride through the area to see the bridge.
Oh, and it was true, a couple of years earlier a driver in a Yugo was blown off the bridge during high winds in winter. When cars are to cross driving slowly on the leeward side of a semi truck used to block the wind. The Yugo driver got impatient and sped ahead, and got to make the long dive to the water. He or she probably had just enough time to admit they ought to have followed the rules.
Looking at a satellite view of Mackinac Island on Google Maps.
There seems to be an awful lot of roads… and driveways… and cars… on an island that doesn’t allow motor vehicles.