Bruce Springsteen Brisbane show: Car park nightmares ruin event for fans

BRUCE Springsteen’s much-hyped and hugely popular Brisbane show had only just come to an end when the headaches for fans began.

Bruce Springsteen played the first of two shows at the concert at the Brisbane Entertainment Centre on Tuesday night. Picture: Marc Robertson

BRUCE, you stole my heart last night. BEC, you stole my sanity.

Having made the ultimately fatal error of driving to see the Boss I and my three passengers settled in to our (admittedly cheap) seats to enjoy a truly incredible concert.

Springsteen was faultless; energetic, charismatic, intoxicating - exactly what I was hoping for.

Elated by his performance we left our seats - but didn’t get very far before we came crashing down to earth.

Positioned at the rear of the arena, we expected a delay heading for the door. We didn’t expect a 15-minute standstill before an excruciatingly slow shuffle toward fresh air.

And the comedown continued.

Upon reaching the car, it was clear we were in for another wait.

There were cars everywhere (none moving) and traffic directors nowhere, it was carnage.

After about 15 minutes, one kindly driver let us cut into the line of traffic where we sat for a further 15.

A clearly confused and distressed traffic controller eventually told us to turn around, that we would have an easier exit that way. Not so. He was back, frazzled, in under five minutes after directing dozens of cars to about-turn.

“They changed their mind”, he said. “You have to turn back around and go out the other way.”

Further carnage ensued as hundreds of cars attempted to turn around, again.

One man in front of us looked dangerously close to a full blown meltdown - gesticulating wildly and hopping in and out of the car to see if he could find a way out. His performance was actually quite entertaining for us but I’m sure it was not so for those, like a colleague of mine, who had two small children in tow.

An hour and a half after leaving our seats we were finally inching towards freedom.

Once we reached the entrance to the entertainment centre we tasted sweet relief and sailed home - traffic outside was flowing freely - but couldn’t help noting the sour ending to the night.

It was a really bad look for Brisbane. Our pals who flew from Cairns for the event said they wouldn't be doing it again and I have to say, we probably won’t either unless BEC can make a drastic change to its clearly mismanaged parking system (for which they relieve each driver of $15 cash).

Bruce, you rocked. BEC, you tanked.