Athens police, Ohio University students and alumni will all be out for the Homecoming Parade Saturday.
The parade will feature about 60 groups, including floats, banners and the Marching 110 and Alumni Band, parade advisor Lindsey Marx said. About half the groups are students, and the remainder are Athens residents, she added.
With about 20 more group participating this year, Marx said she is glad with the turn out and expects the parade to be a success.
“The parade really is the culmination of the week,” she said. “It’s an opportunity for students to get involved and invested in the OU experience.”
The Athens Police Department will have six officers on duty in addition to the usual patrol officers for the parade, Athens Police Chief Tom Pyle said.
They will divert traffic and handle any problems with the crowd, Pyle said. Crowd control has been a problem in the past when attendees have become inebriated before the parade and been arrested, he added.
“You typically see drunken and disorderly charges at night,” Pyle said. “But we’ve arrested people at the parade at 8 in the morning.”
The department typically waives three of the additional officers for the event because it is a long-standing tradition, Pyle said, adding that OU will be charged about $360 for the remaining three officers.
The parade will start at 10 a.m., beginning at Carpenter and East State streets. The floats and marchers will head east and turn left onto Court Street. They will move against normal traffic flow until they reach Baker University Center, turn left down Park Place, right onto University Terrace, and finish at the parking lots at the bottom of the hill.
The floats and banners will be judged for design, originality and incorporation of the “Beyond the Bricks” theme. The winning float will receive $500, and the winning banner will receive $250.
The competition motivates groups to spend time on and to get creative with their floats and banners, Marx said, adding that it allows groups to represent themselves and what they value.
The last time the route of the parade changed was when the new Baker Center opened in 2007, said Chad Barnhardt, who coordinated the parade from 2004 until 2008.
Until then, the parade route travelled up Court, turned left onto West Union Street and right onto University Terrace, he said.
The parade typically sees about 5,000 attendees, Barnhardt said.
Alumni should be a large portion of those in attendance, said Cristie Gryszka, director of reunions, special programs and alumni relations.
Alumni meet other alumni at the parade and enjoy talking with them while they reminisce about the groups they were a part of as students, Gryszka said.
“For alumni, it’s one of the staples of the weekend — football, tailgating and the parade,” she said.
rc348710@ohiou.edu
