FAYETTEVILLE — Bikes, Blues and BBQ organizers expect the rumble and roar of up to a quartermillion motorcycle enthusiasts to invade the Fayetteville and Springdale area for the four-day festival that begins today.
“Regionally - and understand there are people who come to the rally and never set foot in Fayetteville - regionally, we expect between 400,000 and 450,000,” said Joe Giles, executive director of the nonprofit annual Bikes, Blues and BBQ.
There are some bikers who come to the state’s northwest corner during the annual event simply toride the scenic highways and backroads, such as those in and around Eureka Springs, he said.
Others head to the Fort Smith area, Giles added.
The first Bikes, Blues and BBQ rally began on Dickson Street in Fayetteville in 2000, when it attracted more than 300 riders. As its name suggests, the festival features motorcycle riding - highlighted by a “Parade of Power” through Fayetteville - live music, and a barbecue competition.
Eventually the festival grew to the point that its popularity couldn’t be gauged by a head count, Giles said. The newer metrics forcounting include hotel-motel occupancy, merchandise sales and trash collection.
“We frankly grow by about 10 percent every single year, and we expect to grow by 10 percent this year,” he said.
That’s how organizers came up with a projection of 200,000-250,000 for the rally’s core events for this year.
This marks the first year that a separate bike rally for women - Bikes, Babes and Bling - will be merged into Bikes, Blues and BBQ. The women’s rally, first held in 2010 on Dickson Street in Fayetteville, attracted an estimated 5,000 people.
In its second year, Bikes, Babes and Bling was moved to the Washington County Fairgrounds so it wouldn’t conflict with an annual wine festival that was previously scheduled for the Dickson Street area.
“We wanted to consolidate our labor efforts,” Giles said. “Putting on one rally is an enormous undertaking, and putting on two just stretched us thin.”
Over the years, the venues for Bikes, Blues and BBQ grew beyond Dickson Street. By September 2006, rallygoers gained more territory to roam with the addition of a second live music stage, vendor displays and an indoor beer garden at the Randal Tyson Track Center on the nearby University of Arkansas campus, according to Arkansas Democrat-Gazette archives.
That was just the beginning of the expansion.
This year, the venues include the core Dickson Street happenings, the Fayetteville campus’s Baum Stadium, Washington County Fairgrounds and an arena-cross motorcycle race at Parsons Stadium in Springdale. The 2012 event also will include a car show at the Northwest Arkansas Mall in Fayetteville.
As of Tuesday, weather forecasters were predicting chances for showers and thunderstorms throughout the four-day rally, with the highest chances being 30 percent Thursday, and 40 percent Thursday night and through the day Friday.
“If we get a large rain, it will affect our beer sales,” Giles said, noting this year the beer garden is an open one, located in the Walton Arts Center parking lot. “People won’t stand out in the rain to drink beer.”
Beer sales is one of the rally’s three main revenue sources, he said, with the others being vendor sales and sponsorships. So substantial rain could threaten roughly one-third of the rally’s income, he said.
In years when the event’s revenue has exceeded expenses, it has been able todonate some of its proceeds to charities. Past recipients are listed on its website.
“There are some years when we don’t have any profits,” Giles said. But when there are, the organizers will hold back enough “seed money” to set the next year’s rally into motion, and from there decide how much there is to give to various charities.
The Fayetteville Police Department will continue its tradition of getting help from other law enforcement agencies for the rally, said its spokesman, Sgt. Craig Stout.
“We will have a beefedup enforcement in the event areas, on top of our normal patrols,” he said.
Agencies sending extra officers to help typically include the Washington County sheriff’s office, and Springdale, Rogers and Bentonville police departments, he said, as well as the Lowell department’s motorcycle officers.
In the Fayetteville department, officers who usually have desk duty as well as detectives pitch in to help, “from basically sergeants on down, and maybe a couple of lieutenants,” Stout said.
About the fourth year into the rally’s 13-year history, he recalled, it began to affect the Fayetteville police force’s vacation scheduling.
“I don’t know of too many people who’ve had a vacation in the middle of Bikes, Blues,” Stout said.
Last year, police made 27 arrests in the Dickson Street area, he said, mainly for public intoxication, disorderly conduct, driving while intoxicated and resisting arrest. There also were 19 motorcycle accidents within the Fayetteville city limits during the 2011 rally, though none that year involved fatalities.
Last year’s rally also brought “a few” noise complaints and five reports of stolen motorcycles - two of which were recovered before the rally was over, Stout said.
Information about the festival’s lineup of activities can be found a bikesbluesandbbq. org.
Northwest Arkansas, Pages 9 on 09/26/2012