Warm, but No Meltdown

Clearing a path in and out of the heart of the business district of the nation’s second-largest city and keeping it clear for 48 hours is no mean achievement. But for the Los Angeles Police Department, which coordinated security for Pope John Paul II’s visit to Los Angeles, that was just a start. It also cleared paths to get His Holiness to the Los Angeles Coliseum and Dodger Stadium for Mass and to meetings in the San Fernando Valley and elsewhere. It was, as Police Chief Daryl F. Gates said in a message sent after the Pope’s departure Thursday to the 1,900 uniformed officers who made it happen, a superb piece of work.

As with the 1984 Olympic Games, when law enforcement was last tested on this scale, there was alarm over terrorism and concern that traffic would be unmanageable, that it might rain or that the one possibility that planners overlooked would create some kind of social meltdown.

Obviously, LAPD Cmdr. George Morrison and his fellow planners and coordinators overlooked nothing. The LAPD, traffic officers from the city Department of Transportation, the Secret Service, the FBI, the Highway Patrol and the sheriff’s office worked together as though it was something that they do every day. The weather cooperated, as did commuters who somehow avoided being anyplace where they might create a traffic jam.

What they achieved was a peaceful place in which John Paul II could deliver his message of peace. We cannot improve on Gates’ choice of words. It was a superb job.