page_title: Burning Man
section_title: Road access
hierarchical_section_title: Burning Man / Transportation / Road access
caption_attribution_description: exodus from burning man
context_page_description: Burning Man is an event held annually since 1986 in the western United States. Since 1998, the event has been located at Black Rock City, a temporary city erected in the Black Rock Desert of northwestern Nevada. The event is located approximately 100 miles north-northeast of Reno. The late summer event is an experiment in community and art influenced by ten principles: Radical Inclusion, Gifting, Decommodification, Radical Self-Reliance, Radical Self-Expression, Communal Effort, Civic Responsibility, Leaving No Trace, Participation, and Immediacy. The event derives its name from its culmination, the symbolic burning of a large wooden effigy, referred to as 'The Man', that occurs on the Saturday evening before Labor Day.
  The event originated on June 22, 1986, 34 years ago, on Baker Beach in San Francisco as a small function organized by Larry Harvey and Jerry James, the builders of the first "Man" effigy. It has since been held annually, spanning the nine days leading up to and including Labor Day. The 2019 event ran from August 25 to September 2. Over the event's history, attendance has steadily increased. 78,850 people participated in the 2019 event.
context_section_description: Highway 34 provides access to the main entrance to Black Rock City. The highway connects to Highway 447 north of Gerlach, which then runs south to Highway 427 in Wadsworth near Interstate 80.
  Vehicles then proceed from the Highway 34 entrance north to the main gate via Gate Road, a desert dirt road with a speed limit of 10 mph. All vehicles driving into the city must have the appropriate vehicle pass, and all occupants are required to have valid ticket, in order to get in. Vehicles are also searched for any items that are prohibited in the city. For those who have their tickets held at Will Call, the booths are located between the Highway 34 entrance and the main gate. All tickets and vehicle passes must be bought in advance; they are not directly sold outside the gate or at the Will Call booths. Furthermore, unless they have a valid early arrival pass for the pre-event set up, any vehicle who arrives before the gate opens is turned away and told to go back to Reno, and not to wait along the side of the road on either Highways 34 or 447 (which would be a safety hazard), nor stay in Gerlach (and overcrowd the small town).
  When the Burning Man ends, and the mass exodus out of Black Rock City begins, a road traffic control procedure called "Pulsing" is used to direct vehicles out of the city. At regular intervals (usually an hour during the peak periods), all vehicles are "pulsed" forward all at once for about a mile along Gate Road. This allows vehicles to stop and turn off their engines, while those at southernmost mile of the multi-lane Gate Road slowly merge and then turn onto the two-lane Highway 34.
caption: 'Exodus' from Black Rock City in 2016
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