i spoke to an officer a few moments ago. he said the line extends all the way up to 72nd street. to give you perspective, that s about 12 city blocks. that is about a mile from where i m standing. so you ve got now about thousands upon thousands of people waiting in a line that snakes around in two directions. that s about a mile long. and we re now about an hour or so away from the point from where the pope is supposed to awe arrive, which is just about 5:00. so what the police department is dealing with right now is trying to pg out how we re going to get all these people, most of whom have tickets numbering in the tens of thousands into central park in under an hour. it s simply just not going to happen. we re hearing from one of our producers that law enforcement officials because they have just been overwhelmed by the turnout that they are bringing in additional mag normal ters to
avenue goes south in manhattan. this is all being rerouted and redirected for the benefit of the pope. this is, as ron mentioned earlier, the arrival was in the open popemobile sort of more ceremonial motorcade in which people could see him. this is him basically retiring for the night as he heads up to 72nd street, where he will bring a close to a very, very busy day. a day that began in washington, d.c. with the first ever joint speech to congress. charlie, your thoughts on that speech. first of all, one of the interest things about it was we all got in the press gallery, we all got an advance text. none of the members of congress did. they didn t know what they were going to hear. secondly, when i read the advance text and i got to the four americans he was going to concentrate on. okay, abraham lincoln, martin luther king, those are
the pope is set to arrive at this school in east harlem with students a few minutes from now. our live ping tour, 3:34 eastern time as their walking around and telling people what to do. then scheduled to travel through central park and then madison square garden where he will hold mass for thousands of worshipers. on our wall i can show you part of the route. this one, the route through central park. he is set to near at 72nd 72nd street, which is higher than i can reach. that is around the spot where the dakota is, where strawberry fields is, many of you may have been to that if you visited the city on the west side. a little lower over there, less gentrified, feels suburban up there. not a huge fan but that s just me. you that s west drive. that goes through the park. sometimes county drive on that. sometimes you can t the horse and buggies sometimes are on
dolin s residence behind the cathedral. the residence he is staying at is at the papal ambassador to the united nations. he s in washington where the pope stayed but because the u.n. has a special ambassador, it s on 72nd street and the pope stays with somebody from the vatican and new york city has the papal ambassador, permanent observer to the united nations. for that reason he s not staying here at the cathedral. he s going to go down to philadelphia. he ll be there saturday and sunday, as well. which was initially kind of the reason for him coming to the united states. this is sort of, there s a very important meeting in october. if you can explain what is happening in october and what this meeting over the weekend has to do with that. we haven t highlighted it
layers of security. people asked this morning why he wasn t staying at cardinal dolin s residence behind the cathedral. he s staying at the papal of the united nations. he s in washington where the pope stayed but because the u.n. has a special am bbassadoambass on 72nd street and the pope stays somebody from the vatican and new york city has the permanent observer to the united nations. for that reason he s not staying here at the cathedral. he s going to go down to philadelphia. he ll be there saturday and sunday, as well. which was initially kind of the reason for him coming to the united states. this is sort of, there s a very important meeting in october. if you can explain what is happening in october and what this meeting over the weekend has to do with that.