New York State Fair 2013 ended on a weird Labor Day, starting cool, growing hot and humid, getting drenched by afternoon storms and ending on a cool, dry evening. Now State Fair Hound will help you get through the next 50 weeks with discussion, suggestions, reviews and updates. We’ll also be developing and improving our site to help make sure that the 2014 Fair will be a better experience for you.
HORT REFLECTION JU 13
Today, as we start the review process that we’ll continue over the next few weeks, we’re feeling your pain. The banner at the top of the Fair website says “Gates open in 352 days.” Ouch. It sure seems strange not to be heading out to those bumpy parking lots and beckoning gates.

The initial reaction has to be that it was a great fair that didn’t get the public support it deserved. Yeah, there are ways it could have been better and there’s plenty of time to get into that, but attendance numbers should have been higher. It’s up just a tick from last year and that’s not good enough. Consider that the highest one-day number was the 86,168 that attended on Sep. 1, really low for a single-day best.

Rather than try to summarize this year’s Fair and come up with a list of ideas and suggestions for next year right now–while the packing up, cleaning up and closing down is underway—we’ll keep it going with timely posts as we look forward to Aug. 21, 2014. (Photo by Jude Camwell)