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There were hiccups with the first ever NFL Sunday for the new Meadowlands sportsbook. Placing bets wasn't the problem. Getting to the Meadowlands on a day that the Giants were playing and finding somewhere to park was.
In May, the U.S. Supreme Court lifted a ban on sports betting, thus paving the way for individual states to begin allowing the activity. New Jersey, which filed the suit that helped get the ball rolling, was quick to jump on board.
The Meadowlands Racetrack sportsbook, branded by FanDuel, sits just across the parking lot from where the Giants and Jets play. The Giants were in town Sunday. Herein lies the problem.
As the New York Times points out, parking is reserved for Giants ticket holders. If you are there just to place a bet, parking is not easy on Sundays.
“I explained to them I was going to have all of them fired,” said Rose Porch, 51, who made the early morning trek from Hudson County, about the parking attendants who told her she couldn’t enter. “I was going to go to all their bosses and have them fired for lying because I came all the way from Bayonne and I didn’t think that was fair to me.”
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But first you had to actually get to the race track, and that proved to be an even more heralding experience for many.
“It was a hassle,” Orange resident Henry Adamson told the Newark Star Ledger. He was at the Sportsbook restaurant with two friends. Adamson said he’s been to the Meadowlands to place sports bets since the Sportsbook opened, but on Sunday, he said there was a different atmosphere. “This is football Sunday and no one is here. It's been crowded here almost every day."
Eventually, the crowds grew. Some said they had to park far from the race track and catch a shuttle bus to place their bets.
FanDuel plans to make adjustments so customers don’t have difficulty arriving to the SportsBook, said spokesman Kevin Hennessy. Mass transit, Hennessy said, is the best bet to get to Sportsbook on NFL game days.
Numbers should be pouring in this week to get a better gauge of performance on this critical weekend.
Some good news came Monday night as the Jets romped over Detroit in a shocking lopsided victory. This will almost guarantee even more voluminous betting activity in the state should that trend continue.
- Don Shapiro, Gambling911.com
