Bwog staffer Alec Turnbull, like the rest of the media, got up way too early this morning.

The vans pulled up early, far before sunrise. By the time I’d made it out to Broadway at 6am, all the morning news stations had staked out a corner spot and were broadcasting. Their antennae interfered with doorway intercoms along Broadway, turning them into little radios playing the morning news. But the vans were otherwise unobtrusive, given how much hype has been built up around the event. I soon discovered why reporters decided to come later: there’s almost nowhere to get decent coffee before 7. The few interns I saw were at a loss. “It’s going to be a long day,” one said.

A few minutes later, walking through the gates on 116^th, a campus security guard told me the same thing. When asked about getting onto campus later today, he seemed as out of the loop as anyone, and the details of how they’ll deal with crowds of people flashing CUIDs are unclear.

Amsterdam was surprisingly quiet, with the usual crowd of hospital workers and food-cart venders, and will probably be the best place to escape from today’s events. Meanwhile, Broadway is lined with barricades, and the numbers of media vans and police are only going to increase. But if you want to be on national news, swing by. Fox News was out before sunrise interviewing anyone they could find on the street and is sure to be there all day. They asked me, but I still hadn’t had my coffee.

Photos after the jump.