INAUGURATION PLANNED TO LAST DETAIL

The biggest, most expensive, most security-conscious inauguration in American history opens Wednesday, and the thousands of workers who have spent two months feverishly planning it are leaving nothing to chance.

A horse ambulance has been lined up in case one of 457 horses falls in Friday's inaugural parade. All days off for D.C. police officers have been canceled. A stockpile of 350 clear plastic raincoats is ready for use by VIPs if it rains on the swearing-in ceremony.

And the city is prepared for whatever weather hits the 1.6-mile parade route: Freezing rain would bring out 160 workers armed with ice scrapers. Three or more inches of snow would require 300 people and 20 dump trucks.

This morning at 5, dozens of organizers from the Secret Service, the District government, the military and the three inaugural committees are scheduled to converge on the Capitol to rehearse the swearing-in and the parade. Although they represent three dozen turf-conscious agencies, all share a common goal: to make the inauguration of George Herbert Walker Bush, the nation's 41st president, as flawless as possible.

"An inauguration is the one thing that's different from nearly every other event," said Assistant D.C. Police Chief Isaac M. Fulwood Jr., the department's field commander during the five-day spectacle that is expected to attract 300,000 people. "Nobody takes anybody else's word for anything. We can't afford mistakes."

Heightened concerns about terrorism, intensified by last month's bombing of a Pan American jetliner, have made security agencies even more anxious about an event at which the entire leadership of the United States is concentrated in one place. For the first time, nearly a third of the 140,000 people attending the swearing-in -- those closest to the platform where the president stands -- will have to pass through metal detectors. So will everyone in a two-block area near the White House.

Security is only one of a score of concerns for planners. This inauguration features a record 27 official events. One-third of them are open to the public, including a White House "open house."

Police and the National Park Service are particularly concerned about Wednesday's opening ceremony at the Lincoln Memorial. Beginning at 4:30 p.m., the start of the evening rush hour, as many as 100,000 people are expected at the hourlong ceremony, which -- weather permitting -- will feature 21 Navy F14 fighter planes flying wingtip-to-wingtip and an eight-minute fireworks display.

For security and logistics reasons, police plan to close Memorial Bridge -- a heavily traveled commuter route -- inbound on Wednesday afternoon, rerouting traffic along several main feeder streets.

"We're concerned because it's a regular workday, not a holiday, when people expect something," said Park Service spokeswoman Sandra Alley. "The problem is that anytime you close streets for something like this, people always have to stop and look."

In addition to jets and fireworks, the opening ceremony will feature 40 times as many "points of light" as Bush has ever promised in his many speeches. Bush and Vice President-elect Dan Quayle are due to light candles or flip switches on an electrical device to illustrate their campaign theme of "one thousand points of light." The first 40,000 people to clear the metal detectors will be given miniature black flashlights engraved with the silver presidential seal. They will be asked to follow Bush's example and flick them on.

The opening ceremony is designed to establish the inaugural theme of "peace, prosperity and independence" and to provide dramatic footage and images for the 7,000 journalists and photographers from around the world who are accredited to cover the events. The opening is one of nine free events open to the public and one of only three that do not require advance tickets.

The Presidential Inaugural Committee, responsible for most inaugural events, is billing the plethora of parades, concerts, forums, pageants, dinners, receptions and balls as an "inauguration of inclusion" that will emphasize the values of "family and faith."

Unlike Ronald Reagan, who wore a morning coat to his 1981 swearing-in and whose inaugural committee issued a dress code for members of Congress, Bush committee officials have relayed no such instructions. Bush and Quayle will wear business suits.

Like his predecessor, Bush is courting the nation's youth with a Young Americans Ball -- recently expanded to two sites -- and a sold-out, star-studded rhythm and blues concert called the Celebration for Young Americans, featuring Bo Diddley, Percy Sledge, Etta James and others.

For the first time, there will be events for young children, including a Saturday afternoon festival titled "George to George -- 200 Years."

About 3,000 elementary school children are expected at the hourlong, "Sesame Street"-like event at Constitution Hall. The program will trace 200 years of the presidency from George Washington to the man whom the official inaugural guide dubs "his namesake George Bush."

More than 75,000 people -- their names plucked from lists of loyal party workers, dignitaries and major Republican contributors -- have been invited to buy tickets to various inaugural events, several of which are sold out. The most expensive and exclusive is a $1,500-a-plate, black tie Inaugural Dinner Wednesday night at three sites, including refurbished Union Station.

Outside the station that night, the scene will be considerably different. A coalition of 50 Washington-based nonprofit groups led by the Washington Peace Center and the Community for Creative Non-Violence plans to stage a counterinaugural banquet for 1,000 people.

"Our point in being there is to highlight the outrageous nature of a $1,500-a-plate dinner when there are people who are hungry and homeless out on the street," said Peace Center spokeswoman Lisa Fithian.

Although inaugural officials have sought to play it down, the Bush inauguration is expected to break all spending records. Inaugural Committee cochairman Bobby Holt said the committee expects to raise and spend between $22 million and $25 million in private funds -- more than the $20 million Reagan raised in 1985. In addition, more than $7 million in public money has been allocated for inaugural activities.

By contrast, Jimmy Carter's 1977 populist celebration cost $3.5 million in private funds. In 1977, no ticket cost more than $25. And Carter limited the number of bleachers along Pennsylvania Avenue so that more people could see the parade. Bush inaugural officials expect to sell about 25,000 bleacher seats; tickets range from $12.50 to $100.

"If I were George Bush, I would have kept this as simple as possible because so many in our country have so little to celebrate," said the Rev. John Steinbruck, who runs a shelter for the homeless several blocks from the White House. "We've had a national earthquake of Armenian proportions in that affordable housing is gone. I would certainly hope that the president-elect would be more sensitive than this."

The inaugural committee says the cost is driven by two factors: inflation and free events. "The dollars are not being spent for gold and glitter," said executive director Stephen M. Studdert, but for substantive events in which many people can participate.

The committee also is subsidizing two groups: 230 teachers from around the country arrive Tuesday for a "Teachers' Inaugural Experience." And at 2 p.m. Wednesday, The Inaugural Express will pull into Union Station, bearing 300 police officers from Boston and New York.

"This is a way that George Bush can clearly send a message" that he supports law enforcement, Studdert said. It is also a way to repay the Boston police patrolmen's union for its widely publicized endorsement of Bush over his Democratic rival and the union members' governor, Michael S. Dukakis of Massachusetts.

The biggest single event is the parade, which starts at 2 p.m. Friday, when a convoy of limousines led by D.C. Police Chief Maurice T. Turner Jr. pulls away from the Capitol and heads down Pennsylvania Avenue.

The parade features 211 floats, bands and marching units from all 50 states, including the California Raisins, cartoon mascots of the state's biggest cash crop; and 47 fur-clad Alaskan Eskimo Scouts from the part of that state closest to the Soviet Union.

The parade will be preceded by a swearing-in ceremony shorter and simpler than in previous years. The Harlan Boys Choir, a 40-member group from the Kentucky coal town, will sing "This Is My Country," and the Rev. Billy Graham will deliver the invocation.

All 140,000 tickets to the ceremony were distributed last week. The Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies, which is responsible for the swearing-in and an inaugural lunch afterward, has spent weeks deflecting hundreds of requests for tickets.

"It's like somebody wrote our phone number in a phone booth," quipped Michael Ruehling, the committee's executive director.

Some members of Congress have gone to unusual lengths to get extra tickets. One veteran lawmaker authorized two staff members to pick up tickets at the same time, hoping to double his allotment. Others have resorted to more typical tactics: They offer to trade favors. Failing that, they beg.

Ruehling, who has been immersed in the minutiae of protocol, seating, media and catering arrangements since August, has had to take time to cope with another matter: how to keep the 10 Bush grandchildren, ranging in age from 2 to 12 -- and an equal number of young Quayle cousins -- occupied during the inaugural lunch.

The solution: The children, along with five baby sitters, will be entertained by a magician, approved by the Secret Service, at a grilled cheese and chicken nuggets lunch of their own in a private Senate dining room.

In honor of the bicentennial of the presidency, two Bibles rather than one will be used at the swearing-in. One is a Bush family Bible; the other, obtained after weeks of negotiations with its owner, a Masonic lodge in Manhattan, was used during George Washington's inauguration.

Tradition will not be followed in all cases. Quail, which was served at the first inaugural lunch, has been banished this year in favor of chicken.

The paramount concern is the weather. For weeks, planners have been anxiously studying long-range forecasts -- which predict no precipitation and temperatures above freezing -- hoping to avoid the snow that blanketed John F. Kennedy's inauguration in 1961 or the bone-chilling cold that canceled all outdoor events, including the parade, in 1985.

"One of the first things we did was to draw up contingency plans," inaugural committee spokesman Ed Cassidy said. "Everybody's just praying we don't need them."

HOW TO GET TICKETS

Free Events: Tickets will be distributed today at the Washington Convention Center, H Street Box Office, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. or until the ticket supply is exhausted. Limit two tickets for each event per person (except "George to George," an event for children Saturday at Constitution Hall -- limit four tickets per person).

American Bicentennial Presidential Inaugural Parade: Tickets for bleacher seats and for some other official events may still be available through Ticketron, (202) 789-6552, or the American Bicentennial Presidential Inaugural Ticket Office at (202) 252-3590.

Articles appear as they were originally printed in The Washington Post and may not include subsequent corrections.