World Cup preview traffic "sucked," Foxboro police chief says. Fans used backyards as bathroom.

What happens when you mix regular Massachusetts rush hour traffic and 64,000 FIFA World Cup fans heading to Gillette Stadium in Foxboro, Massachusetts? 

"I'll say it. It sucked. The traffic was bad," said Foxboro Police Chief Michael Grace.

Grace said the friendly match between France and Brazil on Thursday afternoon was a huge success by every security metric.

"I can't say enough about the French and Brazilian fans. They were phenomenal," he said, noting there were zero arrests.

Traffic for World Cup preview

The one failure was out of the police's control, he said. Despite repeated warnings to get to matches extremely early, traffic on the way to the stadium was brutal. 

"The infrastructure has limitations," Grace said. "I-95 failed. Route 1, they failed. When I say they failed, they were operational, there were 85 state troopers out there between 95 and Route 1. They can't move traffic any faster."

The big challenge was GPS apps routing drivers to back roads and surrounding towns.

"They went on every secondary road," the chief said, a big difference from regular Patriots game attendees who know to stay on 95 and take Route 1.

Some social media videos even showed people walking 3.5 miles along the train tracks instead of riding in cars. For what it's worth, you can take the MBTA to the matches, though it could cost you $75 per ride.

When the traffic apps brought people to alternate routes, Mechanic Street in Foxboro filled up with bumper-to-bumper traffic. "Hundreds. Literally hundreds of cars coming," said Barbara Hawley, who lives on the street.

Fans use bathroom in Foxboro yards

The real shock was in Gail Pratt's shared condominium backyard. She says she saw a number of people using the backyard as a bathroom, fully dropping their pants to do so. 

"I think they thought they were hiding from the traffic, not realizing that there is this whole row of homes here with our back windows that we could look out and see them pretty plainly," she said. "I was surprised, of course. I understood that the way the traffic was moving, they weren't going to get to a bathroom anytime too soon."

Pratt joked about a possible solution when the real World Cup games start in June. 

"I thought maybe a couple of porta-potties might work well… or we may have to just sit on the sidewalk in some lawn chairs and yell," she said as she laughed.