The size of the crowds

[PG_]

This years Glasto was my 10th, the first being in 1995 and on Sunday night I have never seen a crush like it - at any festival. The junction up top of Pyramid towards JP has to be widened. The crush there on Sunday before Ed was close to becoming a serious incident and I pray this will be noted by the festival team. My wife was close to passing out in the mix and there were young kids gasping for air, it was dangerous and genuinely scary. I'd like to think I'm a pretty savvy festival goer and can see these situations developing but Sunday night developed very quickly, traffic was moving and then it just didn't. There was literally no where to go and little security in sight. People were panicking, I was panicking. There was pushing, screaming, even adults crying. I've never experienced anything like it and I've been to pretty much all the UK festivals. It really put a dampener on what was a superb weekend at my favourite place in the world.

[Yokel Again]

That corner is definitely a bad point. Remember coming up that way before Coldplay last year and people being stuck in the mud, but the crowds coming in behind not realising. Got pretty scary, and likewise, consider myself to be pretty seasoned. Similar experience during Snoop Dogg and that was on a boiling hot dry day. We try and go up the field and down, but even that got wedged. 

[pie_and_a_pint]

18 hours ago, fowls said:

The orange and black octopus wristbands were for those in Worthy View, though I heard talk there were some staff wristbands that looked very similar too.

The orange and black octopus wristbands are EPO (easy pass out) bands. Staff, including all of the recycling teams, have them. The Worthy View ones looked pretty much identical except they said 'WV' on them.

[Badlands]

Saturday afternoon when it was Toots v Liam v Katy, you'd have expected one of the stages to be quiet but each one was rammed!

[Flysheet]

Rag and Bone Man, came in from the GF via Glade and was proper dangerous. Exited via Oxlyers into Silver Hayes and got to Pyramid early for my missus to see Barry

[fingers_mark]

Guy caught selling fake orange/black wristbands at Castle Cary - http://www.somersetlive.co.uk/whats-on/whats-on-news/glastonbury-2017-man-arrested-selling-139352

[Hugh Jass]

19 hours ago, Andeeroo said:

Oh and I felt incredibly sorry for Emile Sande as I walked past. Ed must have taken pretty much all of her crowd. Particularly sad when the streamers and confetti fired over a crowd of people about 20 deep from the stage.

I was at Emeli Sande and the crowd was pitifully small. You could have comfortably fitted everyone inside the area between the two barriers.

The confetti cannon was even sadder when the wind blew everything to the right and straight behind the stage.

[Splatt]

1 hour ago, PG_ said:

This years Glasto was my 10th, the first being in 1995 and on Sunday night I have never seen a crush like it - at any festival. The junction up top of Pyramid towards JP has to be widened. The crush there on Sunday before Ed was close to becoming a serious incident and I pray this will be noted by the festival team. My wife was close to passing out in the mix and there were young kids gasping for air, it was dangerous and genuinely scary. I'd like to think I'm a pretty savvy festival goer and can see these situations developing but Sunday night developed very quickly, traffic was moving and then it just didn't. There was literally no where to go and little security in sight. People were panicking, I was panicking. There was pushing, screaming, even adults crying. I've never experienced anything like it and I've been to pretty much all the UK festivals. It really put a dampener on what was a superb weekend at my favourite place in the world.

This has always been a pinch point & been caught in some scary crushes there in past,  agree something should be done to reduce risk of it happening but nothing seems to have been done to date. Now avoid that entrance around headliners.   Quite often seems to be because people entering pyramid field choose to stop pretty much as soon as they get in as opposed to walk down into the field thus creating a blockage. 

[Prophet6]

Problem now, I think, is that the overall demographic is much more interested in seeing big-name acts and ticking boxes on the lineup.

Back in the day, even early post-fence years, there was a much bigger element of the crowd who would spend more time bimbling, in greenfields, etc. We were in the greenfields on Sunday and it was pretty much deserted - sad to see really.

 

[The Pumpkin King]

We got totally squashed and crushed around the Other stage when I think it was Kaizer Chiefs on stage - just couldn't move anywhere and people were getting concerned!

[BSH]

The worst crowd for me was Rag'n'Bone man, it was uncomfortable and felt bordering on dangerous. I saw a lot of families with buggies really struggling.

Aside from that I found the crowds acceptable most of the time. The SE corner in particular felt a lot easier to navigate now with the new layout.

[Flysheet]

16 minutes ago, Prophet6 said:

We were in the greenfields on Sunday and it was pretty much deserted - sad to see really.

 

It was lovely though!

[Prophet6]

1 minute ago, Flysheet said:

It was lovely though!

Yeah, was nice to have a quiet spot for a while....i felt a bit sorry for some of the people running tents up there though. Must take a lot of time and effort to put something on at Glastonbury.

[Yokel Again]

47 minutes ago, Prophet6 said:

Problem now, I think, is that the overall demographic is much more interested in seeing big-name acts and ticking boxes on the lineup.

Back in the day, even early post-fence years, there was a much bigger element of the crowd who would spend more time bimbling, in greenfields, etc. We were in the greenfields on Sunday and it was pretty much deserted - sad to see really.

 

Wholeheartedly agree with this and posted similar elsewhere.

[Prophet6]

14 minutes ago, Yokel Again said:

Wholeheartedly agree with this and posted similar elsewhere.

The only ideal solution is changing the crowd back into something more like it used to be, but that's just wishful thinking. 

Otherwise all I can think of is they expand the main stage areas, e.g. create a new bigger stage for JP, maybe move the Other Stage to bottom of Pennard Hill and move the camping somewhere else. I'm not sure any of this would work and is probably just encouraging the festival further down the path it's on.

Ho hum. 

[august1]

There really needs to be something better in place in the two front entrances at the pyramid for the top acts. Been in quite a few crushes on both sides over the years, i'm sure the festival are aware of it, Emily cited that Corbyn got jammed around the markets.  

I know a small amount about crowd safety/management and spoke to a steward just before it happened, saying something needs to be done to prevent a crush. He said nothing he can do, didn't bother to radio or anything and just moved away from where it was about to happen. I think they need some people with proper knowledge and power to act rather than a young kid working for oxfam that those points.

The problem for the festival, the area is a market rather than an entrance so cant just put up one way in on the left, out on the right barriers as it will impact the stalls, they really should be diverting people to head to the back before they even get to the market. They do it for the South East corner of a night.

So far no serious injuries but lots of panic and anxiety attacks. I've no doubt there is ridiculous planning for it and it is incredibly complex, but that doesn't seem to feed down to on the ground there.

I remember there was something in place for Rolling Stones to divert people, definitely needs looking at again.

 

[Johndenis]

On ‎6‎/‎27‎/‎2017 at 10:16 AM, PG_ said:

This years Glasto was my 10th, the first being in 1995 and on Sunday night I have never seen a crush like it - at any festival. The junction up top of Pyramid towards JP has to be widened. The crush there on Sunday before Ed was close to becoming a serious incident and I pray this will be noted by the festival team. My wife was close to passing out in the mix and there were young kids gasping for air, it was dangerous and genuinely scary. I'd like to think I'm a pretty savvy festival goer and can see these situations developing but Sunday night developed very quickly, traffic was moving and then it just didn't. There was literally no where to go and little security in sight. People were panicking, I was panicking. There was pushing, screaming, even adults crying. I've never experienced anything like it and I've been to pretty much all the UK festivals. It really put a dampener on what was a superb weekend at my favourite place in the world.

I didn't reflect too much on this until now but you are correct, trying to pass the rear of the Pyramid to get up to JP for Metronomy got crazy.  There were actually kids being passed above the crush.  The same path was empty for Radiohead.  Perhaps the demand for Sheeran was unprecedented?  The other bad crush I experienced was at the base entrance of the Pyramid for Corbyn.

[Fred Zepplin]

29 minutes ago, Johndenis said:

I didn't reflect too much on this until now but you are correct, trying to pass the rear of the Pyramid to get up to JP for Metronomy got crazy.  There were actually kids being passed above the crush.  The same path was empty for Radiohead.  Perhaps the demand for Sheeran was unprecedented?  The other bad crush I experienced was at the base entrance of the Pyramid for Corbyn.

That point is bad and there is no security up there that I have seen to keep an eye on it. I was at the other stage waiting for LCD sound system and my wife had had enough so she went back to the tent on big ground. The route she took was through the market and across the top of the pyramid but the crush was so bad she couldn't get through so she had to walk all the back and past the other stage to get to the tent

[Hugh Jass]

I've been caught out by that slow moving traffic at the top of the Pyramid field before, always around headliner time. Trying to get over to the JP for Suede when Kanye was on was a fecking nightmare.

[priest17]

I definitely drew the short straw having to get the round in during Dolly's set. There were security driving through that path at the same time (surely there's a back stage way they could have gone), one of them threw a crisp packet out of the window on the floor and just looked at me with an 'And Wot' kind of look. I was somewhere between deadly hungover and drunk at that point I had no reaction to give.

But yeah it gets busy back there fo' sho.

[betharm]

We tried to walk round the back of the Pyramid crowd during Dolly, absolute nightmare. A terrible decision, but also my first Glasto, I have never tried to walk that way again.

[Hugh Jass]

There was a fair bit of room in the middle for Dolly if you could fit your way through the people hanging around the edge.