How to create a H&S Disaster

[504329lt]

Whoever dreamt up that system needs to have a serious rethink.

I fail to see how moving people off a wide well drained path (the railway track) onto a narrow muddy path makes things safer. When Flogging Molly ended on The Avalon on Saturday night, it was dangerous to leave the site due to the streams of people walking along the path just north of Avalon.

This combined with the boneheads on every exit created an atmosphere that I have never seen at Glatonbury before.

The programme was explicit in that this system was there for access to Arcadia, Block 9, and Shranglia. Why is it that after 11 you are now unable to cross from Avalon to Croissant Neuf or the Craft Fields etc without going all the way round?

The whole thing is in complete contradiction to the spirit of Glastonbury. Avalon and the fields to the south of the railway track used to be what set Glastonbury apart from the other big festivals. Now you can't even stroll up to them without being denied access by the sort of people that work on the doors in the worst pubs and clubs in the country

Completely disillusioned with the whole thing.

Edited June 28, 2011 by 504329lt

[AnnaGrant]

Agree about the problem for people wanting to go from Avalon to the Green fields just across the railway line, and its not an unsurprising destination for people who've visited Avalon to want to go to.

We tried to do this on Thursday night, but were told to go all the way round, but couldn't get any definite directions-stewards just waved us off and told us to go 'that way'. When we got to Bella's Bridge it was chaos-people were confused about where we were supposed to go, there was a large crowd, and the mud on the bridge meant stewards were having to manhandle people over the bridge.

In the end we gave up and headed back towards Holts.

[johnmcga]

We tried to do this on Thursday night, but were told to go all the way round, but couldn't get any definite directions-stewards just waved us off and told us to go 'that way'. When we got to Bella's Bridge it was chaos-people were confused about where we were supposed to go, there was a large crowd, and the mud on the bridge meant stewards were having to manhandle people over the bridge.

[eFestivals]

But I'm sure I read somewhere that Bella's Bridge was closed for a while on Thursday, presumably because of the ridiculous mud there.

it might have been closed for a while (I don't know, I didn't see it closed), but it wasn't a problem with "ridiculous mud there", but actually more a lack of mud. Mud got stuck to people's feet and got taken away from the approaches to the bridge, meaning that the bridge itself was too steep and too slippy to get over.

Most festivals would have closed the bridge. Instead, Glastonbury had security guys helping people over it - it probably took less staff to do that than to close it anyway.

The next morning when I walked over they'd dumped a huge pile of hardcore on each side of it, raising the approaches again so it was easy to get over. The next day much the same had happened again - so then they had workmen nailing extra battens to it so that people had a better grip.

All in all I thought the fest did an excellent job of managing the problems with that bridge.

[windy_miller]

Bella's bridge is a really badly designed bridge anyway. I find it difficult to get over it when its not muddy.

[Pinhead]

It was closed one night on my way from Ped C to a shift - spoke to the security bulldog and explained that I had permission to go through as had EPO wristband and Oxfam card and was on way to a shift. They were having none of it of course - coherent decision making is not one of their strong points. Anyway, looks like it was down to mud rather than yet another closed off access due to its proximity to Shangri-La.

[polgara]

Absolutely agree....we spent the majority of our time at Avalon but it was an absolute nightmare once the 'restrictions' started. Toilets were blocked off and waved away and told to go back to the cabaret area which was treacherous. Meant that a five min toilet break tool twenty mins.

[johnmcga]

it might have been closed for a while (I don't know, I didn't see it closed), but it wasn't a problem with "ridiculous mud there", but actually more a lack of mud. Mud got stuck to people's feet and got taken away from the approaches to the bridge, meaning that the bridge itself was too steep and too slippy to get over.

Most festivals would have closed the bridge. Instead, Glastonbury had security guys helping people over it - it probably took less staff to do that than to close it anyway.

The next morning when I walked over they'd dumped a huge pile of hardcore on each side of it, raising the approaches again so it was easy to get over. The next day much the same had happened again - so then they had workmen nailing extra battens to it so that people had a better grip.

All in all I thought the fest did an excellent job of managing the problems with that bridge.

[AnnaGrant]

Neil, you're right about the problem at Bella's bridge-I hadn't explained it properly. The ground at the bottom of each side had been worn away, so more of the arc of the bridge had been exposed, making it more difficult to climb over, and the slippy mud was exacerbating the problem.

Someone else had posted elsewhere about putting the closure point not at the exit of Avalon, but across the railway line so folks could walk across to the Green Fields.

[tolywoly]

Agreed. Leaving Flogging Molly early on Saturday, we and the small number of people heading back towards the main site ran in to thousands of people coming in the opposite direction. We got bumped around quite a bit.

It was the first year of this system though. They can learn from the experience and improve things for 2013.

[504329lt]

Agreed. Leaving Flogging Molly early on Saturday, we and the small number of people heading back towards the main site ran in to thousands of people coming in the opposite direction. We got bumped around quite a bit.

It was the first year of this system though. They can learn from the experience and improve things for 2013.

[redmosquito]

Getting out of U2 and back to east camper fields with a young baby in cart was a total.nightmare. Sfter they'd finished we waited for ages for the crowd to die down before setting off but as 1000's of people were all going in the same direction it was total chaos. We had fairy lights all over the cart and handle but peolle just don't look where they are going and walked into it all the time. One guy even tried to jump over it. It was such a bad experience that we couldn't face staying on site past 9 every night so had to go back to the van early. Whilst I understand the reasoning behind the system having what seemed to be the majority of the pyramid crowd all walking in the same direction as a major exit madelife very difficult for some.

[windy_miller]

Why was the "exit" so far down the railway line? Surely the avalon and green fields turnings should not have been inside the exclusion zone?

[504329lt]

Why was the "exit" so far down the railway line? Surely the avalon and green fields turnings should not have been inside the exclusion zone?

[ukslim]

A combination of bad planning and the employment of brain dead zombies as security.

[KryziF]

I have no problem with the concept of a one way system, if they need to manage the crowds for the SE areas, but I completely agree with the OP they need to rethink exiting and toilets in Avalon.

Avalon is not part of the late night area and given the complete difference in the music in the 2 areas suspect most people from Avalon won't be joining the trudge to Arcadia.

Why can't they just rotate the security cordon around by 90 degrees so it crosses the railway track instead of the field exit. It would allow people from Avalon to use the toilet and exit onto the railway line (which would still be one way). It wouldn't affect the safety of the late night venues and would be safer as you don't have three thousand people fighting against the flow.

Plus I feel sorry for the traders in avalon as I saw many blokes prevented from getting to the toilets just pissing against the closed tents.

[504329lt]

To be fair, the last thing you want in security staff is free-thinking creativity. Their job is to implement a system.

Having said that, I went down the one-way system by mistake -- wanting ped gate C. So we backed up, and got challenged by a security guy: "What do you two think you're doing?". We explained, and he unhooked the fence to let us out, nice as pie.

[504329lt]

I have no problem with the concept of a one way system, if they need to manage the crowds for the SE areas, but I completely agree with the OP they need to rethink exiting and toilets in Avalon.

Avalon is not part of the late night area and given the complete difference in the music in the 2 areas suspect most people from Avalon won't be joining the trudge to Arcadia.

Why can't they just rotate the security cordon around by 90 degrees so it crosses the railway track instead of the field exit. It would allow people from Avalon to use the toilet and exit onto the railway line (which would still be one way). It wouldn't affect the safety of the late night venues and would be safer as you don't have three thousand people fighting against the flow.

Plus I feel sorry for the traders in avalon as I saw many blokes prevented from getting to the toilets just pissing against the closed tents.

[ukslim]

Yes, but if the system is flawed then some initative would be useful.

[eFestivals]

The best thing to do is split up the 'late night areas' so they are not all in one corner of the site.

I don't think that's an option.

It's where it is because that's the one part of the site where noise thru the night is not as much of an issue, because Michael has made some agreements with the small number of people who live on that side.

[Cooter]

agree totally with the OP, yes that one way system is a hideous nightmare and all seems quite pointless.

[DeanoL]

I would guess the cordon was placed above Avalon for the same reason the major complaints are coming up: toilets. They wanted those toilets to be accessible to people in the late night areas for capacity reasons, and so they couldn't also be used for those in the Avalon field.

It was far from a perfect system, but the conditions this year were really bad. As bad as it might have got, I can't imagine what it'd be like with last years system in this year's conditions.

[Glasto fan]

I actually think that getting rid of the one way system is the best solution. It has not made things safer, and in places it has made things much worse. Additionally the whole idea of electronic boards with waiting times on is just not right for this festival.

The best thing to do is split up the 'late night areas' so they are not all in one corner of the site. In truth I think the whole Block 9, Shrangrila think has become contrived and needs a complete overhaul.

[verrymerry]

On sunday night we went upto the Stone Circle via Avalon, it looked like they were stopping people going onto the railway because the steward was saying "you can come this way if you have the right wristband" but he let us all through saying "yeah you're bands are fine" when we just had the normal punters ones - basically turning a blind eye so that was lucky!

I didn't get stuck in the one way when it was busy though, we only used it once while U2 was on & it just seemed to take a while, thursday we went in via the railway. I didn't see any major gridlocks though like last year when the railway became a standstill.

[LusciousLucy]

Never had a problem but this is probably down to having the sense to get there just before the headliners finished and taking routes to PGC that didnt involve crowds. 5 mins before the Chems ended our group got together on the Railway Track, we dropped down past Spirit of 71 then right down Holts, left at West Holts, right down the road past Fairy Love, left past the Astrolabe et voila, joined the entry queue. Even with 7 people in tow, that just took 9 minutes!!!

The system flowed nicely into the base of the East End, only snag we had was trying to get through the wall of Human Sheep on the left side of the Arcadia Field, not helped by the fact people were stood over the guy ropes to the cafe at the base.

Once in Arcadia there was feck loads of space on The Common side but I dont expect security even knew or had checked. I dont think there was ever more than 15000 people there all evening and it emptied too while we were there.

There does need to be some sort of way of telling people where to go in the field instead of all being forced into one squishy area. The following night, same time there were even fewer people in Arcadia and even more space and yet friends told me they had been told it was full with a 2 hours queueing system in place.