Glastonbury Thursday

[BigMarv]

It’s just too busy.

Far too busy.

Dangerously busy.

At a guess, maybe 80-90% capacity?

The issue is that with a huge crowd & lack of big names, then the medium sized acts on the Thursday become hugely overcrowded (Mel C, Sasha last year. Example, Eats everything this year). Those acts that wouldn’t command 20% of their Thursday crowds over the weekend become over subscribed.

Not sure the solution, but Thursday needs to be re-thought.

[JayDiesel]

We tried to get to Example at the Glade 40 mins before he started, and it was f**king mental. Only time in my life that I've been concerned being in a crowd, people had nowhere to go at the end as the exit was being blocked by people stood watching. Not a huge fan of Thursday so far, ngl

[LoraMaze]

Honestly this was my biggest problem last year, in hindsight I now know I shouldn’t have bothered with Shadowhawk Duo on the bandstand, but in previous years there wouldn’t have been anywhere near as big a crowd for a bandstand act…it’s purely because it’s something to watch. Not that they aren’t awesome. 
 

I‘ll be taking a camper if I get tickets for next year so might just hide out in it on the Thursday until the evening 🤔

Edited June 22, 2023 by LoraMaze

[FrankieX]

1 minute ago, JayDiesel said:

We tried to get to Example at the Glade 40 mins before he started, and it was f**king mental. Only time in my life that I've been concerned being in a crowd, people had nowhere to go at the end as the exit was being blocked by people stood watching. Not a huge fan of Thursday so far, ngl

That was predictable. I didn't even try, they just moved the problem from Williams Green to another small venue. The solution is more popular acts on Thursday evening, cutting one just causes everyone to go to the next best one.

[FloorFiller]

If they’re gonna have semi-sizeable acts on on the Thursday then they need to make sure there are a lot more of them across the site to split the crowd. No good having one or two on and then f**k all opposite them. Obviously not everybody will want to go to them, but a hell of a lot of people will, and now that William’s Green is gone I imagine the problem has gotten even worse at other venues. 

[Gazla]

Strummerville was filled to capacity and closed to new entrants for Lottery Winners.

[efcfanwirral]

Example wasn't busy at all down the sides near the bar 

[chazwwe]

35 minutes ago, FloorFiller said:

If they’re gonna have semi-sizeable acts on on the Thursday then they need to make sure there are a lot more of them across the site to split the crowd. No good having one or two on and then f**k all opposite them. Obviously not everybody will want to go to them, but a hell of a lot of people will, and now that William’s Green is gone I imagine the problem has gotten even worse at other venues. 

Lottery winners was 1 in 1 out at strummervile. Glade was packed for Example and green peace was packed at the same time. 

[firstglasto]

We say the same every year and nothing changes. Stonebridge is ridiculous on the Thursday.

[FloorFiller]

2 minutes ago, chazwwe said:

Lottery winners was 1 in 1 out at strummervile. Glade was packed for Example and green peace was packed at the same time. 

Tbh, with a festival the size of Glastonbury that routinely packs out the likes of the Pyramid field, I suppose there isn’t actually too much they could do to lessen the Thursday crowds. Obviously licensing restricts what stages they can have active on the Thursday, so basically boils down to get there insanely early and camp out if there’s a must see act for you and settle with the fact you’re probably gonna be crammed in as more people arrive, or just avoid the stages/acts that day, which is a bit of a shiter of a Plan B but hard to think of an alternative and realistic solution. 

[st dan]

Suppose the nicer weather makes the Thursday seen busier too? If it was raining or miserable then you’d have had people sat around their campsite and in their tents. 

[prestonmike]

I think the rise of smartphones and social media has contributed a lot to this, before them, you'd hear rumours about acts playing but nothing was confirmed so not everyone bothered going to check them out, these days, everyone knows about the 'secret' sets well in advance which makes more people try to attend the gigs

[Stanton]

 Crazy P at the glade was fine. Fairly big crowd but still room to boogie. 

[BigMarv]

4 hours ago, efcfanwirral said:

Example wasn't busy at all down the sides near the bar 

Getting there is the challenge.

[BigMarv]

4 hours ago, firstglasto said:

We say the same every year and nothing changes. Stonebridge is ridiculous on the Thursday.

Was meant to be larger this year, I thought? Same size.

[kalifire]

Took one look at Stonebridge and trundled on. Nowhere near big enough. 

[efcfanwirral]

1 hour ago, BigMarv said:

Getting there is the challenge.

We went through the tree house bar, came out at the back of the crowd and was pretty easy after a few people. Have to know about that though 

[Ricci's Special Kebabs]

Why is SE corner closed at 3?

[Gregcharlie]

11 hours ago, efcfanwirral said:

Example wasn't busy at all down the sides near the bar 

It wasn’t even THAT busy in the tent itself - the crusts at the edges are a real thing and maybe the biggest danger going crowd wise. 
 

[Avalon_Fields]

Certainly very busy, Strummerville just about full, Greenpeace massively busy, and even Croissant Neuf I couldn’t get into the tent for Old Time Sailors. 
 

Overall there’s more entertainment than ever before (Even without WG) but it can’t cope with the crowds. 

[Lucy92]

The nice weather doesn’t help. It’s usually a little more bearable when it isn’t as nice as people go back to tents more 

[WestCountryGirl]

I feel I must have just gotten really lucky with my navigation of yesterday evening - aside from when I left Avalon to go to Greenpeace about half seven (going against the sea heading to SEC). I was really surprised when at 10pm I decided to join my friends at Truth stage for Skindred - headed down from Theatre and Circus, walked straight into SEC, little busy turning the corner into Shangri-La but I was actually able to find my friends deep in the Truth crowd without any discomfort or difficulty. Apparently our other friends tried the same roughly ten minutes later and got nowhere 🤷🏻‍♀️ Number of them had talked about the awful time around the Glade for Example earlier though.

[waynewdk]

Few busy shots

[blutarsky]

5 hours ago, Ricci's Special Kebabs said:

Why is SE corner closed at 3?

Thursday licensing rules. Everything is closed at 3on Thursday. 

[majormajormajor]

4 minutes ago, blutarsky said:

Thursday licensing rules. Everything is closed at 3on Thursday. 

It seems insane to me that licensing rules apply.