Liberal Democrats debate safe standing

[Marc]

Safe Standing to me is in the same area as Formula 1, the whole Safety First thing went OTT and through the roof after Senna & Ratzenberger (sp?) died and it ruined the sport for many. Now, gradually the old rules are coming back (no traction control, less computer help and maybe slick tires soon) and the series is becoming more exciting again.
Standing at matches is the same, it went nuts after Hillsborough and now people are not scared anymore to question whether we can have safe standing. Trouble is many grounds going all seater might not want to alter designs/spend the money to make 2500 people happy with safe standing when they would get 5000 in that area in seats...thats gonna be the stumbling block.

 

[steward 433]

Oh, and I think you've hit the capslock button on your keyboard.

Nope was shouting

 

[Stinkers Bridge]

Nope was shouting

"Calm down, calm down" :Scousesmiley:

 

[Brovion]

That's all well and good but you would be pissed off if you paid money for a ticket and travel and then got thrown out

But that's rather the point. EVERYBODY does it and they can't throw them all out. After a few shouts of "Sit down!" the wannabe Nazi stormtroopers, sorry, the hard-working poorly paid stewards give up.

Apparently sanctions and/or fines can be bought in against clubs who allow fans to flaunt the law (although Newcastle must have an exemption) - but what do I care? It's not my club who'll suffer!

 

[Storer68]

That's bollocks though isn't it? You might as well say that the ones who died at Bradford died because they were sitting down. The concept of standing to watch football wasn't responsible for Hillsborough any more than the concept of sitting down to watch football was responsible for Bradford. Both were the fault of the stadiums (and practices) of the day.

Anyway it's only sheep-like fans who sit down when the stewards tell them. At Newcastle away games we stand the whole time.

The people who died at Bradford did die because they were sitting down. The wooden seats they were sitting on were within a wooden stand and the seats had open flaps that allowed large amounts of rubbish that had not been cleared away to accumulate over several years. It only took one lone lit cigarette to start the fire. They were sitting on top of a bonfire . and they only had precisiely 43 seconds to get out. I know because part of my fire training involved a presentation by London Fire brigade who showed the FB's video footage from the start to the end of the fire.

The Final Report, 1990
5.2 In Lord Justice Taylor's Final Report published in January 1990, he praised the football clubs for their positive attitude in implementing the interim recommendations. He then went on to look at the problems facing British football. The report discusses and criticises:

Leadership of football in Britain
Poor facilities and services at football
Old and outmoded football grounds
The lack of consultation between officials and fans
The, sometimes, poor behaviour of players
The selling of alcohol at football, a possible cause of disorder
The attitude of newspapers and television
The effects of hooliganism and segregation on the general experiences of football spectators
5.3 Lord Justice Taylor then went on to make a total of 76 recommendations designed to improve the state of football in Britain. The most important of these were:

The gradual replacement of terraces with seated areas in all grounds by the end of the century, with all First and Second Division stadia being all-seater by the start of the 1994-5 Season and all Third and Fourth Division by 1999-2000.
Setting up an Football Stadium Advisory Design Council to advise on ground safety and construction and to commission research into this area.
That no perimeter fencing should have spikes on the top or be more than 2.2 metres tall.
Making ticket touting a criminal offence.
Introducing new laws to deal with a number of offences inside football grounds, including racist chanting and missile throwing.
Sending older offenders to Attendance Centres and using new electronic tagging devices for convicted hooligans
. The Football Licensing Authority (FLA)
6.1 The FLA was created by the Football Spectators Act of 1989. It is responsible for either granting or refusing a licence to admit spectators to any designated premises to watch football matches. The FLA holds considerable powers to impose conditions on football clubs and to suspend or refuse licences. It has a number of functions:

To enforce, via license, Government policy that clubs in the Premier League and Football League Division One have all seated stadia.
To ensure that local authorities are implementing their powers under the Safety of Sports Grounds Act 1975 as they relate to football.
To ensure that standing accommodation at lower division grounds meets prescribed standards by August 1999
6.2 The main functions of the FLA relate to ensuring the effective management of football supporters inside football stadia. This involves encouraging a general move toward high profile policing and low profile policing. The FLA provides for training modules for stewards, who normally far outnumber policeman at football these days, often by as many as five or six stewards to every police officer. The FLA is also required to keep under review the discharge by Local Authorities of their functions under the Safety of Sports Grounds Act. All clubs require a safety certificate, which indicates a 'safe capacity', in order to stage matches, and periodic tests must be carried out by clubs to ensure their facilities and emergency services are up to standard. Local Safety Advisory Groups involving police, fire and ambulance services and, sometimes, supporters are also used to assist local authorities in exercising safety functions. If clubs fail to meet safety standards they can be prosecuted for contravening a safety certificate or the FLA can insist on a reduction in stadium capacity until the necessary work is done. The post-Taylor regime at football has effectively moved the safety and management of supporter functions at matches to clubs and their appointed agents and away from the police, whose responsibilty now is to deal with public order problems and crime at football.



"It is inconceivable that there will ever be a return to terracing in top-flight football."

and note the common thread running through these disasters - all happened in the UK to people in standing areas
Selected Football Stadium Tragedies in Britain

Date Stadium What happened? Outcome
1902 Ibrox Park Terrace collapsed 50 killed, 500 injured
1914 Hillsborough Wall collapsed 80 injured
1914 Turf Moor Spectator crushing 1 killed
1946 Burnden Park Spectator crushing 33 killed, 400 injured
1957 Shawfield Barrier collapsed 1 killed, 50 injured
1961 Ibrox Park Barrier collapsed 2 killed
1971 Ibrox Park Crushing/barrier collapse 66 killed, hundreds injured
1985 St. Andrews Wall collapsed 1 killed
1989 Hillsborough Spectator crushing 96 killed, hundreds injured

 

[seagullsovergrimsby]

Standing inbetween seats isn't safe as the height of the seat is below waist level. This means if one person went over forwards it could mean a domino effect with lots of lower limb injuries.

Albeit safer than a crush but by no means safe

But I've never seen that happen , even when we are going completely bananas after scoring a goal. If someone stumbles trying to climb over a seat no serious harm is done , only that it makes them look a complete prat.

 

[seagullsovergrimsby]

Deaths and injuries on the terraces that have been caused by crushing or barrier collapses were back in the days of cramming in as many paying spectators as possible. Ground Safety Certificates reduced the official capacities of many stadiums over a period of years and nowadays the seating capacity is less than what it could be with a safe standing area in part of the ground as an alternative.

 

[Kukev31]

Standing inbetween seats isn't safe as the height of the seat is below waist level. This means if one person went over forwards it could mean a domino effect with lots of lower limb injuries.

Albeit safer than a crush but by no means safe

If you can find ONE incidence of this happening, despite thousands of fans standing every week in seated areas I would be very surprised.

 

[turienzo's lovechild]

i'd be interested how many injuries occur in german grounds with 'safe standing'

very little i'd imagine, even at dortmund which has a f***ing massive terrace

 

[Storer68]

This from the Green Guide

Why spectators should sit in designated seated areas
The case for requiring spectators to sit at grounds that are required to be all seated should be addressed under three separate but interrelated public interest headings: safety, crowd management and other customer care issues.

Safety Spectators standing in seated areas create a number of hazards both for themselves and for those around them, for example:

Spectators standing in these circumstances are not protected by any crush barriers. Instead they have a seat back in front of their legs. In the event of an incident, there would be nothing to prevent them from falling forwards onto the heads and upper bodies of the spectators in front. The falling spectators could themselves incur lower limb injuries from the seats. The risk is exacerbated if spectators stand on the seats themselves. The risk of such falls and the likelihood of a cascading effect increase along with the gradient of the seating deck. The majority of upper tiers and many single and lower tiers have gradients above the 250 that the Guide to Safety at Sports Grounds (the "Green Guide") considers safe for any standing accommodation, even where this is equipped with crush barriers to the highest standard. Indeed many seating decks, particularly on upper tiers, have gradients close to the recommended safety maximum for seating of 340. Standing in a seated area with such a gradient must by definition be treated as unsafe.

 

[Storer68]

i'd be interested how many injuries occur in german grounds with 'safe standing'

very little i'd imagine, even at dortmund which has a f***ing massive terrace

When the FSF asked Borussia Dortmund for injury statistics for its 25,000-capacity standing section, Europe's largest, it was told the club do not keep statistics for injuries inside the ground as they were not an issue

 

[Guy Fawkes]

From an article from The Observer, Sunday August 12, 2007

In 1993, the German Football Association (the DFB) published a report into whether stadiums there should have their terraces removed. The answer was an emphatic no, on several grounds.

The notion that standing encouraged hooliganism was rejected, with blame placed squarely on the individuals. 'The majority of these spectators will not behave any differently in an all-seat stadium.' Abolishing standing would raise prices, but 'football, being a people's sport, should not banish the socially disadvantaged from its stadia, and it should not place its social function in doubt'.

Just as important, 'young fans on the terraces embody the vibrant world of football. It is here where the atmosphere that attracts millions of people all over the world to our sport is created.'

The DFB also recognised, unlike the British authorities, that simply installing seats did not guarantee that fans would use them. 'We are now witnessing more and more cases of spectators ignoring seats... and simply standing on them. This is a very dangerous practice.'

As a result, every ground in Germany has terracing, with 24,000 standing each weekend in a single stand at Borussia Dortmund's ground. Though it is not easy to tell from pictures of the vibrant Nord tribune (stand), the fans are divided into small pens that hold about 2,000, each with its own controlled entrance. Fans are admitted only to the pens for which they have tickets - and those tickets are far more affordable than in England. A standing ticket at Dortmund costs as little as €10 (£7), season ticket €148.

For Uefa club matches and competitive internationals, German stadiums are reconfigured. In Dortmund's case, this involves (in the upper tier) releasing seats built into the crash barriers and (in the lower tier) bolting in removable banks of seats. Thus capacities are reduced, as England fans found out at the 2006 World Cup. But this is simply because Uefa and Fifa regulations mirror those in England, not because of safety issues. Volker Fuerderer, safety officer at Schalke's Veltins Arena, where England went out of the World Cup, told the Football Supporters Federation (FSF): 'In nearly six years of the existence of the Veltins Arena I would go as far as to say that there is not a single incident or injury that could be explained by the existence of standing.'

The Football Licensing Authority (FLA), the body who implement government policy on standing, reject the German experience, however. As long as Fifa and Uefa demand that internationals and Champions League games are played at all-seat venues, terraces would have to be convertible. In reaction to the FSF report, John de Quidt, chief executive of the FLA, cited a trip to Hamburg's AOL Arena, where the terraces are converted via a hi-tech system that involves the rotation of the terrace steps through 180 degrees. De Quidt argued: 'There is no way that could work in England. [The Hamburg stand] was built on a huge site and on solid ground with no concourses underneath.'

But this visit was to a single ground and took place six years ago; Dortmund's ground is reconfigured in a completely different way. The depth of De Quidt's opposition to standing areas is apparent from a 2002 interview, when he said 'there's more chance of Martians landing' than of the reintroduction of terraces. Given the obvious prejudice this comment reveals, it is plain De Quidt is not a neutral in this debate.

The arguments against safe standing are weak. Neither the government nor anybody else has demonstrated the imposition of all-seat stadiums to be the best or the only way of ensuring an acceptable level of safety at a football ground. The only figures cited by the FLA are that the number of injuries in grounds that are all-seat is lower than in those that retain a standing area.

But those who wish to establish a causal link between standing areas and accidents/injuries need detailed information on the nature, cause and exact location of those accidents and injuries. They then need to analyse this information in detail, taking into account the wide range of other factors that might act as intervening variables. The FLA have done no such analysis and are in no position to justify the assertion that small, properly designed safe standing areas are inherently less safe than seated areas.

The last sports minister, Richard Caborn, claimed that all-seat stadiums led to a rise in attendances and widened the appeal of football to 'many more groups in society who were previously reluctant to attend matches', including women. He also said that any return to standing areas would cost clubs a fortune because they would need to make expensive adjustments to their grounds.

We strongly dispute the accuracy of some of those assertions. Indeed, the reverse of what Caborn says about social inclusiveness is true, as poorer fans are priced out of the grounds. And, yes, it would cost clubs money to adapt their stadiums, but that would be their choice if they were allowed to reintroduce standing areas.

The FLA have stated: 'Premiership and Football League grounds are safer, more comfortable and more civilised than they were 10 or 12 years ago.' Only one of these concepts, safety, is an appropriate subject for government regulation. And a significant proportion of spectators say the comfort and civility of their experience has been reduced by the abolition of terraces.

Some are seated next to or near others whose size, language or demeanour they may not like. Some seating areas are decidedly uncomfortable, either because of their cramped seats (Chelsea's West Stand) or because they are open to bad weather (Portsmouth's away end).

Read the full article at Observer Sport examines the case for a return to the terrace at top-flight stadiums | Football | The Observer

 

[Brovion]

The people who died at Bradford did die because they were sitting down. The wooden seats they were sitting on were within a wooden stand and the seats had open flaps that allowed large amounts of rubbish that had not been cleared away to accumulate over several years. It only took one lone lit cigarette to start the fire. They were sitting on top of a bonfire . and they only had precisiely 43 seconds to get out. I know because part of my fire training involved a presentation by London Fire brigade who showed the FB's video footage from the start to the end of the fire.
...

So you agree with me? The people at Bradford died because of the stand they were in. The people at Hillsborough died because of the design of the terraces (most notably the fence at the front to stop fans getting onto the pitch). Interestingly the earlier tragedies you mention are all 'Bradford' in origin rather than 'Hillsborough', i.e caused by poor maintenance (barriers collasing etc).

 

[Freddie Goodwin.]

Are the Lib Dems basing their motion on the fact that, since a standing area was introduced at the Goldstone (retail park) there have been no incidents?

Seriously though, for me seats have been dangerous when standing. i have, and have seen, people fall over them or fall through them (kids) with quite nasty falls as shins get scraped.

I do believe we should have safe standing areas. Design is better now and also the technology is there to prevent the overcrowding we used to have. i believe overcrowding was the main cause of problems with standing.

 

[steward 433]

So you agree with me? The people at Bradford died because of the stand they were in. The people at Hillsborough died because of the design of the terraces (most notably the fence at the front to stop fans getting onto the pitch). Interestingly the earlier tragedies you mention are all 'Bradford' in origin rather than 'Hillsborough', i.e caused by poor maintenance (barriers collasing etc).

There have been a lot more disasters than just those two though

Category:Stadium disasters - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[seagullsovergrimsby]

I do believe we should have safe standing areas. Design is better now and also the technology is there to prevent the overcrowding we used to have. i believe overcrowding was the main cause of problems with standing.

Being a regular North Stander at the Goldstone in the 1970's confirms the above statement. Crowd surges after a goal had been scored often meant you ended up 10 feet lower down the terraces even with crush barriers to contend with. With a 25,000 crowd the North Stand used to be pretty full but the big Cup games with 30 - 33,000 attendances meant everyone was packed in like sardines. Safe standing areas would now have restrictions on how many fans were allowed into a particular section.

 

[clapham_gull]

If you can find ONE incidence of this happening, despite thousands of fans standing every week in seated areas I would be very surprised.

It's far more complicated than that.

It's all to do with risk assessment and really depends on the gradient of the seats.

I haven't got the figures to hand, but was told by a safety officer that lower limb injuries have increased in stadium.

It would be very hard to argue that standing in for example the away end at QPR is inherently safe...

...but standing in the lower tier at (for example) at Elland Road is probably risk free.

It's probably "safer" to stand in the away end at Withdean than it is in the South Stand.

I wish people would stop complicating the argument. I'm all for the return of safe terraces, but calling for allowing standing in seating areas becomes a very complicated issue because seating areas even within a stadium are very different.

You have to make an application per seating area, per stadium.

 

[Southover Street Seagull]

and the 96 who were crushed to death on a terrace at Hillsborough? Why did they die where they did?

Didn't die in the seats did they?

There deaths had nothing to do with terraces or seats, it was due to poor crowd control. If you had let hundreds of people into a seated area from the top of the stand into an area that had padlocked fences at the bottom, i.e no way to get out, you would have had deaths.

 

[Southover Street Seagull]

The people who died at Bradford did die because they were sitting down. The wooden seats they were sitting on were within a wooden stand and the seats had open flaps that allowed large amounts of rubbish that had not been cleared away to accumulate over several years. It only took one lone lit cigarette to start the fire. They were sitting on top of a bonfire . and they only had precisiely 43 seconds to get out. I know because part of my fire training involved a presentation by London Fire brigade who showed the FB's video footage from the start to the end of the fire.

The Final Report, 1990
5.2 In Lord Justice Taylor's Final Report published in January 1990, he praised the football clubs for their positive attitude in implementing the interim recommendations. He then went on to look at the problems facing British football. The report discusses and criticises:

Leadership of football in Britain
Poor facilities and services at football
Old and outmoded football grounds
The lack of consultation between officials and fans
The, sometimes, poor behaviour of players
The selling of alcohol at football, a possible cause of disorder
The attitude of newspapers and television
The effects of hooliganism and segregation on the general experiences of football spectators
5.3 Lord Justice Taylor then went on to make a total of 76 recommendations designed to improve the state of football in Britain. The most important of these were:

The gradual replacement of terraces with seated areas in all grounds by the end of the century, with all First and Second Division stadia being all-seater by the start of the 1994-5 Season and all Third and Fourth Division by 1999-2000.
Setting up an Football Stadium Advisory Design Council to advise on ground safety and construction and to commission research into this area.
That no perimeter fencing should have spikes on the top or be more than 2.2 metres tall.
Making ticket touting a criminal offence.
Introducing new laws to deal with a number of offences inside football grounds, including racist chanting and missile throwing.
Sending older offenders to Attendance Centres and using new electronic tagging devices for convicted hooligans
. The Football Licensing Authority (FLA)
6.1 The FLA was created by the Football Spectators Act of 1989. It is responsible for either granting or refusing a licence to admit spectators to any designated premises to watch football matches. The FLA holds considerable powers to impose conditions on football clubs and to suspend or refuse licences. It has a number of functions:

To enforce, via license, Government policy that clubs in the Premier League and Football League Division One have all seated stadia.
To ensure that local authorities are implementing their powers under the Safety of Sports Grounds Act 1975 as they relate to football.
To ensure that standing accommodation at lower division grounds meets prescribed standards by August 1999
6.2 The main functions of the FLA relate to ensuring the effective management of football supporters inside football stadia. This involves encouraging a general move toward high profile policing and low profile policing. The FLA provides for training modules for stewards, who normally far outnumber policeman at football these days, often by as many as five or six stewards to every police officer. The FLA is also required to keep under review the discharge by Local Authorities of their functions under the Safety of Sports Grounds Act. All clubs require a safety certificate, which indicates a 'safe capacity', in order to stage matches, and periodic tests must be carried out by clubs to ensure their facilities and emergency services are up to standard. Local Safety Advisory Groups involving police, fire and ambulance services and, sometimes, supporters are also used to assist local authorities in exercising safety functions. If clubs fail to meet safety standards they can be prosecuted for contravening a safety certificate or the FLA can insist on a reduction in stadium capacity until the necessary work is done. The post-Taylor regime at football has effectively moved the safety and management of supporter functions at matches to clubs and their appointed agents and away from the police, whose responsibilty now is to deal with public order problems and crime at football.



"It is inconceivable that there will ever be a return to terracing in top-flight football."

and note the common thread running through these disasters - all happened in the UK to people in standing areas
Selected Football Stadium Tragedies in Britain

Date Stadium What happened? Outcome
1902 Ibrox Park Terrace collapsed 50 killed, 500 injured
1914 Hillsborough Wall collapsed 80 injured
1914 Turf Moor Spectator crushing 1 killed
1946 Burnden Park Spectator crushing 33 killed, 400 injured
1957 Shawfield Barrier collapsed 1 killed, 50 injured
1961 Ibrox Park Barrier collapsed 2 killed
1971 Ibrox Park Crushing/barrier collapse 66 killed, hundreds injured
1985 St. Andrews Wall collapsed 1 killed
1989 Hillsborough Spectator crushing 96 killed, hundreds injured

On April 5, 1902, during a Scotland vs England football match the back of the newly built West Tribune Stand collapsed due to heavy rainfall the previous night. Hundreds of supporters fell up to 40 feet (12 m) to the ground below. 25 people died and 517 were injured.
The stand at the time consisted of wooden terracing supported by a steel girder frame. Following the accident such frameworks were discredited, and replaced throughout the United Kingdom by terracing supported by earthworks or reinforced concrete.
The tragedy occurred after 51 minutes of the match, which was declared void by the two Football Associations. All proceeds of the replayed match at Villa Park, Birmingham on 3 May 1902 went to the disaster fund.
Down to the poor design of the terrace, this type of terracing would not be allowed today.

The 1971 Ibrox Disaster had Initial reports suggesting the tragedy had been caused by supporters rushing back up the stairs, after a late Rangers' goal, colliding with people leaving the stadium.
But a public inquiry discounted this theory and said the deaths were the result of the crush of fans pouring down stairway 13.
So not on a terrace there is it?

The 1985 wall collapse was caused by fighting between Birmingham and Leeds fans.

 

[Brovion]

There have been a lot more disasters than just those two though

Category:Stadium disasters - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I'm well aware of that! None of those though demolish the argument that it is safe to stand and watch football. Trains are the safest form of transport but they still crash occasionally.

BTW did you know that probably the largest loss of life in a stadium disaster was some place in South America (Chilie I think) where over 300 died? The reason was rival fans rioting. So yourself, Storer68 and other members of the 'cotton wool' brigade should start a campaign to ban away fans as having rival fans in a ground leads inevitably to DEATH.

Finally there are loads of examples of temporary seating collapsing, so if you don't fancy a campaing banning away fans how about one to close down grounds with temporary seating? We don't like Withdean anyway.