Issue 154 ·Wednesday, October 8, 2003
UEA' S STUDENT NEWSPAPER
.FREE
Troubled car park system collapses after Starsailor concert THOM SMITH News Editor
THE UEA 's new car parking system caused chaos at the Starsailor gig on Wednesday, October I. People were forced to queue into the car park, and then queue for more than 40 minutes on the way out. Union Entertainment s Manager. Nick Rayns. w ho wi tnes,ed the event s. descri bed the confusion of dri vers as a "massive public re lati o ns di sas ter". He said that the show li ni , hed at about I 0 :50. and at 11 : 15. there wcrc still 4-500 vehicles trying to leave the car park. By 11:25. te mpers were begi nning to llare. By I I :30. peop le were trying to fo rce the entry and ex it barri ers in an attcmpt to escape. It was at abou t th is time. according tu
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Mr Rayn~ th at "the que ue stretched across the car park and back again , peo ple were continuou sly leaning o n their cars' ho rns. The sec urity staff were coming unde r increas ing threats of violence, and so the o rder was give n that the barriers be lifted ou t of the way. It then took people about five minutes to leave. Mr Rayns went on to poi nt o ut that not on ly does the car pal'k system affect the staff. the studen ts and the visi tors at the un iversi ty but the no ise of the protests affects the neig hbo uring ho uses. Added to thi s. o ne of the mac hines ja mmed as peopl e tried to get into the car park be fo re the gig. which resu lted in a tai lback run ni ng betwee n the car park and the Fiveways. Union Comm unications officer Ned G las icr >aid that the Union had feared that th i> would happen for some time. but the warnings had bccn ignored by the Uni'e"ity:
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"A few months ago vari o us Unio n offi cers and members of staff to ld the University that the new car parking system wo uld cause chaos o n gig nig hts when we have up to 1,500 people in the LC R all leav ing at once. The se rio us concerns we ex pressed haven't been acted on and I'm not surprised th at thcrc was such a big mess o n Wednesday night after the Starsai lor g ig. " "Wc\·e already had load> of complaints from loyal gig custome" and quite frankly I'm worried that if thi s happens aga in we'll >tart los ing customcrs fro m o ur gigs. T he U ni ver~i t y has to act now to sort it o ut. If they don't. we' ll lose c u,turner,. the reside nts on Bluebell Road will go berserk from all the extra noise and the Univcr;ity Security Stall will be 'o tied up dea ling wit h frmtrated drivers they won't ha\e time to en.,ure 'tudcnt w<!ll hcing on campu'
Mr Glasier went o n to say that the Uni o n wi shes to get the university to deal with the proble ms. and so, "We have requested an urgent meeting wi th the Vice C hance llo r because it seems that if no-one in thc relevant departments wi ll listen to o ur conce rns our only choice is to go right to the top." Daw n Dewar. UEA 's T ransport Co-ordinato r said. "Some of our sccurity guards were hara"cd and bullied by drivers leav ing the car park fo ll ow ing the gig on Wednesday. Such hchaviour is unacceptable. and we would have no he,itatiun in taking further ac tion if individua ls are idcntified .Ci nema and theatre-goers often have to yueue hl lca\ c car parks aftcr a show and we \\ould ask those attendi ng gig' at UEA to 'how the 'amc paticnce and rc,pcct
INTERVIEWS WITH STARSAILOR AND DAVE GORMAN, FEATURES ON FilM FASHION AND SOAP COMEBACKS, RMEWS OF BEW AND SEBASTIAN AND FINDING NEMO AND, ONCE AGAIN, 'MORE'