CBRN and Hazmat Incidents at Major Public Events: Planning and Response

CHAPTER 7

Dealing with Event Venues

Major events have to occur somewhere. For the purposes of this book the “somewhere” is a “venue,” regardless of whether it is an open field, a conference center, a stadium, or any other type of location. This chapter discusses how the security and safety effort deals with venues. In particular, this chapter discusses the types of venues commonly encountered, the issues and opportunities posed by new construction, and some methods of securing venues.

MAJOR TYPES OF VENUE

Because of the wide variety of major events, the types of venues that are of significance to the event planner are as numerous as the built environment itself. However, the majority of venues at major events fall into several broad categories, each of which has some unique planning considerations. The previous chapter discussed the concept of a site survey in general, but it is important to examine the key types of venue that will be encountered, as they each pose special vulnerabilities and planning considerations.

Open Air Stadiums

There are a wide variety of coliseums, stadiums, racetracks, arenas, amphitheaters, and similar venues with overlapping categories that are used for major events. The primary categories for the purposes of this book's analysis are open-air and enclosed. The key features of open-air stadiums are that they are exposed to the ambient environment and that they house a large number of people. A handful of stadiums exceed 100,000 in capacity, and stadiums ...