The police expect challenges when 60,000 spectators go home at the same time after the evening’s metal concert.
Updated less than 20 minutes ago
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About 60,000 have bought tickets to see the German metal band Rammstein at Bjerke track, north-east of Oslo.
Rammstein took the stage at 8.30pm as planned, according to the concert organiser.
– This has gone as smoothly and quickly as we could have hoped for, thanks to an exemplary audience and good cooperation with the police and our own people, writes Mark Vaughan in the organizing company All Things Live to VG in a text message shortly after 8.30pm.
– There will be more waiting and longer queues when 60,000 people will move out of the arena late tonight. This is how it is with such large events.
– Broke barrier
– Shuttle buses have been set up to take people out. It goes its way, but it takes time, says operations manager in the police in Oslo, Bjørn Gunnar Nysæter.
For the most part, people behave well, but there have been some incidents of law and order in connection with the migration, says the operations manager.
– A couple of incidents inside the trotting track, and on the way out of the area someone broke a barrier that had been set up to direct the masses out. In addition, we have some reports of people who are out in the roadway on national highway 4, he says.
A little over an hour after the concert ended, there is still a steady flow of people who are to be taken away from the area, according to the police.
– Slowly but surely we will bring the audience home, says Nysæter.
Blocks Trondheimsveien
The transport company Ruter warned ahead of the event against holding a concert at Bjerke trotbane, because there are few public transport options nearby.
The concert organizer had set up shuttlebusser to and from the event, but the tickets were already sold out on Saturday.
Due to heavy traffic, the police closed national road 4 Trondheimsveien to normal traffic for a couple of hours before the start of the concert to ensure that the shuttle buses arrived.
– There is still limited access to the north until after the concert has ended closer to midnight, writes the Oslo Police District Twitter at 20.17, after the road was reopened.
At 21.36 the police report Twitter that Trondheimsveien will be blocked northbound from Sinsenkrysset and southbound from the Linderud exit at 10 p.m.
–Problems with the ticket system
TV2 reported just before 7pm about queuing chaos as a result of half of the scanning system for the tickets being down, according to a guard the channel spoke to.
– There was some online trouble with the machines used to read tickets. It’s a problem we were prepared for and solved quickly, writes Mark Vaughan in the organizing company All Things Live in an e-mail to VG at 19.21.
– Many moving at the same time
The police warned ahead of the concert that it could become problematic when the roughly 60,000 concert-goers return home.
– Everyone would like to go home at the same time. And then there will be many people who will be moving at the same time, said operations manager in the Oslo police district Per-Ivar Iversen to VG.
The police in Oslo have appointed a separate task manager for the concert.
–There were also no parking options at the arena, according to security manager Jørgen Aas, who believes many will have to find alternative ways home.
– We hope many people will take a walk. I recommend that people take some time out of the arena, don’t push towards the exits. Take it easy, and don’t expect to be home within a short time, he told VG on Saturday.
In addition to German metal, the audience got a massive flame show Sunday evening.
