Key Takeaways:
Regardless of whether an owner is planning security in a new or existing sports facility, several key strategies can ensure they find the balance between effective access control and streamlined operations.
The first strategy is to involve in-house facilities experts early and often.
“The best projects that we've had were when we’ve had regular, recurring meetings with the right people that need to be involved and having the in-house people being engaged and asking questions,” says Matt Nebel, principal and managing director of secure design with Walter P Moore. “If they’re coming from a world that’s not the engineering, construction or architectural side of things, ask questions. Let’s have discussions about what we’re doing and then give feedback along the way.”
In-house facilities teams provide perspectives on facilities and security that other interested parties do not have, says Robert Koshgarian, national sports director, project and development services, with JLL.
“The seasoned group that's been together, they are the day-to-day,” he says. “They’re the owner's reality check on what’s happening. They know where the gaps in the systems are if they’re going to design a new one or if you’re looking at the existing building because they live with them every day. They know where the failed camera is, where the failed lights are, the switches that aren’t turning on.”
Another strategy is to make sure owners fully understand threats that can put facilities and fans in harm’s way.
“A firm like ours has expertise conducting these types of services — a threat vulnerability risk assessment — to identify all your vulnerabilities at your facility,” Nebel says. “How does that relate to any other security requirements that you maybe have to comply with at your venue? Then give the venue owner or operator options of what they may need to be able to do to meet those requirements.”
The discussion of security options needs to address the full range of potential threats to the facility’s safe, secure operations.
“Additional planning should address crowd surges, severe weather sheltering, heat-related illness, accessible evacuation, reunification procedures and the management of deliveries and service personnel on event days,” says Scott Klaus, principal and sports and recreation leader with Stantec, an engineering, architecture and environmental consulting firm. “These strategies are most effective when they are coordinated early with the owner, district or university police, local emergency responders, event operations staff and representatives of each user group.”
Perhaps most importantly, building owners’ critical decisions related to the security of sports facilities need to be based on complete information from reliable, experienced experts.
“Sometimes, building owners and operators maybe don’t understand the risk that they’re taking by making a certain decision, either by having the wrong consultant do the wrong scope of work or coming from an engineering background,” Nebel says. “In this world, unfortunately, bad things sometimes happen, and you want to be able to hang your hat on defendable solutions.
“That’s the beauty of using engineering, science, mathematics and physics to come up with these solutions. We can hang our hats on that. That’s a little bit of a scary topic, but that’s where it goes to having the right people do the right scope on these projects.”
Dan Hounsell is senior editor for the facilities market. He has more than 30 years of experience writing about facilities maintenance, engineering and management.
Balancing Security and Fan Experience in Sports Facilities
Managing Security Risks in Sports Facilities
