Playground Weekender addressesissues; calls for feedback

Fri 25th Feb, 2011 in Local News

While the fun flowed freely throughout this year’s Playground Weekender, it wasn’t all smooth sailing at Del Rio Resort. Commendably, the people behind the festival have issued a statement addressing a couple of the key problems that affected punters.

They are also calling for feedback, so email them at info@playgroundmusic.com.au to give props or suggest improvements.

Water

“Playground has been fortunate over the years to have the use of a 50,000L, water tank at Del Rio, which is filled by the local reservoir. This water is treated and approved by local Council and Work Cover.

The pump from the reservoir failed for 4 hours on Saturday (at peak time). When it was fixed as soon as humanly possible, the water supply struggled to catch up with the festival site requirements. We shipped in 30,000L as soon as the pump broke to rectification the situation.

We would like to assure all patrons that at no time during the festival was poor quality water being fed into the system and at all times the water was travelling through a charcoal filter which removed any trace elements or dangerous bugs. Playground apologises unreservedly for the inconvenience caused and has already taken steps to ensure that standby pump and extra drinking water will be made available from next year in case of any unexpected pump or system breakages.”

Ferries

“Over the past 2 years approximately 40% of patrons arrive on the Friday night of the event. This year, we had 85% of patrons arrive during this time. As Friday was also a full moon, the low and high tides were extreme causing delays for the ferries.This combined with a snapped cable on the vehicle ferry, caused a backlog of 40 minutes. The wait to enter the event took up to 4 hours due to this. The wait was not due to the bag search process from our security team rather the issue with the tide and the snapped cable.

In immediate response, Playground Weekender added more security to the searching process as well as getting the RTA on site to address the issue with the cable. The backlog was cleared by 1am on Friday night and service continued unimpeded for the rest of the weekend.

Whilst Playground apologies for the inconveniences caused it also wishes to remind patrons that it is a legal requirement (not just a Playground one) that all Patrons be searched and alcohol confiscated upon arrival, as it is a licensed event.

We have already begun the planning for next year so that no searching is done on the car-park side of Wisemans. All patrons will get straight onto a ferry and over to the site. We will double the size of the holding bay and give people the ability to wait on the Del Rio side of the river where there is grass / shade / seats / water facilities etc.

In 2012, we will also implement a casual booking system (in which patrons book a 4 hour window in which to arrive at the event). This will allow us to book enough ferries to cope with expected demand at the various times.”