A concert with an audience of about 30,000, titled “K-SPARK IN MACAU”, was held at the government-managed Macau Open-Air Performance Venue in Cotai on Saturday night.
The event’s organisers were widely slammed by netizens on social media for poor planning of seating arrangements and failure to properly maintain the order of audience members, in response to which community leaders, in group interviews with local Chinese-language media, have urged the government to improve coordination with event organisers in the future and draw up official rules and regulations for the open-air venue with which organisers and audience members must comply.
The Macau Open-Air Performance Venue, set up on a large plot in south-east Cotai covering 94,000 square metres, is located east of the Lisboeta Macau resort and south of the Grand Lisboa Palace Resort Macau complex.
Before the concert on Saturday last week, six concerts or other types of shows had been held at the venue since it started operating in late 2024.
The “K-SPARK IN MACAU” event started at 7 p.m. and ended at around 10:30 p.m. on Saturday night.
This time, in the run-up to the concert on Saturday, the government made various types of preparations with the aim of ensuring that spectators could leave the venue by public transport after the event in an orderly manner. According to local Chinese-language media reports, the audience members, in general, were able to leave the venue and get public transport to leave the area in an orderly manner, thanks to the government’s various types of special traffic measures in place.
Consequently, this time, no major criticisms were raised on social media concerning the government’s traffic arrangements following the completion of a large-scale show. However, this time, criticisms were widely raised concerning the organisers’ poor planning of seating arrangements and their failure to ensure order in the spectators’ area while the concert was taking place. These criticisms raised on social media have also been reported by local Chinese-language media as well as online media in Macau and elsewhere.
Local Chinese-language media have also interviewed community leaders to comment on the organisation of this concert.
The government’s special traffic measures, according to a statement by the Cultural Affairs Bureau (IC) last week, included two routes of free shuttle buses arranged by the government travelling from the Macau Open-Air Performance Venue, after the completion of the concert, to the peninsula’s Praça de Ferreira do Amaral (colloquially known in Cantonese simply as “A Ma La”) and to the Barrier Gate border checkpoint respectively.
Besides, service hours of the Light Rapid Transit (LRT) on Saturday night last week were extended to 1 a.m. on Sunday.
The special traffic arrangements in place on Saturday night also included a special measure in which all LRT passengers entering from the East Asian Games Station or Cotai East Station could have free rides to any other LRT stations.
Special traffic control measures were also in place in the area around the Macau Open-Air Performance Venue on Saturday.
According to the criticisms on social media that were also reported by local Chinese-language media as well as online media, the organisers failed to properly design the event’s seating plan so that many people in the back rows could hardly see the singers on stage.
Many of the event’s seats were folding chairs.
Due to the situation, some spectators in the back rows chose to stand on the seats in an attempt to be able to see the singers, or go closer to the front, or even move their chairs closer to the front. The online criticisms reported by local Chinese-language media described the concert on Saturday as “chaotic”.
Video clips on social media, the reports pointed out, show that several spectators even fought each other following quarrels concerning seating arrangements.
During a group interview with local Chinese-language media on Sunday, Leong Meng Ian, a senior board member of the Macau Federation of Trade Unions, commonly known as Gung Luen in Cantonese, suggested that the Macau government learn from the experience of other places in organising large-scale concerts and require event organisers in the future to ensure the proper setting-up of all necessary equipment and facilities in order to facilitate the smooth operations of concerts, such as setting up more large-sized screens and further improving audio equipment.
Leong, who heads the Gung Luen branch office in Taipa serving the islands (Taipa, Coloane, and Cotai), also urged the government draw up official rules and guidelines for the Macau Open-Air Performance Venue with which event organisers and spectators must comply, including a code of conduct for spectators guiding them to be a courteous audience member.
She also suggested that the government set up more entrances to the venue when a concert is held next time.
Meanwhile, in a group interview with local Chinese-language media on Sunday, Leong Chon Kit, a deputy convener of the government-appointed Taipa and Coloane Community Service Consultative Council, suggested that in the future the government should arrange more routes of free shuttle buses travelling to other border checkpoints following the completion of a concert, such as the pedestrian 24/7 Qingmao checkpoint.
He also suggested that the government roll out measures aiming to divert more concert spectators to the old quarters in Taipa and elsewhere in the city to boost consumption there.
He also noted that Saturday’s concert had the highest number of spectators since the venue started operating, pointing out that the venue is designed to accommodate “at least” 50,000 spectators per performance. He urged the government to make further improvements to its arrangements in the future aiming to ensure that spectators can enter and leave the venue in a more smooth and orderly manner.
The Post yesterday submitted a written enquiry to the Cultural Affairs Bureau concerning its future improvements to the organisation of shows at the venue. The bureau told the Post that it would comment on the matter in due course.
This screenshot taken from a video clip on social media shows spectators moving their chairs while the concert was taking place at the Macau Open-Air Performance Venue in Cotai on Saturday night. The Macau Post Daily cannot vouch for the authenticity of the screenshot.
