The arrangements of the Radio Nova festival failed: “It didn’t work out”

The festival-goers estimated that this might be what was meant by the barrier-free podium. Jani Korpela

The Radio Nova festival kicked off today, Friday afternoon, in Helsinki’s Suvilahti.

Already during the first performer, there were significant shortcomings in accessibility. Iltalehti interviewed people present who need accessibility. They found the festival area difficult to move around.

Those who came to celebrate the summer weekend at the festivals Anne and Sea say that the website of the Radio Nova festivals stated that the area was completely covered with asphalt. In reality, there is also sand in the area and the asphalt is in poor condition in places. It is difficult to move in a wheelchair on the sand.

– It didn’t work out.

The two also criticize the fact that there is only one smoking area in the area and very little shade.

– If a person with reduced mobility wants to smoke, he has to move across the entire area to another corner.

– Not everyone can be in the sun all the time and the asphalt is always hotter.

Several disabled people interviewed by Iltalehti said that there were no signs for disabled people. They don’t know if there is an area or a platform for them in the performance areas, because they have not been assigned one by the staff or signs. People with reduced mobility had to watch the performances from the back of the area.

Alice, Laura and Jam criticized the Radio Nova festival for not having a separate entrance for people with reduced mobility. They finally got through the crowded vip entrance side, which also didn’t have its own separate queue and the queue was opened later.

Like Anne and Merja, the trio criticizes the difficult access to the area and the fact that it is difficult to get over the small ramps that protect the cables in the area with a wheelchair.

In terms of accessibility, the toilet arrangements were perfectly fine.

The festival responds

Producer Toni Ruohonen tells Iltalehti that customers with reduced mobility have been taken into account at the festivals, for example by making the passageways accessible so that everyone can go everywhere.

– There are cable ramps on access routes. They have to be, otherwise everyone else will stumble and there will be even more damage, Ruohonen describes.

It has been known in advance that the Suvilahti area has been largely covered with gravel and sand, which makes moving around with a wheelchair challenging. Efforts have been made to keep the asphalt usable and empty and the sales points accessible.

The festival’s website states that “the terrain of the festival area is an asphalt field”. It’s apparently some kind of information outage. According to Ruohonen, a lot of excavation work has been done in Suvilahti during the last month.

– I also thought that parts of it would be paved over there. Then it turned out that no, those parts have been smoothed with sand. We are aware of this.

Ruohonen says that the fact that major renovations are coming to Suvilahti next year has become an obstacle to asphalting. Ruohonen cannot say whether the city of Helsinki has therefore made a decision not to repair the asphalt before a major renovation.

According to Ruohonen, shadowiness is a contradictory issue. There are some places to sit in the shade of the trees and the Retro tent is completely in the shade.

– It’s a bit like that when you try so hard to cover areas and make it shady for everyone, then you get complaints that you can’t see anything.

There are wheelchair ramps in front of two of the three festival stages. This has not yet been delivered to the main platform due to delivery difficulties. However, we are trying to get one in front of the main stage by Saturday.

There are no separate signs for the wheelchair platforms, but they are located next to the sound control room on the stage.