Behind the Scenes

In July 2017 with approval of Bournemouth Council the first ‘Sandfest’ music festival was held on Sandbanks beach.

The event was marred by numerous residents’ complaints about anti-social behaviour, crowd disturbances, loud noise and poor event management.

Accessing our good relationships with our Ward Councillors, Mohan Iyengar and May Haines, we worked with Bournemouth Council over the following 12 months to identify and prioritise key issues from residents’ perspective. These included noise levels, crowd management, police presence, crowd dispersal and public drunkenness.

Practical solutions were agreed with the Council and a telephone Hotline established for residents’ complaints to speed up reaction to problems.

The result. A everyone had a lot more fun, no sign of the problems the previous year and not a single residents’ complaint when Sandfest was held again in July 2018.