K-Pop

The chaotic situation of BTS’s upcoming Busan concert: A single entrance for over 100,000 attendees 

Fans are worried about the safety and security at BTS’s free concert in Busan. 

There have been multiple concerns raised over BTS’s upcoming concert in Busan. In particular, the fact that the concert hall is urgently built on the site of an abandoned factory and that there is only one entrance has caused controversy over safety.

The latest broadcast of MBC’s “News Desk” on August 31 reported on BTS’s upcoming concert for the Busan World Expo 2030. Specifically, BTS will hold “BTS in BUSAN” on October 15 at the special stage in Ilgwang, Gijang-gun, Busan. This concert will be attended by 100,000 people, with all seats free of charge.

However, the concert will take place at the site of an abandoned factory, not a concert facility with well-equipped safety facilities, raising many concerns. 

According to “News Desk”, the Busan Metropolitan Government selected candidate sites for the concert to be held and conducted 9 visits and 12 meetings with BTS’s agency HYBE. Busan’s Sajik Stadium and Asiad Stadium, which are well used for concerts, can accommodate at most 60,000 people, so they were excluded because they were undersized, and other options were also removed due to their weak grounds.

The only place that can accommodate a large stage and 100,000 attendees is an abandoned factory. BTS has held concerts in Las Vegas and Jamsil, Seoul, before with an audience of 50,000.

In response, the Busan Metropolitan Government claimed that HYBE first requested an audience of 100,000 to maximize the scale and properly convey the purpose of hosting the Expo, and the city agreed. When inquired about this, HYBE replied, “We will provide detailed information later.”

Since this concert was first announced, there has been a lot of noise. Some lodging establishments made profits by canceling existing reservations, raising the price more than 10 times and accepting reservations again. To handle this, the Busan Metropolitan Government announced that it plans to organize a team to conduct an inspection to catch the rip-off rate. 

Also, the chosen site used to be the Korea Glass Industrial Busan Factory. It is a wasteland with poor transportation. There are few channels to enter the village where the concert will be held, and the surrounding infrastructure such as restaurants and toilets is not well established.

Fans’ concern over insecurity also sparked. According to the concert notice posted on the fan community Weverse, there is only one gate of entry at the concert hall. The number of entrance gates to the Jamsil Olympic Stadium, which accommodates the same number of attendees, is 54. Therefore, one single entry point at such a large-scale concert is absurd and leads to a risk of casualties.

Attendees will have to wait for a long time, but food is not even allowed. The number of toilets in the concert venue is also unknown. In the current chaotic situation, fans are asking for a safe concert even by reducing the number of seats.

BTS’s concert has been confirmed to be held in hopes of attracting more people to the Busan Expo, but the original purpose has tarnished and concerns are everywhere considering the current situation. 

Source: nate

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