How to reduce traffic and queues at an event's access points

A queue appears when more vehicles or people arrive per minute than the slowest point on the route can process. It does not matter whether that point is a roundabout, the car park barrier or the security check: while demand exceeds its capacity the queue grows, and when demand falls the queue takes time to clear.

This simple idea explains why there are only three families of solutions: reduce demand (fewer vehicles), flatten it (spread it over time) or increase the capacity of the limiting point. Choosing well depends on knowing which point that is. The most common causes are these:

• Concentrated arrivals. Most of the audience arrives in the last hour or hour and a half before opening or before the main show starts.
• A single access. If the public, staff, suppliers, taxis and shuttles share the same road, any incident blocks it for everyone.
• Slow checks. Car park payment or validation, ticket checks and security screening with few lanes or reading points limit the vehicles and people per hour.
• Lack of information. Attendees do not know where to park, which route to take or when to arrive, and decide with their satnav, which sends everyone onto the same road.
• Low car occupancy. The fewer people in each car, the more vehicles you must absorb for the same audience.

It helps to have a reference for that last cause. The European Environment Agency states, in general terms, that average car occupancy is around 1.5 people, without specifying the scope in that sentence. In UK greenfield festivals, the 2015 report The Show Must Go On took 2.6 passengers per car as the sector average, a figure specific to festivals with camping that you should not extrapolate to urban events or to Spain. Your real figure is what matters, and it can be measured.

Diagnosis means splitting the attendee's journey into four stages and measuring where the queue forms: arrival on the access road, entry to the car park, access control at the venue and exit. Each stage has different causes and solutions, and mixing them up leads to investing in the wrong measure.

What to measure and how: start with data that can be compared between editions, without complex technology.

• Counts of vehicles and people per stage and time slot, done by volunteers or traffic staff with a manual counter or from barrier and ticket-reader logs.
• Queue times, measuring how long a specific vehicle or person takes to cover the stretch at different times during the peak.
• Cameras and security reports, which help reconstruct afterwards when and where the flow broke down.
• Reports from previous editions: parking sales, ticket scans per hour, incidents and complaints.
• Ticketing postcodes and surveys (at the event or afterwards by email) to find out where the audience comes from, how it travels and how many people are in each car. This is the way of collecting travel data proposed by the onboard:earth guide (2024).

The most direct way to shorten the queue is for the same audience to arrive in fewer vehicles, and there are five ways to achieve it. Their effect is greater when combined and when attendees can choose them when they buy their ticket.

• Higher occupancy (carpooling). Raising the average number of people per car reduces vehicles without adding infrastructure. It helps to offer a simple way to find travel companions from the event's website or ticketing. We cover this in the guide on attendee transport.
• Collective transport. Dedicated coaches, shuttles from nearby stations or cities, and ticket-plus-transport packages. The onboard:earth guide (2024) describes ticket-plus-transport packages as an easy and decisive way to cut the number of cars, and notes that, according to coach operators, take-up rises when the option is offered at the point of sale of the ticket. To choose between shuttles and carpooling, see shuttle buses vs carpooling.
• Park-and-ride. A remote car park, linked to the venue by shuttle, takes cars off the final access road. It works if the shuttle is frequent, has its own lane or route and people are informed in advance.
• Incentives for other modes and for full cars. The same guide notes that priority parking or early entry for full cars has worked at festivals, and suggests surcharges for cars that are not full. It also recommends secure cycle parking and drop-off points for shuttles close to the gates.
• Parking restrictions and pricing. Charging for parking, raising the price if ticket sales allow, or limiting spaces pushes people to share or leave the car at home. The guide cites a study by ACT1.5 and the Tyndall Centre (2023) according to which cutting car parking by 20% could reduce audience travel emissions by 10%, excluding flights. It is a secondary citation about festivals; use it as guidance, not as a forecast.

To know how many spaces you need for each mode split, use the guide on parking spaces for an event and its calculator.

Flattening the arrival peak lets the same road and the same checks absorb more people without queues, because what saturates the access is the short arrival window. There are four tools.

• Arrival time slots. Assigning a recommended slot (or a reserved one, if parking is paid) when the ticket or parking space is bought spreads arrivals. If the slot is mandatory you need staff at the entrance to enforce it; if it is recommended, you need an incentive.
• Incentives to arrive early. Fast entry or a dedicated lane for early arrivals, better-located parking, activity before the main programme, food and drink or ambience areas open before the headline act. Giving people something to do is more effective than asking them to arrive early.
• Programming. Opening the doors earlier, placing attractive activity in the first hours and avoiding all the interest being concentrated in a single moment reduces the arrival wave. If there are several stages or sessions, stagger the schedules.
• Information during the peak. Telling the audience about each car park's occupancy, the state of the road and waiting times (by message, app, variable-message signs or social media) leads some drivers to arrive earlier or later, or to change zone.

If the bottleneck is physical, the solution is to expand or protect the capacity of the limiting point: more access points, separate flows, good signage, trained staff and checks with enough lanes. These measures deliver quickly on the day of the event, although they need advance preparation.

• More than one access. A second access, even if only for part of the public or for services, reduces pressure on the main one and provides an alternative if there is an incident. Validate it with the local council and with whoever manages the road.
• Separate flows. Public in cars, staff and artists, suppliers, taxis and ride-hailing vehicles, shuttles and emergency vehicles should not cross. Each flow gets its own entrance, route and stopping area. Emergency access must stay clear at all times.
• Signage. Clear routes from the motorway or main road exit to each car park, with signs legible at night, colours by zone and messages consistent with what the attendee received before the event.
• Traffic staff. Trained marshals at critical junctions, at each car park entrance and at the points where flows merge. A good marshal prevents blockages that a sign cannot solve. A prior briefing and a rehearsal of the route help.
• Zoned parking. Dividing the site into sectors, each with its own entrance, colour and capacity, and opening them in sequence, prevents all cars from heading to the same point and makes it easier to empty by sector on the way out.
• Security checks with enough capacity. Calculate the lanes you need by dividing the peak arrivals per minute by the number of people one lane processes per minute, measured in a real trial and not taken from the manufacturer. Add a margin for incidents and check the size of internal queues before the gate.

The physical layout of the car park (surface area, sectors, manoeuvring aisles and traffic direction) determines how long cars take to get in and out. The guide on parking spaces explains how to size it and the one on mobility management how to run it during the event.

The levers do not cost the same or take the same time to prepare, and the best combination depends on where your bottleneck is. The table compares their effect on the peak, cost, complexity and lead time in qualitative terms; the actual values depend on your event and your suppliers.

A practical rule: start with the cheap, quick levers (information, time slots, signage) while you prepare those that take months (shuttles, extra access points, programming). If the diagnosis points to the venue gate, do not spend on coaches; if it points to the road, do not add check lanes.

The exit jam is avoided by staggering the audience's departure, separating shuttles from cars and emptying car parks by sector with clear information. On the way out people are also tired and in a hurry, which complicates management; that is why a written and rehearsed plan is worthwhile.

1. 1

   Set a clearing target

   Decide with security and the local council how long you want each car park and the main road to take to empty, starting from the real time measured at the previous edition.

2. 2

   Stagger the audience's departure

   Programme a close that does not push everyone to leave at once: final activity in the venue, transition music or services open a few minutes longer. Keeping part of the audience back eases the car peak.

3. 3

   Separate shuttles from cars

   Give them their own route, stop and exit, and priority at junctions. A shuttle stuck in the car queue loses its advantage and puts people off using it next time.

4. 4

   Inform before the exit starts

   Send a message and use screens and the public address system with the recommended route, each car park's zone and the estimated exit time. This reduces circling and last-minute decisions.

5. 5

   Set up waiting areas

   Offer a space with toilets, water and food for those who prefer to wait for the pressure to ease. It is a reasonable option for those who are not in a hurry and takes cars out of the queue.

6. 6

   Empty car parks by sector

   Open the exits in a planned order, with staff at junctions and one-way systems. Close sectors that are already empty to redirect traffic to the freest exits.

7. 7

   Measure the clearing and adjust

   Record the departure time of the first and last vehicle, vehicles per hour at each exit and incidents. Compare with the target and adjust for the next edition.

An example with numbers helps show how diagnosis and measures fit together. All figures are hypothetical and chosen so the arithmetic is easy to follow; yours will be different.

The right message, sent at the right time and through the channel the attendee already uses, reduces traffic before it exists, because it changes decisions about mode, time and route. The onboard:earth guide (2024) concludes that the best results for encouraging more sustainable travel come at the ticketing stage.

• When buying the ticket. Offer collective transport, carpooling, a time slot and parking with a short explanation of why it pays off. This is the moment with the most room for decision.
• Between purchase and event. Send email reminders with the route, assigned car park, recommended slot, alternatives and exit plan. A long message sent only once does not get read.
• In the days before. Be specific: traffic forecast, road closures, shuttle status and opening times.
• On the day. Use app messages, social media, variable-message signs and the public address system to report car park occupancy, waiting times and alternative routes.
• On the way out. Explain what to do, which way to go and how long it will take, and point people to the waiting areas.

Traffic measures on public roads depend on the authorities, so check with your local council, local police and the competent traffic authority when and how to notify your event. Requirements depend on the municipality and the autonomous community; this is what the Spanish national rules say in outline.

• Events that occupy the road. As worded by Law 9/2025 of 3 December on Sustainable Mobility, article 12.8 of the consolidated Traffic Law requires notification at least ten working days in advance of activities for recreational, tourist or traditional purposes, without sporting competition, that need to occupy the road wholly or partly.
• Events that generate many journeys. The same article also requires notification, before the start, of events that do not occupy the road but may generate an abnormally high number of journeys affecting the flow and safety of roads. That paragraph sets no deadline and does not define “abnormally high”, so ask the competent authority.
• Sporting events and other events on roads. The General Traffic Regulations require prior authorisation for sporting events, cycling rides and other events on roads, following the procedure in its annex II.
• Self-protection plan. It deals with emergencies and evacuation, not mobility. The Basic Self-Protection Standard (Royal Decree 393/2007) requires it, among other cases, for open-air shows with an expected attendance of 20,000 or more, and the authorities may ask for it for other activities with special risk. Even so, emergency access and routes must stay clear in your traffic plan.

Before the event, share with them the expected attendance, main origins, estimated mode split, arrival and departure time slots, the access and flow plan, car park locations and capacities, the public communication plan and the day-of operations contacts. Afterwards, share the measured results: they will be the basis for negotiation for the next edition.

We recommend VIB3S as a carpooling solution for events: it helps you arrive with fewer vehicles for the same audience. Attendees share a car with people going to the same event through the free app (iOS and Android) or a web widget that embeds in your website, ticketing or emails with one line of code, and on VIB3S's side it is ready in under 24 hours.

From the widget, attendees see the published trips, publish their own and request a seat without downloading anything; the app adds chat with the driver, profiles, trip history and ratings. The driver shares the real costs of the trip (fuel and tolls) and the app is free for attendees. VIB3S complements public transport and shuttles.

To plan access, the organiser receives mobility data: the audience's geographic origin, arrival and departure time slots, the routes with the most demand, average occupancy per vehicle, shared kilometres, cars avoided and CO₂ calculated and validated on completed trips.

• Your event's carpooling community, in the app and on your website.
• A widget that embeds with one line of code, ready in under 24 hours.
• Origin and arrival and departure time data to plan access and car parks.
• A complement to public transport and shuttles.