Istanbul CL Final chaos | City Matters statement (p 133)

[kerem gokmen]

We were warned not to use them by locals. I did it through Uber so no problems.

are there ubers still in istanbul? i am asking as an istanbul guy. i thought there were no ubers since 2-3 years. also supreme coart banned uber last week. have you really used official uber? thanks.

Uber Banned In Turkey | NationalTurk

The 11th Civil Chamber of the Supreme Court of Appeals affirmed the decision of the local court, stating that the reasons put forward by the lawyers of the

www.nationalturk.com

 

[cptaidan88]

are there ubers still in istanbul? i am asking as an istanbul guy. i thought there were no ubers since 2-3 years. also supreme coart banned uber last week. have you really used official uber? thanks.

Uber Banned In Turkey | NationalTurk

The 11th Civil Chamber of the Supreme Court of Appeals affirmed the decision of the local court, stating that the reasons put forward by the lawyers of the

www.nationalturk.com

It just linked to yellow taxi's but sometimes no one would accept the ride (because they wanted to negotiate a higher price instead)

 

[WestGorton]

are there ubers still in istanbul? i am asking as an istanbul guy. i thought there were no ubers since 2-3 years. also supreme coart banned uber last week. have you really used official uber? thanks.

Uber Banned In Turkey | NationalTurk

The 11th Civil Chamber of the Supreme Court of Appeals affirmed the decision of the local court, stating that the reasons put forward by the lawyers of the

www.nationalturk.com

Yes we booked through Uber and at payment the drivers questioned it and we said Uber and that was it. They were preferring cash but accepted it. The fare to the airport was 400 lire which is £20. Cheap.

 

[kerem gokmen]

It just linked to yellow taxi's but sometimes no one would accept the ride (because they wanted to negotiate a higher price instead)

yes, that usually happens. i wrote warnings about those last week. but UBERS? i dont think they are really ubers. they are probably fake... thats why i am surprised...

on matchday, i had to take a taxi on bagdat street (kadıkoy)at 9.30pm, since no places was broadcasting or they were full. so i stand in the middle of bagdat street (drunk), tried to stop yellow taxis, none of them was stopping. but i stopped one by force, offered him a good tip for 3km ride (there is apub near my house/ i watched there). anyway. ofcourse that was nothing compared to the problems you guys experienced.

 

[kerem gokmen]

Yes we booked through Uber and at payment the drivers questioned it and we said Uber and that was it. They were preferring cash but accepted it. The fare to the airport was 400 lire which is £20. Cheap.

interesting.... thanks..

 

[Brightwell Bros.]

Yes we booked through Uber and at payment the drivers questioned it and we said Uber and that was it. They were preferring cash but accepted it. The fare to the airport was 400 lire which is £20. Cheap.

I tried to use the official app but just couldn't get them to accept the ride. But that also meant I had an idea what the "proper" price was. Was quoted 3000 for a trip to the airport, sacked it off and got a metro/coach that came to under 100. Robbing fucks.

 

[levets]

Level playing Field are taking UEFA to task over this…

Level Playing Field | Positive experiences for disabled sports fans

We believe that attending and engaging with live sporting events has a positive impact on wellbeing. We work at every level to ensure that disabled fans can freely access and enjoy live sport.

www.levelplayingfield.org.uk

Good morning Stephen.
I hope all is well.

Let me start by thanking you for giving up your time to provide such a detailed report regarding your experience at the CL Final.
Sadly, the same issues have arisen over the past few days regarding the poor matchday experiences many disabled Manchester City supporters faced.

With the evidence we have gathered, Level Playing Field will write to UEFA today to raise our disappointments and concerns regarding the final, a final that UEFA promised would be different to Paris.

We will then release the letter to the public via a press statement mid-morning tomorrow.

It is Level Playing Field policy to only name a supporter/s if they are happy for names to be attached to a complaint or press release.
With this in mind, I am emailing all supporters who have provided evidence to see if they are happy to have their name attached to any evidence that we might use in our letter to UEFA/press statement and if they would also be open to possibly speaking to media if we get any request to communicate to supporters.

Please let me know if you are happy to be named and happy to be referred to if a press request comes in.

Lastly congrats on the treble.
If you have any questions, please do ask.

​ Liam Bird (pronouns: he, him, his) Fans Liaison Officer M: 07566 831627 | P: 01923 545370 W: http://www.levelplayingfield.org.uk/ The Junction, Station Rd, Watford, WD17 1ET

 

[Jogon 127]

I'm not disagreeing by any stretch mate. But we are kidding ourselves if we think UEFA will do anything about it or even apologise or compensate fans.

Not sure, loads of ambulance chasers sorting the dippers out.

 

[Andy_Jones]

Been to Turkey/Istanbul on business many times, for years.
You will be ripped off unless you challenge everything and stand up to it - locals preyed on this around the stadium when vulnerability was high.
UEFA put us on buses with all the consequential issues, Inter were to use the Metro.
They also made sure that a repeat of stadium access aka Paris wasnt going to happen and lots of searching and sheep penning was in order.
All posts in this feed shockingly describe the treatment of our fans by UEFA. Post match was horrendous.
We luckily had a local Turkish friend who after we shared what UEFA planned, insisted on driving us to/from the ground and even he was shocked with the traffic/queues plus that we had to walk several miles after the game navigating traffic with risk to injury or life to meet him on the motorway.
London and Munich will of course be fine for the next 2 years so UEFA and our club will do nothing at all.

 

[levets]

From a BBC journalist who was there as a City fan (Ellis PB)

Hi there,

Apologies for the slight delay in getting this to you. I’ve just been spending the last few days trying to recover physically and psychologically from what was a knackering, inaccessible experience of the UEFA Champions League final as a wheelchair-using disabled fan. As my mother put it in a Man City fan group: “Everything went well getting to Turkey until anything UEFA were meant to organise kicked in… Then it was chaos!”. As I was mostly focused on getting out of there alive and with an unbroken wheelchair so I did not take any pictures…

For the purposes of this email, I’m going to split my feedback into several sections.

ACCESS IN ISTANBUL CITY

• Were any holistic checks around access for disabled fans done when considering Istanbul as a host city for the Champions League final?
• From a public realm accessibility perspective, the city was a far cry comparative capital cities. Simple infrastructure such as dropped kerbs to help wheelchair users get across the road at a crossing point were - at best - partial and - at worst - non-existent.
• The ability for a disabled person to maneuver in public was nigh on impossible without the support of an aide, such was the unpredictability at crossing points and surface consistency.
• The citizens of the city were incredibly helpful when it came to providing support with access - although. at times, it did feel a bit smothering towards one’s independence (such as when the taxi driver picking me up at the airport tried to carry me out of my chair into the seat in his taxi).

BEFORE THE GAME - FAN PARK AT YENIKAPI

• Transport to the Man City fan park at Yenikapi was not easy to come across. After walking around trying to find a way there, we stumbled across the tourist information centre at Sırkecı metro station. They very helpfully provided us with a metro map and told us where to go to get on the metro. When we got into Sırkecı station, although there was an initial very steep ramp, the accessible entrance and lift was clearly signposted.
• The metro system was fantastic, incredibly clean and step-free. Unfortunately, UEFA advised that Man City fans could not use the system, even though it was a step-free route to the ground, so we got off at Yenikapi. The lift was easily accessible there too, but unfortunately the route between there and the ground lacked dropped kerbs and had a number of unsafe, uneven surfaces that I struggled to use even with my mother’s support.
• Upon our arrival at the fan park at Yenikapi, we were ushered into the “disabled queue” to get past security. Unfortunately, this was over uneven gravel as well.
• The accessible toilets at Yenikapi were well signposted and reasonably accessible. Like everything in Turkey there was a steep gradient incline on the ramp in and out, meaning one could not enter and exit safely without support. The toilets were nicely built, but poorly maintained - there was no toilet paper available in the one we went to.
• Although there were some accessible pathways in the fan park at Yenikapi, if one wanted to get to, say, the official store to purchase a programme or other merchandise, one had to go over some uneven land to get there and there were no access queues available, meaning one had to stand in a crowded queue for over 45 minutes just to purchase a programme and a pump bag.

BEFORE THE GAME - TRANSPORT

• The metro system was fantastic, incredibly clean and step-free. Unfortunately, UEFA advised that Man City fans could not use the system, even though it was a step-free route to the ground.
• The access queue system worked well at Yenikapi, once we could find a steward who knew what was going on. A wheelchair-using non-Man City supporter who was without a ticket tried to tailgate us and was almost successful, until we pointed out he what he was trying to do (better security checks needed?). When we got to the front of the queue, we were ushered onto the first bus that was available. Despite this, we heard later that some of our fans had been in the bus queue for over two hours (a nightmare if you have an invisible disability).
• Despite the bus having a very steep gradient and needing the assistance of several people to get up and down it safely, the bus was modern and comparatively accessible with USB sockets next to the accessible spaces, meaning I was able to put my phone and phone charger on charge during the journey (an essential as UEFA had only provided us with mobile tickets).
• The traffic management from the fan park to the stadium could and should have been so much better - it took nearly two hours, with logjams in various places.

BEFORE THE GAME - MAN CITY FAN PARK AT THE STADIUM

• Upon our arrival at the Ataturk Stadium fan park, we waited until our fellow passengers had got off before disembarking down the steep ramp to the fan park. There were no wayfinders or “mobility marshals” available to assist along the route.
• The route from the bus to the fan park can best be described as “independently impassable rubble”. It was an incredibly uneven and inconsistent surface that I even struggled to get over with my mother’s help. If I had stopped at any point, it would have been difficult - nigh on impossible - to restart without risking damage to my wheelchair.
• As I said before, there was no wayfinding assistance from the bus to the fan park. This meant that the entrance to the fan park was something of a log-jam, with fan ignoring the fact I was in the queue because I was out of their eyeline and pushing past me in their attempt to get in. There was minimal crowd control at the ticket checking barrier, if any at all.
• Once we got in, we made our way to the right-hand side of the stage to try and get some food. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted there was an accessible cashier point, so we went over to that and purchased our items. So far so good - but it was a half-hearted attempt at providing an accessible way to get food, because after you had placed your order, the only way to get the food was to join a very inaccessible and long queue to the food counter. My mum, acting as my PA, went and did this for me, leaving me with fellow fans, but reported back that it was a very inaccessible queuing system.
• After eating a very over-priced, poor quality vegan burger, I decided to try to find a toilet. After finding a steward who told me that it was the other side of the fan park, I traipsed over there, only to find there were no wayfinders and no easy way to find the accessible portakabin. After walking down three rows of inaccessible toilets, I found the accessible toilet. There was queue of non-visibly disabled Irish/American Man City fans waiting to use it, but they let me go ahead of them. The fanpark toilet itself was a little dirty by this point (four hours to kick off) and the floor had piss on it, which was something of a trip hazard.
• Around three hours before kick-off, a member of fan park staff came over and told us there was an accessible shuttle to the stadium we could get on. Unfortunately, despite there being loads of staff waiting around doing very little. they did not manage the queue for this correctly: we ended up being at the back of the queue for two successive shuttles/ In the end, we ended up walking to the stadium as it was quicker and once you got out of the gravelly fan park. it was a very smoother, clear, and independently accessible wheeling route to the stadium.

THE STADIUM AND GAME ITSELF

• When we got to the outside of the stadium, I noted where the accessible entrance was and we went towards it. Unfortunately, the gradient of the dropped kerb was less-than-ideal and I required assistance to get up it.
• Once we’d got to the clearly-marked accessible entrance, it was very easy to get past the ticket and security checks and to our seats. The security and ticket staff were very friendly.
• Unfortunately, when we got to our seat, there no meet-and-greeting stewards to tell us about the accessible facilities that were available to us at the stadium.
• The accessible toilets were a bit of a nightmare to find. They were not easily signposted. In fact, for the first time when I went shortly after my arrival at the stadium, I actually used the non-disabled men’s toilets because I could not find the accessible ones and there was no one around to help signpost me to it.
• The second time I went to the toilet, one of our own stewards (Ian - I think his name was - who normally works in the Legends’ Lounge at the Etihad) had to take me and a guy with a bag to them, because of the UEFA local stewards were useless and very unapproachable.
• When it came to getting food and drink, for the first hour-and-a-half at the stadium, we just looked at the queue and decided against purchasing anything from it because it was so long and no one came by to tell us about the accessible payment point. Eventually, around an hour before kick-off a suited-and-booted Turkish steward with questionable English came by and introduced himself to us. He told us where the access queue was and took us over to the front of it. However he promptly abandoned us when we got there, meaning that there was a significant communication barrier between us and the staff.
• For an event sponsored by Mastercard, it was very weird that when we came to pay the vastly-overinflated prices, you could only pay in cash and no card option was available.
• No free tap water or drinking water station were provided inside or outside the stadium. Fans who needed water were made to pay for squishy cartons which were very inaccessible.
• Regarding media positions taking over the seats of disabled supporters, I am disappointed to tell you that seats 224 and 225 were overtaken by a media gantry position (these were the seats immediately to my left), rendering them inaccessible to any disabled fans who might otherwise have used them. It looked as though similar seat positions were occupied by media gantry positions for the Inter Milan fans too.
• During the game, there was very little crowd control. Large numbers of fans stood behind the accessible seats; this was great for creating an atmosphere, but it did make entering and exiting the seats potentially difficult.

AFTER THE GAME - TRANSPORT

• This was absolute bedlam. It was probably the worst experience I’ve ever had exiting a stadium - and I’ve been in a Met Police kettle with Millwall fans after they lost at Wembley.
• When your team wins the Champions League, you want to stay and make memories from it. Unfortunately, upon exiting the stadium, UEFA created only nightmares.
• We exited the stadium using the nearest accessible exit point. There were no wayfinders nor access lanes, so you were shoved straight into thousands of fans trying to get out of the same place and to the same place, with people pushing past you at narrow entrances with very little by way of crowd control.
• We eventually made it out the stadium and onto the road. In the immediate area of the stadium, there was very little by way of traffic control, meaning that private taxis seemingly picking up corporate fans were able to use the same road thousands of Man City fans were trying to cross to get out to the fan park.
• We got onto the smooth road back to the bus area at the fan park and it was lined with police and well-controlled.
• That was, until you got to the actual turn into the fan park, which was a narrow uneven passageway thronged with hundreds of ambulant fans not really looking where they were going and with ZERO access stewarding or attempts at crowd-control by the authorities.
• Next came the extremely dangerous gravel again - only this time, it was pitch-black too, so it was even more difficult to work out where you were going safely,
• Here’s a moment I never forget and is very poignant to the shambolic nature of the way things were run by UEFA. We were making our way over this dangerous gravel in the pitch black towards a free-for-all of buses and coaches back to the city and the airport with no access provision in sight. My mother, who was struggling to help me with my electric wheelchair through the darkness and the gravel. spotted some clearly marked “mobility marshals” and approached them calmly to ask for guidance and support. Rather than the help and guidance she was expecting from these three young blokes, she was shouted at and told to “Go away!” and they immediately went back to tapping their phones and did not give us any help and support.
• After 15 minutes of trudging through snaking traffic in the bus park trying to find a bus with an accessible space on it back to Yenikapi’s fan park on gravel that I was convinced at any moment would break my wheelchair and leave me stranded, a kindly taxi driver convinced a bus driver to lower down the ramp and let me on. Again, the gradient up onto the bus was dangerous and required the assistance of several people (thank God my electric wheelchair is relatively lightweight).
• The traffic out of the stadium was woeful - at one point we didn’t move for around 45 minutes. The traffic control to support those using the public transport that UEFA had laid on was non-existent and so getting back into the city was carnage.
• We eventually got back into the city after several hours on the bus (at nearly 3am). The driver made an impromptu stop at somewhere that appeared to be near a public transport hub we could use to continue our journey. Most of our fans on the bus got off at this stage, but when my mother asked him if he would be able to put the ramp down so I could get off, he just said “Not here” sharply and drove off at speed.
• We then got to the edge of the fan park - and rather than there be an organised bus park like earlier - we were dumped at the side of the highway with an inaccessible pavement until someone realised we could get through a gap in the metal fencing onto some uneven gravel.
• We eventually made it to Yenikapi metro station over the same difficult pavements, where a kindly security guard took pity on us and rushed us down to get what must have been one of the last metros of the night.

CONCLUSION

I would urge UEFA to consider the holistic accessibility of a city (street infrastructure, surfaces in and around fan parks, and having staff dedicated and properly trained to assist disabled supporters at fan parks and stadiums) when looking at potential candidate cities for future Champions League finals.