The opening events for Manchester’s new Co-op Live Arena, a £365 million project, have been cancelled due to necessary last-minute work. The 23,500-capacity venue was set to become the largest indoor arena in the UK upon completion. According to The Guardian, power supply issues and other problems such as long food queues, unfinished seating, and crowd control issues were cited by the venue’s spokesperson as causing the delay.
Just an hour before the scheduled opening of the test event, which was set to feature Rick Astley and attended by 11,000 ticketholders including 2,000 staff members, thousands received cancellation notifications. Due to the Co-op Live Arena’s cutting of capacity just hours prior to the event, many ticketholders were left dissatisfied with the so-called “owners” not caring for those involved in building it.
The subsequent two opening events featuring performances by comedian Peter Kay were also cancelled after the delay. Co-op Live Live stated that they were looking forward to the opening of the venue and that they were rigorously testing critical procedures as part of their opening process. In an apology to affected guests, the venue reduced the overall capacity for the test event and expects them to attend the Black Keys.
Earlier in the year, the arena was embroiled in a licensing row with Manchester’s AO Arena after Co-op Live claimed that it was being blocked from obtaining a 24-hour alcohol license for “competition reasons
Read the full article from Mixmag here: Read More