News - Select Comes to Town

Select Security Group Ltd has provided Event Security, Crowd Safety Management and Event Traffic Management services for the annual Country Comes to Town festival in Portadown, Northern Ireland.

Select provided Event Stewards and licensed SIA Event Security Officers to the event over two days, beginning on the Friday night with a duck race along the River Bann, followed by a Dog Show beside the river.

At 0700 on the Saturday a large operation swung into action with the deployment of Event Stewards and SIA Event Security Officers across the Town Centre and in the People’s Park. Road Closures were erected by our specifically trained Event Traffic Management team to create a safe environment within the town centre for traders to setup their stalls.

The event benefitted from fantastic weather with a massive crowd of 50,000 descending on the town centre. Andrew McQuillan, Director, said:

“Working from several months before the event, we liaised with Event Organisers and the relevant bodies such as the Police Service of Northern Ireland, to ensure we had a comprehensive operational plan for the event.

One of the largest tasks we faced during the day was ensuring a safe passage out of the town for the parade of various vehicles including steam engines, tractors, vintage vehicles and horse drawn carriages. Working very closely with PSNI Traffic Officers on motorcycles, we cleared a route through the town and maintained this until the full parade had passed.”

We knew the town centre would be full of people so we also had to make sure we had alternative routes to allow the Emergency Services to quickly access every part of the town, should there be an incident. This worked well and also enabled our staff to quickly get to the few minor incidents that occurred during the day.”