ECO-PIONEERS


The Blues festival at the Bath & West Showground inspired Michael Eavis to begin a festival of his own, and the first festival – then called the Pilton Festival – was held in September 1970. Acts included Marc Bolan and


THE HISTORY OF GLASTONBURY FESTIVAL


Stackridge, and the tickets cost £1, which included free milk from the farm. Around 1,500 people attended. During the 1970s, the festival was sporadic. In 1971 and 1979 it was organised by Bill Harkin and Arabella Churchill and in 1978 it was born from an impromptu gathering of travellers celebrating the summer solstice at Stonehenge. In 1981 the name was changed to Glastonbury Festival


tival by public transport, but get a lift home with friends, so it was important to offer flexibility by selling single as well as return tickets. We also organ- ised a free cycle ride from Bristol to the site, led by experienced cyclists and with support vehicles following to transport the cyclists’ bags and deal with any breakdowns en route. For 2011, we have decided to put the price of the car parking up to £20, so that we can use the extra money to subsidise the public transport.


How do you approach the issue of energy use?


November 2011 saw the launch of Worthy Farm’s new solar power system. More than 1,100 solar pho- tovoltaic panels have been installed on the roof of one of the cowsheds. These can generate enough power to meet 80 per cent of the farm’s elec- tricity demand; any excess power will be exported to the grid. We are trying to encourage some of the festival’s smaller stalls that don’t use much power to get their own


62


The first festival was held in


June 1970, on the day after Jimi Hendrix’s death. Glastonbury Festival celebrated its 40th anniversary in June 2010


and Michael Eavis took over the running of it. In this year, Eavis donated £20,000 to the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) from the festival profits. From this year onwards, most of the festival’s profits were donated to charities including CND, Greenpeace, Oxfam and Wateraid. In June 2010, the fesitval celebrated its 40th anniver- sary. Tickets cost £190 and the site capacity was 177,500.


mobile solar power units. We will prob- ably encourage this by reducing their pitch fee. If they do this they’ll then have their own power for all the festi- vals over the summer, which will save them money as well as saving power.


Which organisations do you work with? We donate to Greenpeace, Wateraid and Oxfam. We work closely with Greenpeace on our green initiatives, using them to bounce ideas off and asking them detailed questions. We also get involved with Greenpeace’s campaigns and use the festival to edu- cate festival-goers about these issues.


How do you go about protecting the wildlife on the site? That is closely monitored by the Environmental Health Organisation and Mendip Council. All the trees and wild- life are audited and we keep a record of how the land recovers. It’s quite amazing, considering the intensity of the festival, how the biodiversity of the site replenishes itself very quickly.


Read Leisure Management online leisuremanagement.co.uk/digital


We are committed to maintaining and increasing the high level of bio- diversity on the site. One of the ways we do this is by protecting vulnerable habitats. In 2005 a temporary reserve was created for a deer that emerged in Hawkwell, by the pyramid stage. A three acre reserve was created, from which the deer emerged unscathed at the end of the festival.


Do you think the attitudes of festival goers is changing? Yes, definitely. Sustainability is becoming much more mainstream. Glastonbury has a big reputation for its green initiatives – people take notice of what we do, which means we are really under the spotlight. The main way that we approach things is to focus on the areas where we are least sustainable, and try to improve those areas. Education is key and we are lucky in that we have such a great target audi- ence at Glastonbury – people really want to learn how to lessen their impact on the environment. l


ISSUE 1 2011 © cybertrek 2011


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68  |  Page 69  |  Page 70  |  Page 71  |  Page 72  |  Page 73  |  Page 74  |  Page 75  |  Page 76