Analysis of local density during football stadium access: Integrating pedestrian flow simulations and empirical data

This study analyzes numerically the access of football fans to a typical football stadium through pedestrian flow simulations. With this aim, we introduce a novel framework to address the difficulty of simulating pedestrian dynamics in highly complex geometries with multiple accesses. The framework consists of a combination of the Social Force Model (SFM) and Computational Fluid Dynamics tools to calculate multiple desired velocity maps. The introduction of this framework allows the predefinition of the desired velocity fields for the complex geometries in both the interior and surrounding area of the stadium. We validate the results of the proposed framework using actual entry-rate data from the turnstiles of three gates for 15 matches provided by the football club. Remarkably, the validation process allows us to describe the temporal evolution of the spatial distribution of pedestrians during their arrival with a single set of parameters valid for all the analyzed matches. Finally, we assess the potential fatality risk based on the local pedestrian density varying the total number of attendees and their arrival rate. The outcome evidences permanent clogs emerge at the entrance in the most extreme cases with high attendance or low standard deviation of the arrival rate, indicating the possibility of fatality occurrence. •Simulation of pedestrian access to a stadium from the surrounding streets to specific grandstand seats.•Computational fluid dynamics-based calculation of desired velocity fields in complex geometries.•Reproduction of empirical data of the access of fans through turnstiles.•Analysis of the effect of the total number of attendees and the standard deviation of their arrival on maximum local densities.