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Post: Barclays Center is using metal detectors again (blaming NBA/NYPD)

A year after removing metal detectors when fans freaked out over the hyper-security, Barclays Center officials have quietly re-installed the controversial screeners.
Even fans who just want to visit the Downtown Brooklyn arena’s box office have to go through the large, box-shaped contraptions.
...Barclays CEO Brett Yormark insisted that cops and NBA officials wanted the arena to use metal detectors. Barclays Center had been using less-intrusive hand-held wands.
“We believe that walk-through magnetometers will even better serve our guests in providing a safer environment,” Yormark said.
“With the support of New York law-enforcement experts and NBA security [officials] we have decided to utilize walk-through magnetometers at all events.”
MTV, which staged the Video Music Awards at Barclays on Aug. 25, asked for metal detectors and the arena complied — hatching the idea to bring them back, according to Yormark.
Note that the headline is a little misleading. The metal detectors are apparently used for all entrances, not just for ticket sales.

One commenter on NetsDaily wrote
I missed most of the Kidd ceremony
because of this. The lines were CRAWLING getting into the arena.
Bad decision.
Here are two more:
Pearl jam concert was slow also
And I don’t know what good the security did because half the people were smoking pot. These days knives and even guns can be made of plastic. So metal detectors are pointless in stopping these things.
To be honest, things moved so quickly with the wand, because the security used common sense in who they went over with a fine tooth comb. I do believe that when it comes to safety common sense and realistic training by the security is what will keep us all safe, not blanket measures.
But if they feel that this is the safest way, then I guess they’re trying to do what they think is best. I always show up to the games mad early, so it doesn’t affect me.
--it always cracks me up...
when you’re at a show like that and then back at a bball game the following night. It goes from R Rated to PG so quick in terms of crowd “participation.”
in terms of security, I completely agree with you, the wands worked just fine. Leave it to the highly (and very even tempered) disney trained staff to make the call on who to ‘investigate’ more. They seemed to do perfectly well last year and kept that line moving.
February night games are going to be brutal out there.


On Twitter, Yormark responds

I don't think the story's inappropriate, as arena/Nets CEO Brett Yormark suggests, in a tweet that looks like he's trying to change the subject.

Maybe the arena should've gotten in front of it and explained why it was changing its policy, instead of waiting for a tabloid to do so.

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