While, as Andrew says, at Torquay the provision of separated areas was excellent, the enforcement of it left a lot to be desired.Andrew Zigmond wrote: ↑Sat Aug 10, 2019 1:19 amIn which case parents and spectators need to be kept in a designated areas as much as possible or prevented from using electronic devices outside of that area (at Torquay spectators were warned about the use of phones). At Torquay I felt provisions for this were excellent; there were separate toilets for players and a fast lane for players to buy refreshments without entering the analysis area. This isn't the case in every venue but then again these venues were hardly built specifically for chess events and sometimes the logistics don't make this possible.
The area immediately outside the playing halls had notices requesting silence and no mobile phone use, both of which were continuously ignored. On one occasion, when playing close to the entrance, I complained to an arbiter about noise from this area - the solution was to temporarily shut the doors.
Also while there was a fast track refreshment lane, there was no attempt to ensure that players only used this lane rather than venture into the main canteen area. That said, one day I noticed someone was sitting on the floor using a laptop actually in the fast track lane.
Last year at Hull there were venue staff attempting to ensure silence in relevant areas, which I didn't see in Torquay.