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Alcohol sales may improve safety
Published 8:10am Thursday, September 22, 2011There has been some concern among students, faculty, administrators, and the rest of the Troy community at the prospect of serving alcoholic beverages inside the stadium at Troy University during football games.
Concerns focus primarily on the perceived increased rowdiness that may result from fans having access to alcoholic beverages during football games. While these concerns are well-intended and should be taken into consideration; at large evidence suggests that these concerns are unfounded.
Evidence from experts who have studied the control of alcohol at stadiums actually suggests that serving alcohol at stadiums during sporting events may actually increase the level of safety before, during, and after events. There are several reasons for this.
The enforcement of alcohol bans inside the stadium requires a tremendous amount of policing resources. Allowing the serving of alcoholic beverages during events will free up public safety personal to focus exclusively on subduing rowdy fans, who are likely be rowdy regardless of any alcohol restrictions inside the stadium, rather than on policing responsible sport fans.
Banning alcohol inside the stadium during events also increases the amount of drinking occurring before the game at off-premise locations, leading to increased drunk driving and drinking in unsupervised situations. Boyes and Faith published a 1993 study of the Arizona State University ban of alcohol sales, and found up to a 40% increase in the BAC levels of drivers stopped by police, both before and after the games, after the ban on alcohol inside the stadium was implemented. This occurred despite an increase in drunk driving penalties over this period.
Even if fans consume alcohol responsibly tailgating just outside the stadium, many fans linger outside the stadium consuming beverages until just right before the game starts, creating a potentially dangerous rush to the stadium. The same rush occurs during half-time when fans exit the stadium to consume more alcoholic beverages and then return.
Besides the risk of rushing fans coming in and out of the stadium, it also encourages binge drinking among fans, who consume dangerous amounts of alcohol in a short amount of time due to the unavailability of alcohol during the game. In their 1993 of Arizona State University’s ban on alcohol sales, Boyes and Faith found that fans increased their consumption of alcohol both prior to and after the game due to the alcohol sales restriction.
They argued that this alone lead to more damaging effects than those associated with allowing alcohol sales within the stadium.
Drinking at unsupervised locations off-premise, binge drinking and fans rushing in and out of the stadium are far more likely to cause rowdy behavior and pose a risk to football fans than alcohol sales within the stadium. Gary Pearson and Arianna Sale, in a 2011 study of alcohol controls at soccer matches in Britain, and Stuart Frosdick in a 1998 study in the Journal of Stadium and Arena Management, found that the risk of rowdy behavior actually increased with alcohol restrictions.
So not only would alcohol sales within the stadium increase the enjoyment of the spectacle during Troy University Football games, drawing in more fans to Troy, it would also likely increase the safety for Trojan football fans and the community at large.
Daniel J. Smith
Assistant Professor
Troy University
In the studies that were cited, were these bans on alcohol sales implemented following several years of alcohol sales already occurring? I would assume that by implementing such a ban, they were attempting to change an existing behavior.
My point is that humans are creatures of habit. In our situation, fans are not accustom to drinking inside the stadium. If someone drinks heavily outside the stadium now, there is no reason to believe that they will drink any less while tailgating, than they do now, simply because they would be able to drink while inside the stadium.
Ya’ll let me know how that works out.
Cheers, Go Trojans!
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Stop. Just stop. Nobody is buying it. People are not gonna change how much they drink reegardless of where they get it. Alcoholics are gonna drink until they pass out and those who drink responsibly will continue to do do. So stop blowing smoke. This is nothing more then another ploy to generate funds for a dying cause. Attendance is steadily declining so they are getting desperate: $15 M dining halls, new basketball arenas, and now selling alcohol. Maybe if they actually had a decent football team instead of one that almost loses to an 0-3 UAB team, more people would show up.
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And this is not gonna stop people from drinking before the game. Get real. So are they planning to ban drinking in the tailgate area so people won’t stay out there watching the Bama game?! Yeah. Ok. How about you first get the Stadium Club crowd to actually watch the game on the field instead of the Bama game on the TVs up there?!!
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Your wrong about attendance being on the decline. Go here:
http://www.troytrojans.com/sports/2010/7/20/FB_0720102122.aspx?path=football
and click the Game-By-Game stats. You will see that we are actually up over the first two home games that were played in Troy last year. And as far as your definition of “decent,” I think that being Sun Belt Conference champs for 5 straight years, after only 6 total years of being in the conference, more than qualifies for “decent.”
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General Admission tickets cost $15 dollars per game. Stadium Club members spend $100 per game. They are paying almost 7 times as much as me! If they want to watch TV then God Bless em! If you don’t want to support Troy, then it’s okay, we don’t need you. We are growing in number every day. Just stop being an uninformed Hater!
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General Admission used to be $20. What happened? Demand so high they lowered the prices?
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I may be wrong on the total years of being in the Sun Belt. I could be 7 instead of 6.
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You think 18000 is good for a “DIA” colllege football game against a rival on a beautiful day in Alabama? When Troy State played ASU and FAMU a LOT more people than that showed up.. Troy has no business in DIA. The Sunbelt is a joke. Its like Pike County wanting to be in the same division as Prattville or Hoover.
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Once again, the facts don’t support your statements. The fact that 18,000 people showed up to Veteran’s Memorial Stadium to watch Troy during the same time that Alabama and Florida were playing says all that you need to know. The Alabama game didn’t hurt our attendance. That is what I see when I look at the numbers. Do I think that Troy is as good as Alabama? No, of course I don’t. But neither are a vast majority of D1A schools. Should those teams not be worthy of D1A status either? Troy has won the Sun Belt for 5 straight years. Troy has also defeated many other D1A schools in other conferences, including an SEC team. What more proof is needed to convince you that Troy belongs in D1A?
The numbers posted so far from this year alone are enough to convince any reasonable person that Troy more than belongs in D1A. Just look at the common opponent that Troy and Auburn faced on the road, Clemson. Clemson was able to rack up 624 in total offense against the defending national champs, while only gaining 468 against Troy. The reality is that Troy is here and we are staying in D1A. We are now in the second decade of the 21st century. Stop posting these tired arguments left over from the 1990s.
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What other SEC team has Troy beaten besides a pathetic Miss State during a tornado? And who has Troy beaten since Missouri and Oklahoma State. Talk about living in the past! What have they done in the last five years? Ooooo won the big old Sunbelt against powerhouses like FAU, FIU and Middle Tennessee! The fact that the Troy/Alabama State game could bring 8,000 more fans than the Troy/UAB years later is what speaks volumes.
Face it, Troy used to be possible giant killer every three or four years just like every other school(Even Appalachian State beat Michigan a couple of years ago!) But now Troy has become nothing but a mildly amusing homecoming team that the big boys toy with for a couple of quarters and then bury in the end.
BTW, what is the highest ranking that ANY Sunbelt team has ever finished the season? Don’t answer that. You will only embarrass yourself even more.
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Your Alabama State to UAB comparison is flawed. Alabama State fans didn’t have to drive as far as UAB fans. Not to mention a lot of UAB (and Troy) fans stayed home to watch Alabama. I blame UAB for not bringing as many fans as Alabama State. My point was that in spite of Alabama playing at the same time as Troy, we still had a decent crowd. The Troy game ended up being much more exciting.
The Sun Belt has only had football since 2001. Nobody has ever claimed that this conference suddenly showed up in college football with a bunch of powerhouse teams 10 years ago. I do think that it’s a much stronger conference than it was 10 years ago.
Did you watch the Arkansas game? Their head coach didn’t look too amused to me.
Ask any team’s coaching staff that is preparing to face Troy. They all have a great deal of respect for Troy. At least that’s what they say in pregame interviews. Maybe they all are just lying.
As far as your problem with certain teams being D1A, maybe you should take it up with the NCAA. I’m done wasting my time arguing with your flat earth view of college football.
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Roger that, Copernicus…and good luck the rest of the year beating all of those powerhouse sunbelt teams.
Fact: the Arkansas staff was mad after the game because their team was so asleep that they let a scrub team like troy threaten them for a few minutes. But, like all of the other REAL teams, they woke up and dominated lowly troy. Chew on that cud for the season.
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