What screening do stadiums need under Martyn's Law?

Martyn's Law requires qualifying venues to take proportionate steps to reduce vulnerability to terrorism; it does not mandate specific equipment. For most stadiums that means a documented search regime at entry, commonly walk-through metal detectors calibrated for bladed weapons plus bag search, with X-ray screening where the risk assessment justifies it. RedteQ advises venues on what is proportionate rather than what is most expensive.

How many screening lanes does a stadium need?

It depends on expected footfall and how long your doors are open. The calculation that matters is people per hour through each lane against your admission window — a queue held outside the perimeter is itself a crowd risk. RedteQ models this with venues before specifying equipment, and AI-assisted lanes allow one operator to oversee several X-ray lanes at a consistent detection standard.

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Stadiums · arenas · concert halls

Screening For Stadiums And Venues

Thousands of people through a handful of gates in forty minutes, and a licensing authority asking what your search regime is. We have built entry screening for Commonwealth Games venues, international football, championship golf and arena events — and we will tell you honestly how much of it you actually need.

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What You're Actually Trying To Stop

Be specific about the threat before you specify equipment, because the answer changes everything downstream. At UK venues the dominant weapon is a blade, and the catastrophic risk is a person carrying something into a dense crowd. That is a different problem from an airport's, and it deserves a different checkpoint.

Bladed weapons — the realistic, common threat at a UK venue, and the one a properly calibrated archway is genuinely good at finding.
Mass-casualty items — firearms and devices, which is where AI-assisted bag screening earns its place.
Pyrotechnics and flares — the item most likely to actually turn up, and a serious one: a lit flare in a stand burns hot enough to cause life-changing injuries and starts crowd surges. They are small, easily concealed and routinely missed by a hand search of a full bag, which is exactly what X-ray screening and AI detection are there for.
The queue itself — a crowd held outside your gates is a risk you have created. Throughput is a security consideration, not just a customer service one.

A row of walk-through metal detectors forming the entry line at a large venue — Gate screening built for flow: enough lanes that the queue never becomes the risk.

Our recommendation

What We'd Put At Your Gates

A venue checkpoint is a system, not a shopping list. Archways do the people screening, bag search resolves what they find, and AI takes the specialist load off your operators.

Walk-Through Metal Detectors

Garrett Paragon archways with zone indication, so a steward knows where the alarm came from. Quick-Q keeps phones and keys in pockets, which is what actually holds a queue up.

Archways →

AI-Assisted Bag Lanes

X-ray with automatic threat flagging so one operator can oversee multiple lanes at a consistent standard — the answer to the screener shortage every venue faces.

AI detection →

Hire Or Buy

Season-long hire for a stadium, weekend hire for a one-off, or purchase where screening is now permanent. The same engineers either way.

Checkpoint hire →

Just as important

What You Probably Don't Need

You almost certainly don't need airport-grade screening. Aviation screening is built to find very small prohibited items and accepts slow lanes to do it. Apply that standard at a stadium and you will not find more weapons — you will create a large unscreened crowd outside your perimeter while people queue. The proportionate answer is high-confidence detection of the threats that matter, at a speed your gates can sustain. We would rather specify fewer lanes that flow than more lanes that jam. And if a walk-through archway plus a trained bag search covers your risk assessment, we will say so rather than selling you an X-ray you'll switch off by the second event.

In practice

How It Runs Day To Day

Before doors

Lanes built, powered and image-verified, with your stewards briefed on what the alarms mean and how to resolve them.

During the event

Engineers on site or on call for covered events. At recent major events, faults were fixed on site in under an hour.

Between fixtures

Systems serviced, or collected and returned next season. IRR17 compliance handled if you own X-ray.

Martyn's Law raises the question for most venues; it does not answer it. We will walk your site and tell you what is proportionate — see our Martyn's Law guide.

Proof

Over 100 Machines For The Commonwealth Games

Birmingham 2022 needed screening across multiple venues to a fixed, immovable deadline. RedteQ installed over 100 X-ray machines with 24-hour cover, planned to the hour and handed over before doors.

Read the case study

RedteQ screening checkpoint built inside a marquee for the Commonwealth Games

Tell Us About Your Venue

Capacity, gates, doors-open window and what your licensing authority is asking for. We will tell you what is proportionate.

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