Ippodromo Snai La Maura — Attraction in Milan

Hippodrome Snai La Maura in Milan is often used for concerts, but it is a total disaster and torture for visitors. Especially in hot summer days. I do not understand, why the city of Milan does not use a normal stadium (which they actually have!) for concerts instead of this disgusting place.

The hippodrome is just a dusty field WITHOUT tribunes, so, there is practically no point AT ALL, from which you can see the whole stage. If you are lucky to buy the most expensive tickets to the so called Golden Circle and crazy enough to come 5 hours before the beginning, then MAYBE you can take a narrow spot near the end of the stage, but still you will not be able to see it whole like on a normal stadium. All other lucky visitors will just see fragments on the screens.

Since there are no tribunes, there is no any roof or tents or whatsoever. And no fixed places with numbers. Seats? Forget it. You need to go to a toilet? Your spot in the crowd is lost, sorry. Theoretically there are some water refill stations and food stands, but, if you go there you cannot come back to the spot which you occupied earlier, especially near the stage.

The organisation of the concert of BLACKPINK was a torture because they opened the gates FIVE HOURS before the beginning. The control on the entrance was fast and uncomplicated, so I really don't understand the need to let (actually, to force) people in so early. My daughter was dreaming about this concert for months, so even with tickets in the Golden Circle we had to come early to occupy a relatively good spot where she could see at least something. Most of time we saw the backs of taller people standing in front of us, by the way. Being bulked and stucked and permanently touched by other sardines, sorry, visitors.

There were MANY CHILDREN which was clearly predictable. And all those children and their adults were forced by the organisators to stand on a dusty field 5 hours in August heat BEFORE the beginning and then further 3 hours straight.

What they did for us was spraying water from a hose over our heads two times and gave several water bottles to the people in the first row. Wow. I thanked God that the day was cloudy, but it was still 30 degrees. One girl near us fell down and was evacuated before the beginning of the concert.

The concert itself was great, but our friends showed us photos from the same concert in Paris to compare. There was a normal stadium, with numbered seats, roof, toilets, great view of the stage from every point. They came 20 min before the beginning and really had fun. Their tickets cost about the same. If only I knew this before, I would definitely buy tickets to Paris, not to Milan. We came from Germany anyway, so it would not be a big difference in price, but a crucial difference in quality of the experience. So, if you have choice, chose any other concert place, not this one....

Probably the worst venue I've ever been to, when I saw Dua Lipa for the I DAYS festival.

The venue is essentially a giant grass field, divided into physically distinct, non-crossable sections depending on your ticket type. There was almost zero signage anywhere, and we accidentally entered the wrong queue, only discovering this fact after one of the organizers yelled something in Italian. How hard is it to erect a cardboard sign at the start of the queue saying "Ingresso Rosso"?

They opened for entry at 16:00, which was 5 HOURS before Dua Lipa was scheduled to go on stage. The only entertainment was some radio channel that kept yelling their own name every 30 seconds. In the mean time, people were sleeping on the grass and getting baked by the hot sun.

Need something to drink during the 5 hours waiting time? Okay sure, but first you need to buy "Tokens" in a separate queue - a completely unnecessary and annoying step, designed ONLY in the hopes that people forget to use them all, as they are non-refundable.

Getting hungry? Expect a country like Italy to have pizza slices or maybe some spaghetti for sale at a so-called music festival? Think again. How about some dry bread with a few slices of serrano ham and nothing else.

5 hours have passed and Dua Lipa finally goes on stage. This is the ONLY redeeming quality of the venue - the show itself was awesome, the lighting was great, the sound was fine. However, we were lucky to get a good view, quite far up the stage. Our section was second row from the front. The section behind us probably couldn't see anything at all.

Show is over, and people start to leave - in the ONE SINGLE exit available in your section. Huge jam ensues, but eventually we get out.

Now its time to get home. Except, you can't. The closest Metro, Uruguay, is closed. Zero buses. Zero taxis. 80.000 people wander on the street for over an hour. We get to the next station. Eventually the ENTIRE metro line closes, since people are cramming onto the trains. Replacement buses arrive, but there is no announcement or signage, and no people to guide tourists who don't speak Italian. My BF and I walk around desperately for over 2 hours trying to get a taxi. No luck. We eventually find a hotel that manages to get contact with the taxi company, and we find our way home.

In all fairness to Ippodromo Snai La Maura, this misadventure was entirely due to the incompetent event organizers (both the festival organizers and the City of Milano), and not so much the venue itself.

I hope this review helps someone out there to plan accordingly - PREPARE for a crazy long wait time, and PREPARE for how to get...

Interesting choice of venue for a music festival. The lack of water was definitely noticeable. We were inside the venue for four hours, and outside in queues for about four hours too, which was nice. All in all I think we saw about 20 ambulances picking up people outside alone. I'd say stock up using the water fountains outside, but we did this and our bottles were thrown away by the security at the gate. Definitely a nice contrast with the advice to 'drink lots of water' that was playing on the stage screens. I've never seen a bar run out of water before but neither the scam token-only (2€ = 1 token) bar nor the scam drinks vendors in the crowd had any water by the end of the event. Putting flags at the start of the queues might seem smart, but as queues continued for several kilometres and all converged at the back of the park, we and hundreds of other people ended up waiting in completely the wrong queue for no reason. Letting groups through in groups is also an interesting crowd control decision; isn't that exactly what caused the crush at Hillsborough? A slow trickle might be better than large clumps (which are what you will find after your half hour wait at the Portaloos, too). People were sprinting to get in in each group, which led to massive crushes. This wasn't helped by doors opening (to the roughly 69,000 attendees) a full hour late. We were in the pit, which was very full- but as I ate properly as a child I'm taller than 90% of Italians and had a nice view of the stage. No real complaints for the setup itself apart from the screens which kept breaking and the audio which often went quiet for a few beats and then played all the sound in one loud bang. Really kept you on your toes, that. I've been to quite a few concerts and festivals, and I have never felt as unwelcomed as here in Mailand. The I-Days festival reflected the city- poorly organised, dirty, overcrowded, very late, and very, very smelly. I don't understand why the venue changed to this nasty dusty field instead of the huge venue right next to it. Certainly, no artist could ever motivate me to come back to this disaster of a setup. The horrendous setup completely destroys any of the musical talent the...