EURO 08 - we enjoyed fair, clean and safe games

At the final press conference everybody agreed that Klagenfurt had seen “fair, clean and safe EURO matches. There were no problems whatsoever.“ All concepts – from traffic to security – worked out perfectly well according to Governor Jörg Haider, Mayor Harald Scheucher, Regional Police Commander Wolfgang Rauchegger and Public Safety Director Albert Slamanig.

Governor Haider provided the actual figures: “On the three match days, 285,000 football fans poured into Klagenfurt. On the first match day (Germany - Poland), there were 85,000, on the second match day (Germany - Croatia) 104,000 and on the third match day yesterday (Croatia - Poland) 96,000 football fans in the city.” If we add the 150,000 visitors on the days between the matches, a total of 435,000 fans visited the Carinthian capital during the EURO. All in all, Klagenfurt exceeded the UEFA visitor forecasts by 30 percent.
The traffic concept proved to be highly successful. An additional 15,000 people took trains or buses during the time of the group matches. The utilisation rate of public transport in Klagenfurt was higher than expected. “The public transport organisation recorded a doubling of passengers from 30,000 to 60,000 people”, Haider said.

The images of Carinthia and Klagenfurt broadcast by foreign TV stations are priceless advertising for the city and the region. “In all their coverage, the media always included references to our province”, Haider said. And here again, the Governor had some figures ready: The opening match between Germany and Poland was watched by 23.66 million people on the German ARD TV station, which was more than the fantastic number of viewers who watched the opening match in 2006. 25.08 million watched on German ZDF and 1.12 million on Austrian ORF. When Germany played Croatia, ARD counted 9.46 million viewers, ZDF 24.25 million and ORF 990,000 viewers. 10.48 million followed the match between Austria and Croatia on ARD, 11.26 million on ZDF and 1.48 million on ORF. The match between Austria and Poland had 13.11 million viewers on ARD, 14.23 million on ZDF and 1.66 million on ORF.
Scheucher spoke about “fair, clean and safe games” and about a celebration of football in Klagenfurt. The Mayor also reported that the catering stands on Pfarrplatz would stay open until 29 June. As of today, Karfreitstraße will be accessible again, while 10. Oktober-Straße will remain a fan mile. The Bavarian beer tent in Europapark will also be open until 29 June.

Regional Police Commander Rauchegger, too, was happy about the peaceful EURO football matches. “Our task concept worked out perfectly”, he said. With reference to the alleged car burglaries he informed the media that one person had already been arrested and two others searched.
Public Safety Director Slamanig said that the past few days were a “veritable triumph of cooperation”. The highly complicated task was mastered in an excellent way. He confirmed that the four years of intensive preparations had paid off.