Encounters
A crowd is not a number. It is a few thousand cells moving in a bounded space, colliding at a rate set by how tightly they are packed, how loud the room is, and whether anyone is looking up. Most collisions are nothing. A few carry something across. Pick a real gathering and go and watch it happen.
Filter by venue type
Gatherings (29)
Click to select, double-click to go down to the floor. Figures are published attendance for the period named on each site's marker.
What the venue changes
Nightclub floor
2 p/m² · 100 dB · 1.6 drinks/h · attention 0.8
Loud enough that speech only survives at arm's length, wet enough that inhibition drops. Maximum encounters, minimum range.
Beer tent
1.1 p/m² · 88 dB · 2.4 drinks/h · attention 0.95
Seated, long tables, the highest alcohol throughput of any venue here — and quiet enough to still hear a stranger.
Front of stage
3 p/m² · 105 dB · 0.9 drinks/h · attention 0.25
Everyone faces the same direction. Density is extreme but attention points away from the neighbours.
Street carnival
1.6 p/m² · 95 dB · 1.2 drinks/h · attention 0.7
A moving crowd. Encounters are frequent and brief because nobody occupies the same metre twice.
Pilgrimage ground
2.5 p/m² · 80 dB · 0 drinks/h · attention 0.5
The densest sober crowd on Earth. Bonds here form on shared purpose alone.
Street crossing
3.5 p/m² · 75 dB · 0 drinks/h · attention 0.15
The control case. Thousands of bodies inside touching distance and almost nothing forms, because nobody stops.
Conference floor
0.45 p/m² · 72 dB · 0.4 drinks/h · attention 0.9
Sparse and quiet: the longest speech range of any venue. Few collisions, but nearly all of them are deliberate.
Metro carriage
4 p/m² · 78 dB · 0 drinks/h · attention 0.1
The tightest routine packing of humans anywhere, and the least social space on this list. Bodies touching, nothing forming.
The queue
1.5 p/m² · 70 dB · 0 drinks/h · attention 0.85
Stationary strangers, sober, for hours, with nothing to do but the person next to them. The highest tie yield of any venue here — and not a drop of alcohol involved.
March
2.2 p/m² · 92 dB · 0.1 drinks/h · attention 0.55
A crowd that already agrees, moving together. Shared purpose raises contact, but the column keeps everyone walking.
Stadium concourse
1.9 p/m² · 85 dB · 1.1 drinks/h · attention 0.4
Fifteen minutes of half-time churn. Wet, loud and busy, but everyone is trying to get somewhere before the whistle.
Warehouse
2.6 p/m² · 106 dB · 1.3 drinks/h · attention 0.75
Louder than a club and packed tighter. Speech range collapses to almost nothing, so what forms here forms at touching distance or not at all.
Covered market
1.3 p/m² · 80 dB · 0.05 drinks/h · attention 0.5
Thousands of brief, functional exchanges an hour. Contact is constant and almost none of it survives the aisle.
Model and sources
The crowd is simulated, but none of its constants are invented. Movement, spacing, sound, alcohol and group size all run on published figures.
Speed vs density
Free walking speed 1.34 m/s, collapsing to zero at 5.4 p/m^2.
Weidmann (1993), Transporttechnik der Fussganger, ETH Zurich
Crowd level of service
Six density grades from free circulation to force propagation.
Fruin (1971), Pedestrian Planning and Design
Proxemic zones
Intimate 0.45 m, personal 1.2 m, social 3.6 m.
Hall (1966), The Hidden Dimension
Noise and speech range
Vocal effort rises 0.5 dB per dB of noise, never enough to hold distance.
Lane & Tranel (1971), J. Speech Hear. Res.; Hall (1966)
Blood alcohol
Widmark equation, 14 g standard drink, 0.015 %/h elimination.
Widmark (1932); NIAAA standard drink definition
Alcohol and group formation
Moderate doses increase group bonding; heavy doses reverse it.
Sayette et al. (2012), Psychological Science 23(8)
Conversation size limit
Speech groups fission beyond four participants.
Dunbar, Duncan & Nettle (1995), Human Nature 6(1)
Strength of weak ties
Novel information travels across bridges, not inside clusters.
Granovetter (1973), The Strength of Weak Ties, AJS 78(6)
Where couples meet
Bars and restaurants account for roughly a quarter of recent meetings.
Rosenfeld & Thomas, How Couples Meet and Stay Together (Stanford)
