UKC

Slight disclaimer, I may or may not be a routesetter. I may or may not contract or work in house. Either way, my views are my own and do not represent those of any wall or person, unless stated.

routesetting. What a pain. You know that product that walls sell? Routes? A wall with naff routes is a naff wall, no two ways about it. Same goes for old routes. Poor route turnover is boring, bad value for money. 

General consesus amongs various informal polls suggests a 3 month turnover for routes is ideal, but that's another topic. Today we're talking about the disruption of it. Or more the moaners and complainers.

routesetting is vital, if it doesn't happen, you'd moan, so why moan when it happens?

yes it's loud, and yes it closes areas off, but that's a necessary evil.

setters will be booked months in advance, the wall commits to paying them. Setters will turn down other earning potentials to honour bookings. Money is committed to that setter. So no, the setter can't come back later. 

Unfortunately from time to time walls get busy, external groups appear without notice. Why should they be turned away when they're bringing more cash in than the average punter?

so when the wall gets a bit busy, who gives? 

Do you complain to the crag police when it gets a bit busy? Actually yes you probably do.

set later in the day. What when it's much more busy and there will be scheduled sessions?

set at night? What and pay the setters double? Ok, then the budget will only stretch to half as much setting. Then you'll moan about old routes.

setting happens, it's part of running a wall. You know those usually very good facilities that you don't have to use? You could always use the other local wall with mega old routes, dirty, uncared for and cold. 

Vote with your feet. I know I'd rather be at a clean, welcoming wall with regular resets, even if that setting prevents me climbing 100% of the wall.

final solution? If you're that bothered, ring the wall before you set off and ask how busy it is. 

As a side note, setters are overworked and underpaid. Your minimal entry fee contributes to that. Thanks.

end of rant. 

I was hoping this thread would be about routes that just stop half way up the wall or veer dangerously in to the next line. Or routes that attend protests and chain themselves to trees.

This is not as interesting.

Apologies. I should've put a 'beware of imminent rant' disclaimer first. Will try harder next time!

I have been trying to get my local wall to set a multi pitch girdle traverse so I can inconvenience 50 people at once without being banned.  For some reason the people I have mentioned it to think I am joking.

I've been to a couple walls that seem to think it's OK to re-set during peak hours, which I personally think is a bit crap. Fair enough if they are re-building the wall, like Westway refurbishing the bouldering which left it shut for a while, or in the Castle, which is regularly has bits shut to improve them, this obviously takes time, but turning up at certain walls, like Reading to find 1/3 of it closed on a mid week evening while they are re-setting is just bad planning. 

I don't imagine anybody who regularly climbs indoors hates the idea of new routes, but being charged full price for entry to something that is restricted isn't great for business either. 

It would appear from your rant that you probably do have some connection to a climbing wall, if so, and your paying customers are complaining, maybe you should listen, they are after all..., paying.

Well the entry fees aren't exactly minimal these days.  If you've paid £10 to get in maybe you want to climb something.   It looks to me that bouldering walls in particular aren't a bad business, lead walls probably less so.  If bouldering walls didn't make reasonable money there wouldn't be so many new ones going up.

It isn't as if people can climb 100% of the wall anyway.   When 40% of the stuff is out your league and another 40% is easy to the point of boring that leaves 20% of interest and if that 20% is getting reset then there's bugger all to do.  Same if you come without a partner expecting to use an autobelay and all the autobelay lines are out of action.

If the wall is busy and it's pulling in 10 quid for everyone that walks through the door then it should have enough money to spend on route setting and arrange for it to happen at quiet times or when the wall is shut.  Plenty of service businesses do some of their work outside opening hours so as to maximise revenue during opening hours.

Routesetters are underpaid for their skills for the same reason pilots are underpaid in the US or junior academics are underpaid.  Too many people want to be one relative to the number the industry (think) they need.  They don't need to pay more because they can get somebody else.

How much do route setters earn? 

I overheard a staff member at my local bouldering wall telling a customer that it was only half (or two thirds or something) the entry fee that day because half the wall was shut due to route setting. That's great for pay as you go people but not so good for regulars with monthly passes who don't see a saving, but it's something at least.

Setting in peak times should be an absolute no-no and is completely avoidable, surely if someone's job is to be a route setter, then by definition they should be able to set routes between 9 and 5, you know, that time when most other people are doing their jobs and not climbing. 
My local wall stop setting at 6pm, pack up completely then continue the following day, access to a wall with a few routes is better than no access at all.

I'm more than happy to climb around whatever work is going on at whatever time. 

My bugbear is with wall managers who only give you 24 hours notice that it's happening. 

There's an entry fee..?!

The route setter isn't there at peak times because he started work at 16.00! It's because he started early and has been setting routes all day, he needs to get finished so he can go home and see his family or travel to the next wall and keep an appointment there. 

There's no such thing as 'nothing to climb' because the route setter is there. Try something harder to challenge yourself or go on something easier and practice technique etc.

The obvious answer to all the issues here is for the the wall in question to put up a notice detailing when the route setting will be, that way the moaners can stay away. However that spoils the surprise element for the rest of us, but you can't win them all.

We often go to the wall on a weekday at opening time.  Frequently we get the wall to just us for the first part of our session.  

Sometimes there are areas blocked off for route setting.

It still beats going in the evening/ weekend!

For the avoidance of doubt, I agree with the OP.

The one beef I do have with route setters is when they set Red & White spots on the same/next panel as red.   After two weeks, they're pretty much the same colour, especially from above for feet.  Ditto black/grey/dark purple  and green/slightly lighter green  etc

I'm not colour blind, but I do sympathise with those who are.  One of my partners is, and a laser pointer is a key belayer's accessory.

This is simple human factors stuff - surely not that hard to plan, but perhaps I'm missing something.

Grading is what it is - I can't get excited about that.  So I come across the odd move that may be 6c if you've got 8a strength, but I'll get over it

So a little bit of "route setting colour maths" for you.  Many of the walls I set at have 8 or 9 different colours, with no spots or multi coloured holds.  Typically they want 3 routes per line so that means in every 3 lines you have used all the colours available, or to put it another way, the same colour is never more than two lines away.  Corners make this worse as two lines away might not be very far at all in terms of distance, (Awesome walls sheffield is a good example of this).  On top of that you may be asked to set a specific list of grades, which with the holds available has eliminated certain colours, (eg needs to be an easy route but there are no jugs in 3 or 4 of the available colours).  Essentially what I am saying is that a lot of the time, the colour choice is completely out of the hands of the route setter.  We are doing the best we can to set the number of routes we have been asked for, at the grade ranges we have been asked for and we simply have no choice other than to use orange next to red etc.  

For professional free lancers, typically between £160 and £200 a day, plus normally, but not always, a crap to average milage rate.  This is to cover maintaining a couple of grands worth of tools and equipment and doing around 20,000 miles a year in a vehicle which you are also expected to sleep in the back of on an industrial estate.  

Sometimes thats a pretty good day rate for what you are being asked to do, sometimes its a total piss take as each days work is a bit different.  

I am more concerned that you are a route setter and yet in your profile picture you are top roping... wearing socks...

Thanks Alex, interesting to know

How do you actually set the routes? Do you pre-plan, plan and try as you set or bolt a load of holds and then grade it?

Genuinely intrigued, I think it’s very skillfull.

Definitely don’t pre plan in any great detail other than very occasionally for comp finals I may have an idea of certain moves that I want to try and put in - but even then you need to be prepared to ditch them if it doesn’t work. About 50% of the time I don’t know what I will be setting till I get to the wall anyway so couldn’t pre plan even if I wanted to  

But we also don’t just bolt a load of holds on with no idea of what it will be till we climb it.  Quite often we are told what grades we have to set before we start. It’s hard to think of what to compare it to - it’s a bit arty I suppose, like drawing or sculpting something, but where all the tools are really heavy and you have to carry them up ladders or ropes!  Ultimately its just experience and you have to practice it a lot and do a lot of climbing in lots of different styles- which is why generally speaking the climbers with a lot of comp climbing experience tend to be the best/most versatile setters where as stereotypically trad climbers are very one dimensional setters. 

9 divided by 3 = 2 ?!

Your "route setting colour maths" is somewhat suspect.

ha, that actually made me laugh. I'll take time to respond. I was visiting relatives in Qatar, had no plans to climb, as it's Qatar. A flat desert. Happened across someone who knew of a tiny crag, and offered to take me. I was in borrowed kit, so socks to improve shoe fit. And leading wasn't possible, and the rock was too soft for any gear, so a local group installed top ropes. Ex pat climbers there are making the most of a minimal opportunity, and it was awesome to see! 

Also, its my profile picture, as when I created my profile it was one of few climbing photos I had on it tablet, and one without my face which I'd rather not show.

thanks for noticing though!

Yes, I love having my surprise of arriving to find that the pink that I've been saving for the onsight for weeks and taken a extra rest day to maximise my chances on is being stripped as I watch spoilt.

I think you misread.  lx said "Two lines away", so a colour, then a gap of 2 before it reappears, which means that 9/3 = 3 and mathematics is saved!.

1 X X 4.

Which wall do you go to where they reset all the routes at a given grade at the same time rather than a particular section of the wall?

No, the 1 and the 4 are clearly 3 lines away from each other.

I'm sure you'd agree that adjacent lines are 1 line apart.

A few responses to some points made. Peak time at most walls is after the 9-5 working day. Most setting jobs will have you in first thing, and expect you to be out by peak. But many walls have lunch time pensioners deals or what ever. External groups such as schools and MOD also tend to use the walls during the day. So off peak hours can actually be busy! But unexpectedly busy, lots of lunch timers or external groups is a last second thing. Setters are booked in advance. You can't tell the setter they can't set because it got busy, or you'd have to pay them for nothing.

The only preventative solution is a night shift, and as mentioned in my OP, that would double the cost of setting, and thus half the regularity of setting. Hardly ideal. 

Reduced entry fees on setting days in interesting, although during setting hours, the wall is likely offering an off peak rate anyway. 

As for taking up routes, most setting doesn't take that much space, and hardly consumes the wall. Bt we have to be safe and can't be dropping holds on heads, therefore some route locations may make a bigger impact on space, it is what it is. There will still be something for you to climb, even if it means repeating some routes. And lucky you, next time you're in, there will be some fresh routes for you to enjoy!

in response to pay, as has already been answered, it depends on the contract. I've had varying amounts for varying jobs. My personal min is 80 and max 150. For 9 hours hard physical and mental graft.

Bouldering walls such as The Climbing Works in Sheffield do this. 

So to clarify: in a best case scenario, with 3 colours on a line you would have two full lines either side before those colours repeat, although it doesn’t always work that way due to hold availability. 

The point was that in practice, what colours you can put where is often completely decided for you based on the colours already on the wall either side of you and you have no choice in the matter.  

Presumably that is to change a bouldering "circuit", but I can't imagine a lead wall doing it.

This has been suggested and looked at by a number of walls but pretty much binned once they have looked at it in any detail. The cost would be way more than double.  The route setters wages would have to double for working nights, but we wouldn’t be able to do a mix of some day and some night sets in a week so would need all walls to do it.  But you can’t just give the setters the keys to the building and let them crack on, there would have to be wall staff in there as well to comply with the rescue plan, and they would also have to be paid more and may not be able to fulfill their normal role in the day if also working nights.  Cost increase would be massive plus may contradict conditions of planning permission for walls in built up areas anyway. Better solution is to start earlier. I rarely start as late as 9:00, normally 8:00 and if it’s a “standard” set we are normally done by 3:00ish.  

Customers not respecting barriers when setters are in is the biggest ongoing pain in the ass for route setters.  The reality of a large hold on the head from 15m is not that it would hurt, or even knock you out.  It would empty the contents of your head all over the floor and kill you instantly.  Some of these holds are the size and weight of a breeze block.  It never ceases to amaze me how little sense of self preservation climbing wall customers have.  

I interpreted it as a 2 line gap.  This sort of ambiguity is why we don't program computers in english!

Agreed. 

There can be a pretty high correlation between a particular section of wall and the stuff I'm interested in climbing .  If I'm there without a partner and all the auto belay lines are out then it's a nuisance.

Very interesting subject TomTom. 

Routesetting should be done on a professional level. It's routes a climbing gym sells, so they'd better provide the route-setter with good pay, a safe environment, etc. In the end it will work both ways, better/more routes and satisfied customers, and more professional routesetters who get more recognition (pay/work-environment) for their job.

Are you aware of modern Austrian/German routesetting? Initiatives like these will help raise standards. https://www.alpenverein.de/chameleon/public/76e873dc-1d6c-336a-094d-3217071...

I'm currently working on introducing routesetting-standards in an other European country. Non-compulsory at first, except for the governing body ('BMC equivalent'). My aim is to raise awareness to the fact that routesetting is a real job which requires adhering (in some way) to industry safety standards, a good pay and a safe place to set (no customers on the floor).  Hopefully it'll lead to route-setters getting the recognition they deserve.

This is a good comment. The Castle used to put up a notice with the next month or so of bouldering area resets. If you felt that it wasn't worth paying full price for a session when the Mezz was closed then you didn't have to. Also you knew when it was crunch time for any given project. I haven't been lately, but I'd assume that they do the same thing these days with the circuits? (Which is another reason why hold-colour circuits are often bad, but that's another thread...)

Thanks for all of your replies - indeed I was missing something, so I shall be more tolerant and accepting in future.  I can't say I get overly vexed about hold confusion in the first place, but henceforth I shall chill!

Some walls (e.g. Big Rock in Milton Keynes) set so that each line, and the lines on either side, avoid the common colour-blindness combinations or holds that are too similar in colour.

They also clean their holds between each route set (it amazes me the number of walls that still don't do this, leading to a sea of identical looking chalky, dusty, grey, frictionless holds). As someone with minor colour-blindness, it makes a huge difference on long routes and in steep overhanging areas where lighting tends to be poor.

At other walls, I have had to resort to guessing which holds are in on a particular route/problem based purely on hold size, shape and texture etc because everything just looks grey. And I have no hope of being able to read any moves more than 10 metres up from the ground as I won't have a chance of telling which colour most holds are.

All of this requires planning in advance by the wall rather than the route setters and it is never going to be perfect due to wandering lines and hold availability but it makes a big difference to colour blind people.

Reduced entry fees on setting days is normal at all German walls I have climbed at, especially when they set large sections once or twice a year (usually stripping training and competition walls in one go), which takes a few days and will reduce the available wall area for that time. Usually you also get posters and even email warnings beforehand (if you have signed up). 

They will also continuously re-set individual routes, which you barely notice as it is done off peak. 

My only grief is that all setters have a supernatural power of removing a route just when I finally get close to climbing it in one go.....

CB

Setting planned a week in advance, advertised online and done before 6pm is ideal. Those interested in avoiding setting can then do so. Its hard though... a big modern bouldering wall is setting about once a week, often across nearly the whole facility (section by section). Its odd that the  different issues related to bouldering seem unrecognised by some route climbers; surely the number of sessions for bouldering in the UK now exceed those for routes? Robert needs to get down with the kids.

Moaning is a job role for some people. Most climbers seem fine with setters but we have our fair share of the selfish and stupid. The behaviour of idiots around taped-off areas is no different to those walking under climbers on problems. Some people lie when they say they understand wall safety on the entry forms, some just don't care, some are oblivious, and all those who offend regularly in such ways should really be banned.

Incidently if there is karma or a heaven,  rroute settlers are sitting well, as you get paid little for something that gives tremendous joy.

I’ve never set at a commercial wall that doesn’t wash the holds in between sets, and I’m not aware of any that don’t. I reckon I set at over 30 different walls last year.  The volume and style of traffic does vary a lot though in different walls.  Extremely chalky holds can be a sign of a good route (it’s certainly getting climbed a lot!) 

The castle has more customers in a day than many walls do in a week so stuff is filthy straight away.  Consequently they are looking at how to try and educate customers on brushing holds as particularly with the modern trend of loads of slopers, not only does this make the holds look more like their original colour, but it also helps return the climbs to the grade they were when they were set.  

There are several free websites where you can submit photos to see how different colour-blind people see things (some under different lighting conditions). This might help  walls. When using any colour crucial design, visual variable redundancy is always advisable: for climbing holds this could be shape styles, textures, dots. As long as colour saturation levels are very different in major problem areas (eg to help the red-green colour-blind, use an unsaturaded ('pale')  green and a saturated ('bright')  red and ensure if pinks are used as well, they are more like magenta). However, even those with no colour vison issues  often can't tell the colour of chalked holds from above!

If I can reach a hold of the correct colour I will use it. It is a standing joke amongst friends that with my big ape index and flexibility it is not unusual to see me climbing two routes at once, with a bit of wide bridging.

I climb at Awesome Sheffield and they set some really good corner routes there (they rarely set a bad route anywhere in the wall!).

They have a notice up that says which lines are to be reset and when and by whom. Check it if you want to avoid setting days. The setters are normally done by mid-afternoon. They tend to only reset two or three panels at a time, so that leaves about 96 panels (290 lines) left to play on! This can change when setting for competitions when a lot of routes have to be set or reset!

In an ideal world, a route would have a date for it's removal put on it as soon as it is put up. That way you would know how long you can save it for the onsight attempt or how long you have to work it for the redpoint and can plan your training accordingly

though you are now getting into an area that  is the realm of hold manufacturers not route setters.  One frustration for walls/setters is simply trying to get colour consistency within the same colour.  Different fillers affect the colour which is an issue in Polyester and polyeurethene, (which has no fillers), comes out slightly different again.  It is slowly being standardised as more and more of the manufacture moves to one place but it still a longs way off.  Especially as we are now seeing more holds come over from America which are totally different agin.  Some walls set 5 routes per line - there are simply not 10 different prime colours that are all different from each other. By far the best solution currently available is multicoloured/spotted holds - but these are 10 to 15% more expensive so significantly increase the cost of a product that is already going up in price anyway.  It is also not an option for polyeurethene holds which is what a lot of the market is moving towards.  I think the best solution is actually less route density and more frequent turn over of routes.  

At my local wall in Stirling the route setting is very well managed. In winter it takes place every two weeks on Monday daytime - in Summer it is every three weeks. A timetable is published and the setting is done on a sequential basis so you know which routes will be changed next. The area is quite compact so the wall has to close for the period of setting but at least it is predictable. The route list is not immediately updated so you get a chance to on-sight an ungraded route which I quite like. After a few days the list is published.

It's often not that bad in practice. I suspect most boulderers probably prefer a reasonable density of setting as they get more problems at their grades (except on slabs, where space can be good as scary high thin moves should never be directly above low big holds...always a vital issue to consider when setting there and too often forgotten.)

Climbing a thin slab move right above a volume is a nightmare, and I've no idea why walls feature this set-up so regularly.

Fair play

The first customer killed will be the last as the insurers will then insist the wall is closed completely during resets.

That’s not much consolation when I’m at work and people are trying to walk under me! I’d prefer it never came to that. 

It varies and depends on the setter and how good they are.

Well not for the people that climb before 6pm it's not.

But I think you're absolutely right about using the internet more. In Sheffield there are 3 walls. They all have their own web sites. But only one wall actually uses it to communicate what they doing. They also use social media too to let people know what they're up to, including forewarning of routesetting, competitions and other events. I've no idea how many people use these things but at least they're there for anyone wanting to find out stuff. The internet is a great way to let the public know what's happening because it's effectively free. I'm sure many younger climbers know how to follow web sites etc. even if some of the older climbers don't.

https://tinyurl.com/yacxo95r 

It probably says something about climbers' attitude to risk. We are used to assessing and taking small risks all the time and probably have a pretty healthy and realistic approach to them. But the sum of everyone's individual risks is unacceptable to the climbing wall industry as a whole - and meanwhile climbers also have a healthy individualism and disrespect for petty rules. Basically climbers and indoor walls don't mix very well!

Not a very good red setter? Better with yellows......

Clearly a FORTRAN programmer.

Very much this, I can't make it to every wall every week to check out the notices and the staff when I rung were clearly busy and distracted so it sucked that half the auto belay routes were out of action when I took some newbies. 

Not sure I agree with that.  I see customers do/attempt to do dangerous stupid things all the time.  Many customers will respect barriers and not try to climb over/under them.  But most of the time when customers are walking through where we are setting or trying to move barriers it is either:

ignorance - they don't really understand the risk.  It is not comparable to an outdoor climbing situation its route setting at an indoor artificial facility.  

arrogance - they just have this stupid belief that they should be able to do whatever they want because its climbing and its all about freedom and their adventure shouldn't be suppressed etc. 

But the sum of everyone's individual risks is unacceptable to the climbing wall industry as a whole - and meanwhile climbers also have a healthy individualism and disrespect for petty rules. Basically climbers and indoor walls don't mix very well!

Arrogance and an inability to follow rules doesn't mix very well in a modern society full stop! Especially when everyone thinks they have the right to sue someone every time they do something daft! I'm pretty sure its not just the climbing wall industry that has this problem.  As much as I would love to just have a darwinian survival of the fittest approach to silly behaviour it unfortunately is just not possible.  

If it seems like some of this has hit a nerve - it has!  Understand that amongst free lance route setters customers not respecting barriers is the most commonly whinged about thing by a long way.  I have had mothers wheel buggies with babies in underneath me whilst I'm 10m in the air swinging a bag of holds about.  I've nearly fallen off ladders because of customers jumping onto the mats next to them, (which makes the ladders move a lot).  Customers regularly lead climbing directly above a traffic cone and netting barrier, pausing to unclip the quickdraws that I have clipped up so they can clip into them, or just skipping the first two quickdraws and clipping the third and pleading complete ignorance that the line was shut.  I route set 3 to 5 days a week all over the country and I see something like this every single week, and what makes it worse is that a lot of peoples reaction when told about it is just to kick off.  My biggest fear is that I am going to be dragged into court because a customer has done something stupid.  We don't walk into your office during the day and start doing what we want.  Please respect ours.  

Rant over!  

I think you're right to be worried.  You've described a situation which is not only foreseeable but apparently commonplace, and yet the measures being taken to prevent people from wandering underneath are clearly not working, from your own account.  It's also endangering your own health and safety, if customers are so close your ladder is being interfered with. I suggest both you and the walls you work at both need to take another look at your risk assessments and consider taking more effective actions, possibly physically closing off larger areas of wall with barriers, or having a member of staff there to direct customers away. 

Vast majority of customers are fine but the only way really to stop the ones who want to push their luck is to have a member of staff to direct traffic.  This has been discussed but is expensive.  Some customers will physically pick up barriers and try to move them because they think they are in the way - so they are clearly obvious to them and they are stopping them from going where they want to go! What else can you do in this situation other than have a "security guard" - definitely not the way walls want to operate! Overall things are improving in the industry but it would be nice to have more of a forum to discuss some of these things with the customers and explain it from our point of view which is why I have commented on this thread I guess.  There is generally an awful lot of assumption and false information from wall users about the way in which walls are run.  

Is it worth trying to educate such morons?

Well ideally we’d just ban them...

If people are ignoring the barriers then that is probably contributory, but if you know this is happening regularly then a court might ask why you haven't put more effective systems in place to keep the public out of the danger zone.

I'm not a health and safety specialist, but as a manager with H&S responsibilities I am regularly reminded that cost is not an excuse.  Besides, the cost of an 8-hour shift at minimum wage is around £60 - are you going to explain to a judge that's too much to pay to prevent a serious, possibly fatal, injury?

I don't know the terms of your contracts with the walls concerned, but they might claim that they have offloaded this responsibility for health and safety onto the independent contractors who are doing the route-setting. As a freelance you may not be covered by the wall's insurance - do route-setters usually have their own public liability insurance?  Either way, it may be you rather than the wall who carries the can, so as I said before you're right to be worried.

If what you describe is commonplace it suggests to me that the industry has a dangerously complacent attitude to this area of its operations.

A notice on the counter by the till where everyone pays or shows their pass that has to be read before going in would help. After being asked to read the one taped to the counter, each customer is then also given a copy. The same notice, on A3, in bold, is also taped to the wall either side of the area being resett.

This notice could be very short so as not to slow entry much at busy times, but could still be effective and to the point ... An overhead plan of the wall, the wall section being reset + cordonned off area marked with highlighter pen. Above this, in bold text, something like " The cordonned off area is out of bounds for your safety until Resetting opetations are completed. You will be banned for the rest of the day/evening if you enter this area or interfere with the barrier." 

It could then be at the setters discretion as to what constitutes at breach of the notices rules, and for you to ask msnagement to enforce it on those who don't want to take it seriously.

Not fool proof enough, but at least an extra inexpensive step has been taken.

All good suggestions I'm sure, but do you not think a big f*ck off orange barrier ought to be enough?

And as for the suggestion above, if you think any wall is going to pay a member of staff (even at minimum wage) just to stand by a barrier all day, I suggest you have no idea of climbing wall finances.

It seems to not be enough, pre notice on entry, and on adjacent walls at least prepares the customer to be more mindfull of this.

The suggestion of chaperone / security / Wally detector - redirector wasn't mine, but as discussed by others, once someone is slightly or seriously injured, + sues, they sure would employ such other tactics.

I realise that it wasn't your suggestion but, assuming a wall is setting 3 times a week and paying this person £80/day, I refuse to believe that any wall will pay 12 grand a year for someone just stand by a barrier.

Especially as many setters are only on about £120/day self employed. Take the tax and expenses off and the wally watcher is probably earning more than the setter!

It certainly ought to be, but the comments above seem to indicate that it isn't.  If you're a routesetter or run a climbing wall, once you know it isn't sufficient then it would be sensible to take another look at your risk assessment and consider whether something more should be done.  You need to take account that people might be idiots, especially when there's plenty of evidence that they are. And yes, they will have contributed to their injury and a court would take that into consideration, but that doesn't let the wall/setter off the hook completely.

But saying "we can't afford it" isn't an excuse, and certainly wouldn't wash in court.  If a business cannot afford to do something safely, then it shouldn't be doing it.  To repeat my earlier point, would you want to stand up in court after someone has been killed or suffered a life-changing injury when a hold was dropped on their head and explain that you knew that customers regularly ignored the barriers but you wouldn't pay £60 to have someone there to keep them away?

Electric sheep / person fence?

With some kind of intelligent chip that detects light accifental brushes and sends low voltage shock, but if deliberate lifting or moving is detected, sends high voltage + sadly smokes that type of offender.

But it's not £60, is it. Unless you only set one day a year. It's several thousand.

And, yes, I'd happily explain that we did a risk assessment, erected barriers to a safe distance to create a cordon and put up warning signs. You only have to take reasonable precautions not every precaution possible. 

I don't know how long it takes to reset routes, but the OP said it's usually done every 3 months. I guess it takes several days each time, so yes, it would amount to a few thousand each year, but if a business is so marginal that a few thousand is the difference between success and failure then it's in serious trouble. 

If you're confident your risk assessment is sound, that's fine. As you say, it's about doing what's reasonable, and judgements have to be made. However is it reasonable to ignore a a history of people regularly ignoring the barriers and warning signs? You might then have to justify your risk assessment and explain why you didn't do more when you knew it was only partially effective.  That doesn't necessarily mean having a person on duty, but if everything else has failed then I doubt that a few thousand quid would be seen as a valid reason not to, when faced with the risk of a serious accident.

Ruling that out because there are other things to be tried first may be reasonable. Ruling it out because it's too expensive, as an earlier post suggested, probably isn't.

But they're not going to be setting all the routes in one go, every three months. They'll be setting a few routes every week. Somebody doing nothing but stand by a barrier for a few days a week really isn't possible.

Maybe but it's still several thousand pounds. 

No. But paying someone to stand by a barrier isn't the solution.

I'm going to take a wild stab in the dark here. You're not self employed, are you?

It's easy to spend someone else's money!

Jeeez I remember the days when wall owners were the route setters and they worked late at night and early mornings with a real passion for climbing and their customers and their own enjoyment ????

I'm sure some walls have some great staff setters but many aren't that lucky, and sadly don't realise this!

As a paying punter, if I'm paying £10+ to go climbing each time, I appreciate routes that are clean, competently set, interesting and regularly changed. I guess that's why some walls are busy and some are empty!

Are you a route setter? If you are, and if you are confident that you have effective safety systems in place when you work, then that's great and you can sleep at nights confident that you probably won't injure or kill someone.  However someone described a situation where they regularly find punters have ignored or removed the safety precautions and put themselves, and sometimes the setter, at risk of possibly serious injury.  Whatever their risk assessment may say, their safety precautions aren't working.  If they know they're not working then they need to look again at the risk assessment and do something about it. It's not enough to say that the punters have only themselves to blame. 

My point is that it's not an excuse to say that it's too expensive to put an effective safety measure in place - if you're going to do something, there is a legal obligation to do it in a safe way.  Being self-employed or a small business does not excuse you from this. If you can't do it in a safe way, maybe you shouldn't be doing it all.  Of course this has to be proportionate, you wouldn't be expected to spend a lot of money to avoid a low impact and low probability accident, but where serious injury or death is concerned then a few thousand pounds cannot be considered unreasonable.  If that's not affordable, then that's a problem but it doesn't mean it can be ignored.

I realise that the problem is that most customers aren't willing to pay a realistic price to use a climbing wall, and a few engage in stupid behaviour which pushes up the cost. The result is that walls have to cut corners, but if those corners include safety then sooner or later someone will get hurt.  I suspect that the route-setter will be left to carry the can.

Although I broadly agree with you, I would say that what can be reasonably expected of a company to do to mitigate a risk is partly dependant on the size of that company. I.e. a big business would be expected to do more than a small business. That's my basic understanding of h&s regs. Something being too expensive can be an excuse.

In this case I'd say that paying for security to stand guard may be excessive. But at the very least they should be looking at improving their barriers and warning signs. They may decide that is also unreasonably expensive, but they should at least have a record of discussing it and why they didn't use it.

As for pay depending on who you are and which wall can be less than minnimum wage if the wall doesnt pay for testing the route etc. So some settimg sessions could be as little as £30 followed by testing for free.... I know average is higher but be  careful assuming so.

Wait, so hold on. I set up a barrier. Punter moves or steps through barrier, gets a hold dropped on head.

At what point in the court room do they dismiss the damn case because the punter stepped through a barrier?!

paying someone to stand there and prevent someone doing something they shouldn't do is nonsense. A big orange barrier underneath what is clearly a routesetter should be enough for any judge to see the setter or wall is not at fault as they have taken the precautions to prevent death by hold to head. 

If not, I don't want to live in this world any more. H and S has gone mad, and continues to even more so the more we pander to it.

On the subject of barriers, setting over a climbable archway which leads to a bigger section of routes. I'm going to block that whole arch way off. I realise that I am not setting in the area at the other side, but no you cannot walk under me to get there unless you fancy a hold to the head. That's a bug bear of mine!

The problem is that your "barrier" is not a barrier, is it? People can walk through it / step over / slide under. I'm guessing, that actually its a line of orange material linking some cones, or something like that? A barrier would be more difficult to pass, such as herass fencing. Choosing such material fencing is not ideal as it poses a risk to someone falling off an adjacent route. Your " barrier" is just a soft notification of an area you would prefer people not to enter, but is not actually a barrier?

You could use a solid barrier, but might then have to take out another adjacent climbing line, and then place your soft barrier there too, as a means to prevent climbers going on the line which if they fell off could cause injury by the more solid barrier ?

What if you had a taller post by the wall, that you could run several lines of your orange material from, or some plastic netting, orange etc, that is high enough to stop people stepping over, linking it to other posts around your area?

Would that be safe for adjacent climbers to fall on in the swinging off chance by accident, and keep people out of your work zone too?

H&S has gone a little bit mad in a few cases, but higher standards that seem silly are better than lower standards where people still get badly hurt.

In industry where sites are heavily governed by lots of h&s rules people just get on with it or get banned from working there, but people who work outside of such industries, often have a massive problem with breing advised about the simplest rules, such as do not pass my danger zone barrier. Many climbing wall punters have yet to encounter any of this, as they are still at school / uni or just entering work life, or in jobs where there is little risk of injury so they don't get tuned into how seriously to take H&S stuff for a while yet.

most of the walls I work at now use orange netting for roped setting with s sign on it as well.  This is consistent with building sites etc.  For the most part it keeps people out  bear in mind that the customers are all climbers so having something  that they are incapable of getting over is difficult! 

I only work for walls where I am covered y the walls insurance.  This is consistent with the vast majority of full time professional free lance route setters.  

I remember those days.  It was before no win no fee and the routes were no where near as good, (apart from the ones set by actual route setters because the job still existed, even back then).  

Where someone has ignored the barriers and warnings they have clearly contributed to their injury and this would be taken into account when assessing damages in the event of a claim. But you might be asked to justify why you thought your safety measures were sufficient, and if they have fallen short of what is necessary then you might be held liable, to at least some degree. Personal injury claims aren't black or white, often both parties have contributed to the accident happening to some extent and there is often an apportionment of liability. 

If you've done a proper risk assessment and taken reasonable steps to keep people out but someone ignores them and gets hurt, then you can argue that you've done what's necessary and shouldn't be liable.  The problem arises because this isn't a one-off, you know that people are regularly ignoring your safety measures. In those circumstances then I think you might be expected to review those safety measures, which clearly aren't working, and put something more effective in place.

It has to be proportionate, and dave657 is right to say that a large company with deeper pockets will be expected to do more than a small business.  However that doesn't let the small business or freelancer off the hook.  You can't simply say "we can't afford to do anything about this, so we'll just carry on as we are and keep our fingers crossed", which is what appears to be happening.  And I very much doubt that any court would consider a few thousand pounds to be too much, even for a small business, to mitigate a significant risk of serious injury or death.

Ultimately it's for the route setters and the climbing walls to make their own decisions about what is necessary to keep the public and themselves safe.  From what's been described by lx, I wouldn't want to justify those working methods to the HSE and a court in the event of an accident, and I think lx is right to be worried. If people are regularly ignoring your barriers and putting themselves at risk then I suggest you should be worried too. 

Does the Association of British Climbing Walls have guidelines for this?  This is the sort of thing it should be advising on and perhaps taking legal advice.

Setting routes over a an arch that is a walkway surely can only be safely done outside opening hours or by closing the other area + access to it off, unless there is an alternative way through?

If you are a genuinely good professional free lance route setter then I would be exetremely surprised if you are working for £30 and not being paid for testing. At the moment we are turning down more work than we take and walls are trying to book more than 12 months in advance. A new wall opens every month and there are no new setters. For a genuine professional freelance routesetter the day rates start at about £150, but not many will turn up for that.  There are a few exceptions with specific walls where the wall supports the setter or in exchange for easier days and more regular work  etc  

“So why aren’t there more route setters” - because it’s a physically hard, highly skilled job that takes time to learn and in the way that it is currently done is hard to maintain much beyond the age of 45 without getting seriously broken. 

There are are a lot of average/crap route setters out there as well though and many walls have been burned by these guys which is why it is a very hard profession to get in to, as well established walls are reluctant to take a risk on someone they don’t know. 

Bit catch 22 in that case, they want experienced setters but aren't willing to give new setters experience. Not brilliant for the long term but understandable for the wall's business. 

Rock Over in Manchester have their own wall for training route setters, this to me is a brilliant way of investing in the future but I guess not everyone has the time & space to offer this. 

I only work part time and wouldn't mid adding some bouldering route setting to my skills list if anyone has any ideas / suggestions.

Where I set most often, the barrier would be a series of cones, connected by orange plastic netting. The barrier shouldn't just be a chain, it needs to hold in something that might get dropped and inevitably bounce on rubber crumb flooring. 

Anyone with anything about them should know that is a barier intended to keep someone out of that area. To be honest I rarely see attempts to move barriers, but I set much less than alex, and it doesn't surprise me that he deals with worse

I'll usually block off lines adjacent to where I'm setting, or where climbers may fall/swing/lower into my area. This can often present as closing more wall than necessary, and causes complaints, but that's me taking the necessary precautions not to hurt anyone. 

As in the example of the arch walkway, the whole section at the other side would be closed. Seemingly unfairly and causing a big percentage of the wall to be unusable, but that's the nature of that wall design. There's no way around it, other than night setting, which as discussed isn't financially feasible. 

+ Lx etc...

How does anyone manage to walk over / under / through such orange plastic netting ?, especially with a baby buggy? Is it not high enough / incomplete, or with easily opened access gaps?

A poor and entitled attitude, usually. IME, I haven't had much of it, but much more so the complaints and moans and whinges about the space I've taken to ensure customer safety while I set.

Bloody customers, eh? Don't they just make you sick!

I hear what you say about not wanting to set at night etc but, as in any service industry, the facility is - or should be - run for the benefit of the customer not the convenience of the staff  (including freelancers). If that means setting when the wall is closed, so be it. If you don't want to do that, fine. Look for some other line of work but please don't expect the customer to fit in round you or when you feel like deigning to work. I expect those guys who do roadworks overnight to avoid disrupting daytime traffic would sooner work days too. Your rant/whinge/bleat sounds to me suspiciously like "Yes, I'm in your way, yes I'm limiting  what you can do, yes that does mean you are not getting the facility we advertised and you have paid for, yes my drilling/power screwdriver is drivingyou nuts but tough titty because I'm more important than you."

Yours, someone who regularly worked nights, split shifts, double shifts, weekends,  bank holidays and even a few Christmas Days because that is what the job I chose to do entailed to serve the customer properly.

Simply put i kmow a couple of walls that just lay thier hourly instructor rate 10 per hour and dome pay for testing.. tend to be quiter walls or older walls where people used to do it for free... Personally I absolutely love route setting and like  coaching would do it for free if the bank account would allow. But just want to highlight that  hundreds of pounds a day is the same for every one. 

Hey dude, probably some customers have an entitled attitude and complain and it's easy to focus on them but also remember  that you've probably got a ton of users who happily enjoy your routes and have a great time trying them. Unfortunately it's easier to focus on the negative feedback rather than the positive. 

Reality is, we are probably  spoiled with climbing walls in this country. Excellent walls, good cafes, plenty of choice in any major city and always a supply of new routes to train on during the week. Route setting every once in a while is such a small factor really and vital to a good wall.

I actually like it when I go to a wall and see that my favourite angle is being set;

1) New routes are about to appear.

2) Chance to spice up your session and go on that angle and portion of the wall that you avoid and change your routine.

I believe complaints are about expectations... we set weekly at the same time so clients know whats going to be happening and the same climbers are there everyweek, so we talk a little with them.

As for complaints about routes, its easy at my main wall to be close enough to hear but also out of sight. This is great because you get to hear the whole conversation about routes, mostly what I hear is positive. I think another reason for this is thst we are on sight to offer help if someone is struggling.

The wall sells a product. That product is routes, and therefore the better the product the better the wall, the better the customer experience. Frequent routesetting prevents the product going stale, and improves that customer experience. Therefore, routesetter benefits the customer, so for the customer to moan about setting is madness. Routesetting is done for the benefit of customers not the staff.

setting can only happen when it is viable for the wall to do so, if you make it harder for the wall to set, it will happen less frequently, then you'll be moaning about old dirty boring routes. 

Like you, I have worked all sorts of shift patterns and such, but it's not that simple to just switch to night setting. As alex mention earlier, it is more than just an increased pay for the setter.

i do others things, I study, I coach, I run kids clubs and I have other work. If I had to set at night, that would totally disrupt my schedule for work during the day. Don't get me wrong, I'm happy to pull crazy shifts from time to time, but the whole industry of routesetters won't be. 

Setters will also have to be accompanied by a wall manager, that will totally disrupt their schedule. Setters will also need someone trained in rescue, increasing the cost further. Smart walls will have a routesetter manager, and so you can limit the staff needed to set to two, but then those staff can't be utilised they way they may need to be before and after. You underestimate how tight a ship staffing and financial outlay has to be for walls to run. They are not goldmines.

The main point of this whole post is exactly as you've put it 'yes I'm in your way/limiting/being noisy' however, I'm doing you a favour giving you new routes to enjoy, I'm trying to minimise impact as best as possible, but I have to keep the area safe, and if you open your eyes you'll see many many many other climbing surfaces surrounding you. God forbid I block 5 lines out of 70 or so. No I'm not more important than you, but without me, you wouldn't be here using this facility, so cut us and the wall some slack for trying to improve your experience of the wall, even if that improvement takes away 5% of 'the advertised facility' during 'off peak' hours. 

The routes were just as good if not better back then ! You think that GOOD routes / moves are a new thing? He he he

There is the problem in a nutshell.  You are "doing me a favour"? Do you honestly believe that?

Because you are not. You really are not. You are selling me your services (albeit via the wall's owners). You create routes for pay, as a commercial service. Nothing at all wrong with that but don't kid yourself you are 'doing me a favour' any more than Starbuck's or Tesco are 'doing me a favour' when they sell me coffee or groceries. It does, however, perhaps explain your  'like it or lump it' attitude to wall users.

How you organise your business is up to you and juggling different strands is for you to solve in a way that does not impact adversely on the customer but one thought that occurs is that since you obviously need others on hand in case of accidents etc why not have two or even more  setters working at the same time when the wall is closed?

Either way, you work in the leisure/entertainment industry and that requires that you should work round the customer rather than expecting them to fit in round you and put up with whatever you want to do in terms of blocking off areas or using loud power tools. Presumably you are quite happy for restaurant staff, bar staff, cinema staff, club staff, airline staff etc to work unsocial hours for your convenience when you are the customer. What makes you think route setting makes you so different?

Some people are dicks - and I'm agreeing with the sentiment that moaning at instructors because the wall is busy or a grade seems "off" to you, is just bad behaviour. I think people should show courtesy to each other, even - especially? - when they are customers talking to workers. Common sense seems to be that it works the other way around; but, anyone who's worked in a "customer-facing" job, who's worked a crap job, or who's sensitive to the inequities of the cash-nexus will be polite in their dealings with workers, including climbing instructors and route setters.

However, it's a bit annoying to fork out your hard-earned only to find half the wall is missing its holds, and someone is drilling a hole in your equally tired and overworked mind whilst you try force your way through the mosh-pit-cum-bouldering area.

The obvious solution is that walls should communicate better with climbers - have a website, a facebook page and a whiteboard on site that show when setting is scheduled - and perhaps even consider communicating when regular classes happen, when large groups are expected or just signalling "peak hours" (not always obvious to everyone). Many walls already do this well...

Of course, many of us will still turn up after work on Tuesdays and Thursdays... but the press of bodies, the smell of communal sweat, the excitement of narrowly dodging falling novices...! Ahh! Who doesn't learn, over the course of winter, to savour these things...?

Well said and I can't disagree with anything there. I have been to walls with certain routes in mind and definitely been disappointed to find that bit of the wall is closed for routesetting. But of course I, and probably most, climbers appreciate the world doesn't revolve around us and have no reason to complain. Disappointment is not the same as moaning or complaining about what is, as you say, a necessary service.

I think the effect must be greater on smaller walls though. If you want to climb on one section, say the steep bit, and that's closed then sometimes it's not worth staying.

But really the only complaint for me is with walls that don't use the internet to publicise what's going on. You shouldn't need to be a computer whiz to bang out a blog post on what's going on - and the fact is some walls seem to be able to manage to do it. Seems like it should be possible to have at least one computer literate member of staff working for them.

Interesting point, as a route setter i'm often intrigued when I go to centres at how they operate the setting. In what are probably the large majority of cases most probably don't have sufficient barrier in place to stop people getting into the area i.e. a single strand of rope doesn't really cut it especially from an insurance pov.  The orange mesh fencing stuff (can't remember the proper name) with decent posts and attached to the wall/something heavy at both ends with a sign ought to be standard really.

I agree in principal, but with other customer service jobs you want the person there to enable you to do something whereas with route setters you don't actually want to see them. 

So where customers want to use facilities evenings and weekends, I can't see too much wrong with the status quo of resetting routes outside of peaktimes during the week. 

As most night shifts are 6 while 6 on varying days I don't think that would work for customers either. Also night shifts are normally employed where continuity of service/labour is paramount e.g. production, security and emergency services. I'm not really sure that night shifts are required to keep on top of routesetting once a week at a wall. I only mention this as we're comparing routesetting schedules to what is the 'norm' in other sectors. 

When you consider that the extra cost might eat into resetting frequency, hold renewal, site maintainence, and quality of facilities such as the cafe and communal areas I'm not sure if forking out for a number of people to work unsociable hours is a good idea even with a customer focussed ethos. Inconveniencing a limited number of people on a Wednesday morning might actually be the most customer friendly way to go about things. 

Transition Extreme in Aberdeen did the right thing and advertised when they would be routesetting for the Scottish Youth Climbing Series last week. They announced the set was complete on Friday and I  thought it was worth contacting them to check that the wall was fully open as normal

https://www.instagram.com/p/BfeUlajgboU/?hl=en&taken-at=1009751723

 they assured me it was, but when I arrived roughly a quarter of the lines were marked up as no climbing. 

I went to Nottingham Depot on Saturday when setters (possibly lx and pals) were setting for the British Juniors on Sunday. We knew all the competition wall area was out of bounds and problems were being set across the centre but took the risk.... intelligent setting meant minimum disruption.