Capacity/attendance information for US event venues

Question

Can you think of a source for data regarding the capacity (number of seats or people that can fit in the venue) of different venues in the US, ideally large urban centers like NYC, LA, Chicago etc?

Venues in this case means locations dedicated to holding events of all sorts, such as sports arenas, theaters, music halls, business conference centers, even bars and restaurants.

I am looking for any data that would either directly or indirectly point to how many people each venue can hold, with priority on large US urban centers.

Answer 1

If you have a handful of stadiums and arenas only, then you might find a list online that suffices. For example, from Wikipedia global or US only.

If you need wider coverage, and also for many types of buildings, consider the following two options:

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Option 1: Wikidata, with as an example some variation of arena (Q641226) and maximum capacity (P1083)

SELECT ?arena ?arenaLabel ?maximum_capacity WHERE {

  SERVICE wikibase:label { bd:serviceParam wikibase:language "[AUTO_LANGUAGE],en". }

  ?arena wdt:P31 wd:Q641226.
  OPTIONAL { ?arena wdt:P1083 ?maximum_capacity. }
}

try it!

If this is helpful, but you need some Sparql help for refining the query, you can ask a new question here, or at the Request a Query page.

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Option 2: OpenStreetMap has a tag for leisure=stadium as well as keys for capacity and seats.

You can use the Overpass-turbo tool to develop a query, and since it's not massive amounts of data, probably export from there, too.

[out:json][timeout:25];
// gather results
(
  // query part for: “leisure=stadium”
  node["leisure"="stadium"]({{bbox}});
  way["leisure"="stadium"]({{bbox}});
  relation["leisure"="stadium"]({{bbox}});
  // query part for: “seats=*”
  node["seats"]({{bbox}});
  way["seats"]({{bbox}});
  relation["seats"]({{bbox}});
);
// print results
out body;
>;
out skel qt;

try it!

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You asked about:

... sports arenas, theaters, music halls, business conference centers, even bars and restaurants.

I think option 1 may be better for sports arenas, theaters, music halls

and option 2 may be better for business conference centers, even bars and restaurants.

My opinion would be to to cast a wide net with OSM data for various categories, and then use the existing link to Wikidata objects. For example, in OSM, the Barclay Center has this tag: wikidata=Q807966