Destination: Bradford

St George’s Hall is the Alhambra’s sister venue — same Bradford Theatres group, same good prices, same friendly staff — and it sits next door to Bradford Interchange, which makes getting there about as easy as public transport gets. We have only been a couple of times, though, and the reason is everything below.

Getting in: genuinely good

Credit first. There are lifts from the main reception up to the theatre, and a ramp from upstairs back down to street level, so you have options in both directions. The building itself — the oldest concert hall still in use in the UK, opened in 1853 — handles wheels better than plenty of venues a century and a half younger.

Seated shows: parked in the stampede lane

For some shows, wheelchairs are placed at the end of the seated rows — on the aisle side. That is fine right up until the interval. Then everyone who NEEDS to be first to the bar or the bathroom comes past you: climbing over the back of the chair, standing on your feet, kicking them as they squeeze through, because the rows are so close together. And because the chair sits in the aisle end, you end up blocking two, sometimes three rows of people trying to get out.

The fix seems obvious to us: put the wheelchairs at the other end of the rows — the end nobody is fighting through to reach the bar. But what do we know.

Concerts: a free-for-all we now avoid

For some events, concerts especially, there are no allocated wheelchair spaces at all. It is standing on the floor and a free-for-all, fighting for floor space — while seats for able-bodied people are set up a couple of steps up at the back. At the last concert we went to, we spent half the night trying to stop drunk guys and girls falling onto the chair. A wheelchair sits lower than a standing crowd, so from behind it looks like there is an empty space in front of us — and people keep trying to occupy it.

That is not a comfort problem, it is a safety problem, and it is why we have mostly stopped coming. Allocated, protected wheelchair spaces at standing events — ideally on the raised level where the seats currently go — would change our verdict overnight.

Toilets

Wheelchair-accessible toilets are very limited in number, and as far as we have seen they are all downstairs. Factor that into interval timing, especially given the aisle situation above.

Our advice for booking

For a seated show, it is workable: book, enjoy the prices, and brace for the interval. For a standing concert, ring the box office first and ask, specifically, whether there is an allocated wheelchair space and where it is. If the answer is vague, think hard — we speak from experience.

Need to know

• Address: Bridge Street, Bradford, BD1 1JT — directly opposite Bradford Interchange (bus and rail), a short walk from Forster Square station
• Website: bradford-theatres.co.uk/st-georges-hall
• Box office: 01274 432000 (shared with the Alhambra — same group)
• Getting in: lifts from main reception to the theatre; ramp from upstairs to street level

We love coming to shows here. The prices are good, the programme is strong, and access is OK — getting in and getting seated is not the problem. The problem is where they put you once you are in, and what happens to your view when the show leaves the stage floor or the audience leaves their seats.

We are regulars — multiple times a year, and sometimes multiple times a month, depending on what is on. We are not panto people, but there are plenty of good shows through the year, so skipping Christmas and the six-week summer holidays is no great loss.

The wheelchair seating, and the overhang

Wheelchair spaces are at the back of the stalls, underneath the overhang of the upstairs seating. For most shows this is genuinely fine — when all the action happens at ground level, you see everything and the seats are perfectly decent.

But the moment a show goes upwards, the overhang takes it away from you. Circus acts on ropes and trapezes, the flying sequences in things like The Wizard of Oz — anything that happens above head height simply vanishes behind the ceiling. Everyone else gasps; we find out what happened at the interval.

Audience participation: the view disappears entirely

Worse is anything with audience participation, because the wheelchair section is no higher than the ordinary seats. At Rocky Horror, when the Time Warp came on, the whole house was asked to stand up and dance — which they rightly did, and we spent the number looking at the backs of dancing strangers. We could not see past them to the stage at all. When a cast asks people to stand, the wheelchair section effectively loses the show until everyone sits down again.

A raised platform for the wheelchair spaces — even a modest one — would fix both problems at a stroke. Plenty of venues have one. It is the single change we would ask the Alhambra for.

Getting there and parking

One thing to know before your first visit: the step-free entrance is round the side of the building, near the cast entrance — not through the main doors. It works fine once you know, but nobody tells you until you are looking at the steps, so head for the side on arrival.

The theatre is a decent walk from both the bus and train stations, though for the most part it is flat, so it is doable rather than difficult — just allow the time. Parking immediately near the venue is mainly disabled parking, which is exactly the right way round, and there are plenty of ordinary car parks close by for those who can walk the last stretch.

Toilets: be quick at the interval

There are two wheelchair-accessible toilets just outside the main theatre. The trouble is the able-bodied toilets are a short walk from the main doors — so at the interval, everyone uses the accessible ones. Be quick out of your seat when the lights come up, because with that much traffic they can end up nasty quite quickly.

The merchandise stand

The merchandise store is never wheelchair accessible. What happens next depends entirely on who is on that night: sometimes staff will kindly bring merchandise down for you to look at; other times you are asked to send an able-bodied member of your party up to buy it for you. When it is your money they are taking, being told to send someone else to spend it is not a great feeling — a fold-out table at the accessible level on show nights would solve it entirely.

Food and drink

Food and drink inside is expensive, but they do not usually stop you bringing your own in, which softens it considerably. The theatre is licensed, with a range of alcoholic and soft drinks.

Our advice for booking

Think about the show before you book. A ground-level play, musical or comedy night: book with confidence, enjoy the good prices. Anything aerial, and anything famous for getting the audience on its feet: know what you are trading away, ring the box office, and ask exactly what you will and will not be able to see from the wheelchair spaces.

Need to know

• Address: Morley Street, Bradford, BD7 1AJ
• Website: bradford-theatres.co.uk/alhambra-theatre
• Box office: 01274 432000
• Prices: good value, and own food is not usually challenged.