A closer look at the barrier.
- Radja Gios
- Dec 6, 2025
- 5 min read
Why we say "nadarhek" instead of "dranghek" in Belgium.
Anyone visiting a festival or race in Belgium today will literally run into it: the "Nadarbarrier" . For crew, production, and safety, it's so commonplace that almost no one wonders where the name comes from. Yet, that barrier tells a surprising story, one that begins with a French photographer, a giant hot air balloon, and a Brussels mayor with a safety instinct.
Nadar: photographer, aviator and showman
Gaspard-Félix Tournachon, better known by his stage name Nadar , was already a kind of creative director avant la lettre in the 19th century: draftsman, journalist, portrait photographer of the Parisian cultural elite and fascinated by new technology.
To literally take his photography to the next level, he had a colossal balloon built: Le Géant ("The Giant"), a gas balloon estimated to be 40 to 60 meters high with a volume of around 6,000 m³. Wikipedia
The plan: to take aerial photographs of Paris and other cities. Aerial photography before its time, with military and cartographic applications in mind.
Brussels 1864: the day the fences got a name
On September 26, 1864, Nadar landed in Brussels with Le Géant at the Botanical Garden. It was billed as a major city event: King Leopold I , Mayor Jules Anspach , and tens of thousands of spectators gathered to watch the balloon take off.
Only… there's a problem every modern event organizer recognizes: crowd control . The audience wants to be as close to the balloon as possible, but that's dangerous: gas, ropes, ballast, wind...
The Brussels government is therefore installing a new type of mobile wooden fence to keep crowds at a safe distance. These fences were heavy at the time, but easy to move and can be linked together. This is the same principle as the crash barriers we still use today.
The next day, the Brussels press refers to them as "Nadar fences" or "Nadar barriers." The nickname still sticks today, first as a joke, then simply as a standard term.
Who actually invented the barrier?
Strictly speaking, the fence is therefore not Nadar's own invention. It is also unclear who invented the mobile, switchable fence. According to various sources, Mayor Jules Anspach is often cited as the one who came up with the idea for the fences for the occasion. In much English-language literature, he is even credited as the "inventor of the crowd control barrier," following Nadar's visit with Le Géant. Wikipedia
What is clear:
The combination of a large mass, a dangerous zone, and mobile fences was deployed in Brussels in 1864 in a way that strongly resembled the modern barrier.
The press spontaneously linked Nadar’s name to it.
The word "nadarhek" / "barrière Nadar" subsequently became a typical Belgian word for barriers. In French dictionaries and linguistic research, it is explicitly described as a Belgianism. persee.fr Focus on Belgium
The modern, interlocking steel fences we know today were only further developed and commercialized in the 20th century. Some sources cite French patents from the 1950s for interlocking metal barriers, but the exact inventor of "the" modern fence is less clear. Wikipedia
Nadar himself: not happy with "his" fences
Interesting detail: Nadar considered it anything but an honor to have his name on fences. Columns and historical articles describe him even sending an angry letter to King Leopold I. His point: he wanted to push boundaries, not confine people with barriers.
Historians agree that the letter actually existed, though the text itself isn't easy to trace. But the image is beautiful: an artist dreaming of freedom in the air, and meanwhile, his name goes down in history as synonymous with fencing.
Are there standards for safety barriers?
No, I haven't found anything about that.
The fences that Brussels erected around Nadar's giant balloon in 1864 weren't an official invention, not a brilliant drawing gathering dust in an archive somewhere. They were simply local, improvised security barriers. Practical and simple.
In the 19th century, crowd control likely existed longer than the term itself. Cities used wooden railings, ropes, temporary metal barriers… but everything was simply local and depended on what was available in the city's warehouse.
The modern barrier we know today, a metal fence about two meters wide, with connecting hooks and sturdy feet, only evolved decades later, out of the need for robust, mobile fencing at cycling races, markets, and major events. So, there's no "original barrier" that was ever officially documented.
What we use today is the result of years of practice, mistakes, improvements, and common sense from people who wanted to make events safer and more efficient.
What are the common dimensions today?
Although no one has ever declared a global standard, you see roughly the same basic format everywhere.
The classic barrier looks like this almost everywhere:
Width
Usually 2.0 to 2.2 meters
A balance between flexibility and speed: you can quickly cover many meters without individual fences becoming too heavy.
Height
Around 1.05 to 1.15 meters
High enough for people to stop and lean, and low enough not to block sight lines.
Depth of the foot
50 to 70 cm
Weight
12 to 25 kg , depending on pipe thickness and steel type
Material
Galvanized steel
Resistant to rain, mud, festivals and everything the Belgian weather throws at it.
You see variants per country:
In France, slightly heavier models with Vauban-style feet.
In the Netherlands sometimes lighter types.
In the UK and US they tend to use flat feet rather than curved feet.
But the base remains the same everywhere: about two meters wide, about one meter high, and connecting to form an endless silver snake.
What are barrier fences called abroad?
Belgium
Nadarhek , nadar fences or nadars.
Barrière Nadar / clôture Nadar
Used by authorities, suppliers and in documents surrounding events, road works, markets, etc.
The Netherlands
Mainly dranghek as a generic term, but sometimes also “finish barriers”.
France
Barrière de police or barrier mobile de sécurité as neutral terms.
Vauban Barrier is very common for the same type of metal fence, referring to the French fortification builder Vauban and the idea of a defensive line.
English-speaking world (UK, US, Australia, …)
Crowd control barrier or crowd control barricade .
At events you often hear about bike rack barricades or bike rack fencing , because the barriers resemble bicycle parking in shape.
Hong-Kong
There they talk about “Mills barriers” , named after a local manufacturer; internationally the term appears alongside “crowd control barrier”.
And then there are the frontstage variants , which in the live world are usually simply called "Mojo-" or " Crash Barriers." But that's a topic for another blog post.
Some fun facts and anecdotes
The Giant's Fiasco The Giant's flight from Brussels was supposed to be spectacular: Nadar dreamed of flying towards Austria or Turkey. In reality, the balloon landed that same night somewhere between Ypres and the North Sea, after experiencing weather problems. Several authors later described the entire balloon epoch as a fiasco – but the name of his fences stuck. marcelgrauls.be
Nadar and Jules Verne Nadar was friends with Jules Verne . The balloon Le Géant inspired Verne to write his novel Cinq semaines en ballon ( Five Weeks in a Balloon ), and Nadar himself is said to have been the model for the character Michael Ardan in De la Terre à la Lune ( From the Earth to the Moon ). Together they even founded a "Société pour la recherche de la navigation aérienne" (Society for the research of aerial navigation) to promote aviation. Wikipedia
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