Villa Park redevelopment

[Mic09]

53 minutes ago, VillaJ100 said:

Bloody hell if they're going to have more concerts at VP they need to sort the travel situation. Absolutely paralyzed all the roads all the way up to Perry Barr on Tuesday and today. Took 2 hours on bus and still not home

I think concerts will always jam everything up.

Fans that visit VP on regular basis know how to get in and out fairly easily, if someone comes in for a one off event they will just drive up to VP or get a taxi/train. 

[Rich_H]

Never mind the travel situation, if they want to do more gigs at Villa Park they need to overhaul the entire experience. Last night was an absolute nightmare with no preparation with what they were going to have to deal with. 
 

- Ran out of Purity by 7:40 in the Holte Standing, Heineken about 20 minutes later

- No barrels prepared for changing so they were rolling them from storage and pouring foam for half a barrel

- Nowhere to get water bottles filled up despite allowing empty bottles to be bought in

- Routes to and from pitch standing often blocked by people gathering around the seating area with no Marshalls outside of at the top of the stairs

- Signage wasn’t clear at all and was leading to a lot of confusion just to get in, got turned away from 2 queues when we were at the front as they had no green wristbands

- Sound really wasn’t great and sounds like it was equally bad for Pink earlier in the week, can’t imagine they used the same backline or sound engineers so maybe just the acoustics or the layout?

 

We ended up with £126 worth of preordered drink receipts we couldn’t actually get and no one at the bar could tell us how to get a refund so will need to sort that today, we stuck around for nearly 2 hours afterwards and still had to walk to Aston train station to have any hope of getting a taxi as roads still seemed gridlocked all around the area. Real shame as I was quite excited about getting 4 of my mates into Villa Park since they’d never go for the football but they all left with a very negative impression, real shame and tainted what should have been a great gig. 

[VillaJ100]

4 minutes ago, Rich_H said:

Never mind the travel situation, if they want to do more gigs at Villa Park they need to overhaul the entire experience. Last night was an absolute nightmare with no preparation with what they were going to have to deal with. 
 

- Ran out of Purity by 7:40 in the Holte Standing, Heineken about 20 minutes later

- No barrels prepared for changing so they were rolling them from storage and pouring foam for half a barrel

- Nowhere to get water bottles filled up despite allowing empty bottles to be bought in

- Routes to and from pitch standing often blocked by people gathering around the seating area with no Marshalls outside of at the top of the stairs

- Signage wasn’t clear at all and was leading to a lot of confusion just to get in, got turned away from 2 queues when we were at the front as they had no green wristbands

- Sound really wasn’t great and sounds like it was equally bad for Pink earlier in the week, can’t imagine they used the same backline or sound engineers so maybe just the acoustics or the layout?

 

We ended up with £126 worth of preordered drink receipts we couldn’t actually get and no one at the bar could tell us how to get a refund so will need to sort that today, we stuck around for nearly 2 hours afterwards and still had to walk to Aston train station to have any hope of getting a taxi as roads still seemed gridlocked all around the area. Real shame as I was quite excited about getting 4 of my mates into Villa Park since they’d never go for the football but they all left with a very negative impression, real shame and tainted what should have been a great gig. 

On one point I've heard the sound at the pink concert was great from people who went but the same gridlock and travel problems. Not sure about refreshments

[Rich_H]

3 minutes ago, VillaJ100 said:

On one point I've heard the sound at the pink concert was great from people who went but the same gridlock and travel problems. Not sure about refreshments

My sister went to Pink and was in Lower Doug and said the sound was out of sync from different speakers at times and vocals were patchy. She wasn’t drinking so her only complaint was they weren’t letting her keep lids on the water bottles bought from the bar despite wanting to buy 3 each with it being so hot, she got there 90 minutes before so it was still filling up at the time. 
 

It’s been a while for me since doing a stadium gig and my last ones were at Wembley over a decade ago, I think having experienced Hyde Park twice last year and how well that worked for similar ticket prices it just showed a real gulf in experiences - for the sake of a £20-30 additional travel cost if planned properly it makes it hard to justify going to VP for a gig again. 
 

Hopefully the lessons from these two and the work around North and Villa Live allows them to really improve the hosting as I imagine it’s a great source of revenue during the summer. 

Edited June 17, 2023 by Rich_H

[rbcuk]

Tranmere fans haven’t forgotten 

 

[Villatillidie95]

Birmingham Mail running an article saying that development is on hold pending the transport situation. Think we all knew that was the case anyway, but sounds like the club dont want to begin anything until they get assurances or concessions from the council.

Plans to renovate Villa Park's North Stand are currently on hold due to transport concerns, despite Aston Villa hoping to break ground on their stunning new redevelopment earlier this year.

Quote

Aston Villa plans to redevelop Villa Park on hold due to major concern

Latest Aston Villa news from BirminghamLive as transport concerns delay Villa Park redevelopment

 

[The Fun Factory]

Not a great look for Villa all of these problems coming from the concerts last week. For many of us sounds all too familiar!

[Follyfoot]

On 16/06/2023 at 10:48, The Fun Factory said:

Actually I think the last time a Villa home game had an attendance over 50,000 was verus Blues back in September 1976. The current North Stand put capacity down to 48,000, which dropped to around 39k in the 90s before the current trinity has put as at 42.5 for the last 20 years.

I can almost definitely say there were well over 50k in 1981 against the Albion and Ipswich, unofficial yes but the Holte was ridiculously packed 

[OutByEaster?]

25 minutes ago, Villatillidie95 said:

Birmingham Mail running an article saying that development is on hold pending the transport situation. Think we all knew that was the case anyway, but sounds like the club dont want to begin anything until they get assurances or concessions from the council.

I mean, I don't think it's factual, but it's a very interesting article - perhaps Mr Preece is being 'encouraged' by the club to put pressure on the council?

It's pretty useful for the club to get that pressure out there.

 

[Villatillidie95]

3 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

I mean, I don't think it's factual, but it's a very interesting article - perhaps Mr Preece is being 'encouraged' by the club to put pressure on the council?

It's pretty useful for the club to get that pressure out there.

 

Absolutely, this article will generate comments on social media and no doubt people will tag the local council's pages and make comments under their own posts demanding change. All part of the "soft power" the club can exert, the councillor in the article even described Aston Villa as "one of the city's key anchor institutions".

[The Fun Factory]

Obviously, the original schedule has slid by at least 12 months.  I presumed the original plan was to start with the demolition of the academy and villa village now, followed by closure and demolition of the existing north stand in the autumn.  Getting the 2028 euros will be massive. If the UK and Ireland win this will have to develop, or Birmingham will not be a host city, and will start the stopwatch on the development.

September 23- Uk and Ireland win the euro 2028 bid

Early/Spring 24- Witton station improvement plan announced

Summer 24- demolition of villa village/academy

Winter 24- closure and demolition of north stand

The whole phase 1 project will probably take 18 months/ 2 years, resulting in a  summer 2026 or late 2026 completion. That will leave 2 years before the euros, and possible time for the smaller scale phase 2 of development which still sounds a bit vague to me- even though a capacity of 52,000 odd was quoted in the 2028 submission. 

I would guess we have about a 1 to 2-year window to sort this out or we could end up with no euro matches or even a redevelopment. 

NWSE are pragmatic businessmen. They will only do this development if it is economically worth it, but because they want a shiny new stand. Pre covid Purslow indicated that no development plans were in the background.  As shown by the gas lounge work in the current north stand, and the initial application just to demolish villa village on its own. The demand has only gone crazy since then. It might be more economically worthwhile if they just keep putting up the prices 10% every year with demand higher than supply. As shown by the mad decision to charge holte end prices in the current out-of-date north stand, and yet we will sell it out.

Sorry to be a bit of a debbie downer but until I see a wrecking ball at Villa Park I will believe it when I see it. We have been waiting on this for the entire 21st Century.

[sne]

If given the choice I still think they'd rather build a new stadium. Won't happen due to history of VP and what not but I think they'd wish they could.

[StewieGriffin]

7 minutes ago, sne said:

If given the choice I still think they'd rather build a new stadium. Won't happen due to history of VP and what not but I think they'd wish they could.

Where would we go though? Nowhere else in Aston, and Aston is quite close to town, so we'd have to move out towards the shires...

Mate

[sne]

14 minutes ago, StewieGriffin said:

Where would we go though? Nowhere else in Aston, and Aston is quite close to town, so we'd have to move out towards the shires...

Mate

Yeah, that 's one of the reasons why it won't happen 

[brommy]

4 hours ago, The Fun Factory said:

Not a great look for Villa all of these problems coming from the concerts last week. For many of us sounds all too familiar!

It seems like there were more albeit minor issues for Springsteen but I can only speak from the experience of sitting in the Lower Holte for the pink concert. Apart from the unexpected queue arrangement (tickets were shown at the entrance to the Holte End car park but then not required again as the large Holte End exit doors were wide open making it feel open plan to the area behind the Holte), and a 10 minute queue for beers on a very warm night, I was very proud of how Villa Park looked and performed.

My wife and I caught the train from Barnt Green to/from Aston with no waiting or overcrowding so I suspect the traffic delays were caused by not enough people using public transport.

Birmingham Council want the large scale events to increase the status of the city and bring in external money to the city. Last week should a reminder to the Council that they need to invest in better transportation and traffic management. Increasing trains to the incredibly close Witton station (especially when the underpass to Station Road is completed) should be a high priority, no matter how tricky it could be at New Street.

[blunther]

18 hours ago, brommy said:

 

My wife and I caught the train from Barnt Green to/from Aston with no waiting or overcrowding so I suspect the traffic delays were caused by not enough people using public transport.

 

Surprised at that - went to the train station after the gig and the queue for the platform back towards town/barnt green was as far as the eye can see. Way worse than a matchday, and I'd be surprised if most of the crowd even managed to get on a train ebfore they stopped running. You must have got out quick!

[brommy]

1 hour ago, blunther said:

Surprised at that - went to the train station after the gig and the queue for the platform back towards town/barnt green was as far as the eye can see. Way worse than a matchday, and I'd be surprised if most of the crowd even managed to get on a train ebfore they stopped running. You must have got out quick!

I think it ended about 22:55 but because we were in the Lower Holte we were out of the large exit doors and then out near The Holte Pub within 5 minutes. A brisk walk to Aston station, arriving at 23:08 and walked straight up on to the southbound platform. Unfortunately we'd missed the last Redditch train (23:02 - sod's law it was on time!) towards Barnt Green so we got the 23:12 to Longbridge and got an Uber to Barnt Green which was obviously much cheaper than getting a taxi from central Birmingham.

My biggest issue is why don't Birmingham Council (who will have approved the concert and be welcoming the extra 'tourist' money coming in to the region) liaise with West Midlands Passenger Transport Executive to extend the latest train services when there's mass people events on in the city. There's no bottle neck at New Street at midnight so another half a dozen Lichfield to Redditch line and Birmingham to Walsall line trains would have avoided any overcrowding that my wife and I had obviously just missed.

If anyone thinks more late trains just isn't the sort of thing that can be done, I worked on the train and tram network in Manchester from 2010 to 2021 and every Parklife festival at Heaton Park had extra services arranged, including trams that ran through the whole night.

[VillaJ100]

20 hours ago, brommy said:

My wife and I caught the train from Barnt Green to/from Aston 

*Villa fans in the shires etc*

[brommy]

1 minute ago, VillaJ100 said:

*Villa fans in the shires etc*

Born in Selly Oak hospital and lived close by for 22 years, the past 3 decades has seen me just the other side of the Lickey Hills at around 2 miles from the Birmingham border. Still closer to Birmingham than many parts of Solihull are though.

[Captain_Townsend]

Just occurred to me: our new stand is contingent on the station upgrade, the station upgrade is contingent on Birmingham being a host city for the Euros and Birmingham being a host city for the Euros  is contingent on us building a new stand?

Are we actually in a bit of a bind here?