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Villa Park redevelopment


Phumfeinz

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What's stopping us building  a world class stadium with a capacity of 60k, as long as we promise to keep parts of the ground closed until the transport infrastructure is improved to allow for the greater capacity (seeing as that's what's holding us back)?

The North Stand obviously needs a rebuild and as Stevo says, its common sense to increase the capacity at the same time, seeing as it needs to be rebuilt/improved anyway.

We could keep the upper tiers of Trinity and also Witton Lane closed to keep to a capacity that Birmingham Council allows until everything else in in place.

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3 hours ago, rodders0223 said:

It certainly does make sense, but then I look at the stadium of light with it's 48,000 capacity and it looks horrific. VP looks bad enough as it is with all the empty seats now :(

I think VP has looked great for most of this season.

Closing the top of the Trinity was a great idea, imo. It means the rest of the ground looks almost full most of the time

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9 hours ago, Stevo985 said:


I'm rambling. The point is, the redevelopment of VP isn't JUST about extra seats. There are parts of the ground and surrounding area that need to be redeveloped.
If the club are demolishing the North Stand to make improvements to the aesthetics, the corporate facilities, the disabled areas, the concourses etc (all stuff that needs doing), would it not make sense to add a few thousand seats while they're all at it?
Rather than doing it all at exactly the same capacity and then in 5 years be saying "oh we need more seats, we probably should have added them when we were doing all that work?"

I understand your point, and I personally would love to see a new North Stand with the features you talk of, but I would also ask this : 

if we are promoted next season and then give the green light to the works is the lost revenue while the works take place really going to matter ? Matchday takings mean so little in the Premier League these days that I doubt it will matter in the longer term. 

If we give the go ahead to improvements this summer and don't get promoted next season how likely are the new corporate facilities in the new North Stand to sell out game after game for teams like Wigan, and Rotherham (or their equivalents). If they aren't sold out and the club has to survive some more seasons in the championship on the much reduced TV money how exactly will this be done ? 

The club reduced costs this season by closing the upper tier of the trinity road stand, this was in my opinion a sensible move and meant that area didn't need staff. If we then build a new (I assume larger) North Stand, there is nothing to suggest we could fill it in this division and therefore some areas are likely to remain closed in the new stand as well as the trinity road.

personally I want Villa to be self sufficient, we all know that if we are in the Premier League and we have some success we will need to address the North Stand and surrounding areas, but surely this is better done at a time when the benefit will be noticeable and beneficial rather than having the possibility of it becoming a half full white elephant.

i am all for redevelopment, I just don't see the rush, and waiting and seeing could in this case be the best course of action, as so much hinges on next season.

 

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4 minutes ago, dukes said:

i am all for redevelopment, I just don't see the rush, and waiting and seeing could in this case be the best course of action, as so much hinges on next season.

Whatever season we are in, things will always hinge on the season after. 

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16 minutes ago, dukes said:

I understand your point, and I personally would love to see a new North Stand with the features you talk of, but I would also ask this : 

if we are promoted next season and then give the green light to the works is the lost revenue while the works take place really going to matter ? Matchday takings mean so little in the Premier League these days that I doubt it will matter in the longer term. 

If we give the go ahead to improvements this summer and don't get promoted next season how likely are the new corporate facilities in the new North Stand to sell out game after game for teams like Wigan, and Rotherham (or their equivalents). If they aren't sold out and the club has to survive some more seasons in the championship on the much reduced TV money how exactly will this be done ? 

The club reduced costs this season by closing the upper tier of the trinity road stand, this was in my opinion a sensible move and meant that area didn't need staff. If we then build a new (I assume larger) North Stand, there is nothing to suggest we could fill it in this division and therefore some areas are likely to remain closed in the new stand as well as the trinity road.

personally I want Villa to be self sufficient, we all know that if we are in the Premier League and we have some success we will need to address the North Stand and surrounding areas, but surely this is better done at a time when the benefit will be noticeable and beneficial rather than having the possibility of it becoming a half full white elephant.

i am all for redevelopment, I just don't see the rush, and waiting and seeing could in this case be the best course of action, as so much hinges on next season.

 

1) arsenal would probably disagree

2) even randy was trying to increase non matchday revenue, we some facilities in the trinity that can be used every day of the week, theres some daft stat along the lines of us having >20 function rooms whereas goodison park has one, they've built that education / activity bit in the corner, randy should have gone and got the football league museum to put somewhere

based on what the dr has said before i think he's looking than just match day revenue, how does he get people spending money at VP tomorrow? the number of seats will just be part of the redevelopment, it'll be bigger than an attendance boost

and on the previous page someone said about a tram to star city, with genting pulling out i dont see star city surviving, it might suffer a long drawn out decline (which lets be honest it has been for years anyway) and i still his theme park will be something quite similar to what they've got there

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On ‎27‎/‎02‎/‎2017 at 02:03, Wezbid said:

I don't make many games as I'm not a local but god damn is parking/transport an issue. It took me an hour to get out of Birmingham last time I drove. Shame we can't just have 20,000 car spaces under the ground, although that would just end up a bottle neck too. If you've grown up on 30,000/40,000 crowds every week it's probably just the norm and no biggie smalls but I'm used to 3,500/4000 crowds usually at home and I'm away in 5/10 mins. 

I'm sure there's no simple answer but gridlock after every game shouldn't just be expected and the norm. It would drive me mental having to do that all the time. On the plus side I still have 3 years of Wittertainment podcasts to catch up with. 

I don't think VP is any worse than other grounds for parking, you could always park at Star City if you know it, 20 minute walk away. London grounds are non existent for parking.

I wouldn't say public transport is terrible either, you have Witton and Aston as two main train stations and plenty of bus routes to and from Town that go within a mile radius of the ground.

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As it looks like the club is going to add disabled seats in the summer in the lower north, I guess all this excited talk of building work is some way down the road. As it would be a bit silly to reconfigure the lower north, and then flatten the entire stand a couple of years later when we are achieving world domination/sell outs every game/champions league football. Well we can dream can't we. 

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24 minutes ago, The Fun Factory said:

As it looks like the club is going to add disabled seats in the summer in the lower north, I guess all this excited talk of building work is some way down the road. As it would be a bit silly to reconfigure the lower north, and then flatten the entire stand a couple of years later when we are achieving world domination/sell outs every game/champions league football. Well we can dream can't we. 

Not really. There's not a huge amount of work involved in adding the disabled seats. It won't alter any future plans I'm sure.

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On 12/03/2017 at 14:15, TrentVilla said:

 

Redevelopment of Villa Park; Trent Villa Proposal

1. Get that abomination of a name of the Witton Lane Stand

2. Put up Ron Saunders name

3. Any other business

I was no fan of the old goat during his time at the club, but we'd look incredibly small minded and petty to change it for changes' sake whilst he is still alive. 

Far better to change it when (hopefully) the stand is bulldozed as part of any future upgrade. 

 

It's a carbuncle, and does us no favours.

A three tiered effort there, with a smaller mid level tier for corporates will also hopefully free up the better seats in the Trinity again for actual fans.  

It looks shit to see them continuously vacant. 

Edited by HolteExile
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19 hours ago, Stevo985 said:

Sorry to go back to an old post.

 

Think of it this way:

 

Say you wanted to do some work on your house. You wanted to give it a nicer kitchen and bathroom and improve the garden. But to do that you had to knock half the house down and rebuild it.
You live on your own, but you're engaged and you know that in a few years you'll have a wife and 3 kids and you'll need a bigger house.
So you get a quote for the work and the builder says 

We can do the bathroom and the kitchen and the garden and rebuild the house for £30,000.
Then in 5 years we can knock the house down AGAIN and rebuild it but add 3 more bedrooms, and that will be another £30,000.
OR
Seeing as we have to knock half the house down this time anyway, we can rebuild it bigger NOW and it'll only cots you £40,000 for everything.

Which would you choose?



I'm rambling. The point is, the redevelopment of VP isn't JUST about extra seats. There are parts of the ground and surrounding area that need to be redeveloped.
If the club are demolishing the North Stand to make improvements to the aesthetics, the corporate facilities, the disabled areas, the concourses etc (all stuff that needs doing), would it not make sense to add a few thousand seats while they're all at it?
Rather than doing it all at exactly the same capacity and then in 5 years be saying "oh we need more seats, we probably should have added them when we were doing all that work?"

I live outside of Adelaide, the only city in the world that had a one way freeway. Dumbest idea ever. Now after many hundreds of millions of dollars wasted, we have a two way freeway. 

Prepare for the future now, it is much much cheaper. 

In case any one cared how it worked. The freeway was one way into the city from 2am till 1230pm then it closed till 2pm and opened out of the city till 1230am and closed til 2am, and so forth.

Exceptional on weekends when it was the opposite way around. Confusing?

Edited by Villan_of_oz
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12 hours ago, villa4europe said:

1) arsenal would probably disagree

2) even randy was trying to increase non matchday revenue, we some facilities in the trinity that can be used every day of the week, theres some daft stat along the lines of us having >20 function rooms whereas goodison park has one, they've built that education / activity bit in the corner, randy should have gone and got the football league museum to put somewhere

based on what the dr has said before i think he's looking than just match day revenue, how does he get people spending money at VP tomorrow? the number of seats will just be part of the redevelopment, it'll be bigger than an attendance boost

and on the previous page someone said about a tram to star city, with genting pulling out i dont see star city surviving, it might suffer a long drawn out decline (which lets be honest it has been for years anyway) and i still his theme park will be something quite similar to what they've got there

Arsenal are in a very different position to us, how far away from being in that position we are depends on what is planned (for clarity I mean in relation to the team, which is paramount to bringing in new fans) in the eventuality that we do get promoted.

Arsenal averaged an attendance of 59,944 (against a capacity of 60,000)  for the 2015/2016 season, whereas we averaged 33,690 (against a capacity of 42,785)

The cheapest season ticket (adult) for Arsenal in 2015/2016 was £1035 (highest was £2000), whereas our cheapest Adult Season Ticket price for the same season was £335 (highest was £615), so even given a massive increase in ground capacity we are unlikely to have the same revenues simply because the fanbase would be unlikely accept such massive increases no matter what additional services were added or what the team were doing.

I am not and never have said that the re-development of Villa park is linked to additional seats, but of course they are a major part of that.

as things stand Witton is never going to appeal to people on wet Monday morning in January....I am not sure that i can see that changing. As you have said Star City is not far away, offers many different facilities in a small area and is in decline...have you ever visited in day time and weekdays ? Believe me it's like a ghost town

We have ample conference facilities / function rooms in the Trinity...so how often are they sold out for non-match related revenue ?

Organic growth rather than development for the sake of it is what I am advocating. I don't believe this is a case of if we built it they will come, all the evidence (Star City, and even Resort World) points to the opposite.

Edited by dukes
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While we are on the subject of transport links, I'd like to point out that they've actually got worse.

I used to be able to catch a bus from Sutton Coldfield (by the cinema) to Aston that would drop me off just opposite the train station. The 104, 102, 105 all used to run along there. They have all been scrapped by National Express and replaced with x2, x4, x5 - all which go up the Aston Expressway. Meaning I now have to catch 2 busses to Villa Park and a further 2 busses back, either that or get off in Erdington and walk 40 minutes.

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4 minutes ago, Junxs said:

While we are on the subject of transport links, I'd like to point out that they've actually got worse.

I used to be able to catch a bus from Sutton Coldfield (by the cinema) to Aston that would drop me off just opposite the train station. The 104, 102, 105 all used to run along there. They have all been scrapped by National Express and replaced with x2, x4, x5 - all which go up the Aston Expressway. Meaning I now have to catch 2 busses to Villa Park and a further 2 busses back, either that or get off in Erdington and walk 40 minutes.

Get the train bro. 5 minutes. 

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23 minutes ago, dont_do_it_doug. said:

Get the train bro. 5 minutes. 

I live exactly half way between Sutton and Wylde Green. its a 25 minute walk to either.

I'm lucky though as I have a friend with a huge drive just around the corner from Villa Park, I park at his and go in for a coffee after the match while the traffic dies down :)

I was thinking more in general for people who live around me that rely on public transport.

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3 hours ago, Junxs said:

While we are on the subject of transport links, I'd like to point out that they've actually got worse.

I used to be able to catch a bus from Sutton Coldfield (by the cinema) to Aston that would drop me off just opposite the train station. The 104, 102, 105 all used to run along there. They have all been scrapped by National Express and replaced with x2, x4, x5 - all which go up the Aston Expressway. Meaning I now have to catch 2 busses to Villa Park and a further 2 busses back, either that or get off in Erdington and walk 40 minutes.

Get the 907....stops outside the Perry Bar shopping centre. 10 minute walk from there.

104, 102 and 105 were all scrapped about 10 years ago!

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