Casement Park in line for major overhaul - 40,000 all seater Stadium.

[ONeill]

HS's tacklin some oul bird down there and is hoping for a £20'000 sweetener so he can blow it all on White Lightning and shellsuits.

[DennistheMenace]

Sounds like the Irish version of the Queen Vic.

[Maguire01]

How does this work ?


The MP for West Belfast, Sinn Féin's Paul Maskey, said the development would create employment in the area and concerns about the road infrastructure could be resolved through dialogue with residents.

We should get Maskey to sort the York Street intersection too - 'dialogue' has to be a significantly cheaper way of solving infrastructure issues than fly-overs and under-passes.
The most inept politician i've ever seen.

[Maguire01]

Just read this today, assume it has been posted somewhere earlier on this thread?

http://belfastmediagroup.com/new-setback-for-casement/

Anyway, it gives a better appreciation of the residents' position. I know I wouldn't be happy if I effectively lost the use of my back garden.

Would it not have been feasible to try and buy up the houses on one side of the ground and then have a bigger footprint, shift the stadium a bit to one side? From Google maps, there looks to be around 15 houses on the stadium side of the street to the west of the stadium - two houses are already on sale on Property Pal at £220k and £140k -buy up those houses for sale and offer others a good price - say £250k - total cost less than £4m (small in the scheme of the development). Obviously it could only work if people wanted to take the offer - there wouldn't be power (or desire i'm sure) to vest.

[Bingo]

Just read this today, assume it has been posted somewhere earlier on this thread?

http://belfastmediagroup.com/new-setback-for-casement/

Anyway, it gives a better appreciation of the residents' position. I know I wouldn't be happy if I effectively lost the use of my back garden.

Would it not have been feasible to try and buy up the houses on one side of the ground and then have a bigger footprint, shift the stadium a bit to one side? From Google maps, there looks to be around 15 houses on the stadium side of the street to the west of the stadium - two houses are already on sale on Property Pal at £220k and £140k -buy up those houses for sale and offer others a good price - say £250k - total cost less than £4m (small in the scheme of the development). Obviously it could only work if people wanted to take the offer - there wouldn't be power (or desire i'm sure) to vest.

If you start buying houses for that purpose you into a whole new ball game regards price and the time it takes. For reference see Anfield and Liverpool FC, its a complete balls up and that was even when they done it for large number of houses on the QT.

[Maguire01]

Just read this today, assume it has been posted somewhere earlier on this thread?

http://belfastmediagroup.com/new-setback-for-casement/

Anyway, it gives a better appreciation of the residents' position. I know I wouldn't be happy if I effectively lost the use of my back garden.

Would it not have been feasible to try and buy up the houses on one side of the ground and then have a bigger footprint, shift the stadium a bit to one side? From Google maps, there looks to be around 15 houses on the stadium side of the street to the west of the stadium - two houses are already on sale on Property Pal at £220k and £140k -buy up those houses for sale and offer others a good price - say £250k - total cost less than £4m (small in the scheme of the development). Obviously it could only work if people wanted to take the offer - there wouldn't be power (or desire i'm sure) to vest.

If you start buying houses for that purpose you into a whole new ball game regards price and the time it takes. For reference see Anfield and Liverpool FC, its a complete balls up and that was even when they done it for large number of houses on the QT.

Well i've already estimated where it is regarding price - £4m out of a £70m budget (appreciate I may be off the mark on this, but i've set out how I came to that). As for time, it would obviously be contingent on residents wanting to sell, but if I was offered 120% of my house's value in the current market, i'd bite their hands off. From a time perspective i'm sure you're right though - as it's public money, there's probably a limited window of opportunity to spend it.

[snatter]

28k single tier, all covered, all seater. Simples!!

All covered would be ideal, I have raised this suggestion before only to be shot down by some!

Completely farcial from a design point of view not to have it fully covered. How can they argue that a roof adjacent to the Anderstown Road is in any way more obtrusive than the other 3 sides which border properties.

My understanding is that the A'town Rd roof had to be dropped because it failed the minimum daylight impact standards for the apartments on the other side of the A'town Rd.

I've said it many times before - the Casement site is simply too small.
That's why they haven't been able to build a roof, nor ever will, over the A'town Rd stand.

And that's why the uncovered A'town Rd stand has to be so deep - they're shoehorning people in there to get to the (already reduced) required 37k capacity.

ALL brand new stadiums built over the last 20 years have their deepest stands down the SIDES of the pitch, to maximise the number of seats with the best possible views (technically known as inside the Optimal Viewing Circle). But here in Casement, because the site is too small, we'll have the deepest stand BEHIND the goals. This will become an international joke amongst stadium architects.

That's why they're proposing closing the main arterial A'town Rd for several hours on match days, causing traffic chaos on matchdays. There's no room around the stadium to allow safe dispersal and congregation of fans, and only one entrance, so the only safe way to do is to roadblock the arterial A'town Rd route through S&W Belfast, causing traffic chaos including on the M1.

The constrained Casement site increases the construction build costs as vast underground bunkers will have to be created for carparking and ancillary facilities.

The constrained Casement site disallows the full range of Conference / Bar / Retail facilities to be built. And getting approval for concerts is by no means certain because of the close proximity of residents. This will have a massive negative impact on funding the long term maintenance of the stadium.

A far better outcome would be achieved by moving the project to a bigger site. Musgrave Park, 220m away is, in my opinion, ideal. It is big enough to allow for an unconstrained design, and safe dispersal of crowds via multiple exits without having to close the arterial routes.

If Belfast City Council wasn't obsessed by sectarianism, they'd have offered the use of the site a long time ago. It would be in the best interests of Belfast City & the GAA. Cork and Liverpool City Councils have done just that re PuC and Stanley Park.

A Musgrave site would generate vastly more income from Conferences, Functions, Bars & Concerts. Despite being only 220m from Casement, it is on the other side of the M1 and would be perceived as being in a neutral area. This automatically doubles the potential income from  non-GAA events.

[Walter Cronc]

28k single tier, all covered, all seater. Simples!!

All covered would be ideal, I have raised this suggestion before only to be shot down by some!

Completely farcial from a design point of view not to have it fully covered. How can they argue that a roof adjacent to the Anderstown Road is in any way more obtrusive than the other 3 sides which border properties.

My understanding is that the A'town Rd roof had to be dropped because it failed the minimum daylight impact standards for the apartments on the other side of the A'town Rd.

I've said it many times before - the Casement site is simply too small.
That's why they haven't been able to build a roof, nor ever will, over the A'town Rd stand.

And that's why the uncovered A'town Rd stand has to be so deep - they're shoehorning people in there to get to the (already reduced) required 37k capacity.

ALL brand new stadiums built over the last 20 years have their deepest stands down the SIDES of the pitch, to maximise the number of seats with the best possible views (technically known as inside the Optimal Viewing Circle). But here in Casement, because the site is too small, we'll have the deepest stand BEHIND the goals. This will become an international joke amongst stadium architects.

That's why they're proposing closing the main arterial A'town Rd for several hours on match days, causing traffic chaos on matchdays. There's no room around the stadium to allow safe dispersal and congregation of fans, and only one entrance, so the only safe way to do is to roadblock the arterial A'town Rd route through S&W Belfast, causing traffic chaos including on the M1.

The constrained Casement site increases the construction build costs as vast underground bunkers will have to be created for carparking and ancillary facilities.

The constrained Casement site disallows the full range of Conference / Bar / Retail facilities to be built. And getting approval for concerts is by no means certain because of the close proximity of residents. This will have a massive negative impact on funding the long term maintenance of the stadium.

A far better outcome would be achieved by moving the project to a bigger site. Musgrave Park, 220m away is, in my opinion, ideal. It is big enough to allow for an unconstrained design, and safe dispersal of crowds via multiple exits without having to close the arterial routes.

If Belfast City Council wasn't obsessed by sectarianism, they'd have offered the use of the site a long time ago. It would be in the best interests of Belfast City & the GAA. Cork and Liverpool City Councils have done just that re PuC and Stanley Park.

A Musgrave site would generate vastly more income from Conferences, Functions, Bars & Concerts. Despite being only 220m from Casement, it is on the other side of the M1 and would be perceived as being in a neutral area. This automatically doubles the potential income from  non-GAA events.

Thanks for the very thorough and articulated response Snatter. Regarding the minimum daylight impact standards surely the residents on the other three sides are closer than the apartment block along the Anderstown road?

A deep stand behind the goals can improve atmosphere (Borussia Dortmunds ground an example) but to not cover the ground entirely is madness.

I agree on Musgrave Park but surely that opens a can of worms as it's in South Belfast or is it still technically West?

[snatter]

The artificial deadline to spend the money is something that should be highlighted.
If the money was ringfenced and legally protected, there'd be less aof a scramble to try and ram this second-rate Casement solution through.

The GAA would be better to pause, draw breath, and think about how to achieve the best possible solution to serve Ulster fans for the next 100 years. If they had a bigger site, and the budget didn't stretch to doing the near-standard modern fully covered bowl, then the main side stands could be built to allow it to be fully completed in future.

With Casement, we'll never be able to expand and do the job right without shelling out a fortune to buy at least one side's worth of houses.

[snatter]

Thanks for the very thorough and articulated response Snatter. Regarding the minimum daylight impact standards surely the residents on the other three sides are closer than the apartment block along the Anderstown road?

A deep stand behind the goals can improve atmosphere (Borussia Dortmunds ground an example) but to not cover the ground entirely is madness.

I agree on Musgrave Park but surely that opens a can of worms as it's in South Belfast or is it still technically West?

The A'town Stand roof would have to be much higher than the others becasue it is (embarassingly) the deepest stand.
It is the deepest stand becaue that's the only way that the seated capacity can be pushed up to 37k (as opposed to the 40k that was tendered for).

Below is a link that illustrates just how high the A'town Rd stand roof would had to have been.

See post 1 at http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=1563744, published at a Community Consultation Event held in November 2012.

--

In Belfast's sectarian micro-geography, Musgrave Park would be technically South rather than West, but at only 250 metres away, does it matter?
The greater commercial opportunites would create far more job opportunities for the people of West Belfast.
Transport links (esp to rail) are better as well.

[snatter]

One more bit of sense before I leave my desk.

There's nothing more miserable than sitting in the rain.
Especially if you've paid a decent amount to sit in a joke of a brand new £75 Million Irish stadium that is only 3/4 roofed.

If, God forbid, we do end up with thousands having to be accommodated in the uncovered A'town Rd stand, surely it would be better for the poor drenched souls to be allowed to *stand* rather than sit.

Additionally, I think the GAA & architects should look at these RAIL SEATS that

1. allow safe standing
2. allow more fans to be accommodated in the same space.

See this great site for technical details:

http://www.safestandingroadshow.co.uk/the-case-for-safe-standing/case-for-3

For every 40 seated fans, you can get 72 safely standing fans instead!!!!!!!!!

If both the stands behind the goals had these RAIL SEATS, then it might be possible that the 37k capacity could be met by having a shallower A'town rd stand, that could just allow some form of ROOF to be built over it.

This has got to be worth examining.
If anybody has contacts / influence over the GAA project team or architects, then please forward this to them.

The GAA shouldn't get hung up about having an all seated capacity, when a partially standing capacity could deliver a roof over fans' heads instead.

[Kidder81]

Is not a big deal but Sinn Fein should surely look at getting someone else other than Paul Maskey to speak on this matter. I know he is the local MP but his public utterances are mind boggling at times and are doing him no favours.

[Milltown Row2]

Hardstation, has Pat Sheehan, West Belfast MLA (and clubman of mine) not got involved? Pat played hurling and football (when free) for the club and has a big interest in all things GAA.

I haven't asked him, may do next time I see him

[Maguire01]

Is not a big deal but Sinn Fein should surely look at getting someone else other than Paul Maskey to speak on this matter. I know he is the local MP but his public utterances are mind boggling at times and are doing him no favours.

And every other matter.

[Maguire01]

Thanks for the very thorough and articulated response Snatter. Regarding the minimum daylight impact standards surely the residents on the other three sides are closer than the apartment block along the Anderstown road?

I don't know the details on this case, but i'd assume the position and movement of the sun during the day would impact houses on some ends of the ground more than others.