Future of Croke Park

[magickingdom]

eye sore to say the least, has gaa written all over it- only do half a job, as a mate of mine says one word describes croker: amateur- and he doesnt mean it in a good way. Croke park at present is a purpose built concert venue or 3/4 of a modern stadium.

how dumb is your mate? has he visited any other studium

[Red Army]

i  have ben to a lot of great stadiums all over the world. Croke park is a great stadium but has 3 main faults. The roof doesnt cover the bottom tier. the front of the bottom tier isnt sloped enough for a goood view, canal end anyway. The hill just looks stupid.

I wouldnt put a fully closed roof on it though, just enough to cove the seated areas. a 96,000 would be full about 3 times a year. i doubt if even the hurling final could fill that most years.

its a bit like Old Trafford with the railway holding futre expansion up. Supposedly when complete it will hold 98,000, and will be biggest in Europe.

[Galforever]

Somebdy mentioned to me what they would do to 'complete' it a few years back & i have also thoguht to be to be a good idea since.

Complete the 'bowl'. but maintain the 2terrace in the lower section (ie standing section' and have theupper section seated. this would ensre that the terrace status is kept and also make the stadium probably the most ubique in the worls. not sure how architecturally sound this would be though

[rrhf]

I think it is ridiculous to build a house that big and stop on the final wall.  Problem is the GAA dosent need the extra capacity that the final stand would bring.  Always thought it kind of ironic that we stand in the wet all year around until we get our big day out in Croker where we pay treble the price for a seat ... in the wet.  Croke Park should be sold to and rented back from the government, as we need it.  Time to cash in our chips. 

[ardal]

I always thought it was the railway that was stopping the development of Hill 16 and Nally stands.

My understanding is that when Dublin get around to building an underground station, one of the stops will be under Croke Park. This could possibility mean they can do away with the line running behind the McNally Stand and Hill 16.

I did that tour of Croker last year. There is a platform area already laid under one of the stands for a train station. They have signal lights installed and a raised platform area fenced off to one side. Our guide told us that CIE were invited to put a station in but they declined at the time. She also told us that they had plans to build part of Hill 16 out over the current train tracks that run behind it. However CIE again stopped them doing this as (get this) CIE owned the airspace above the rail tracks and they were unwilling to let the GAA built part of the propsed Hill stand in it! Thats why we have the stunted half arsed current lay out.

CIE are a world onto their own. I once worked for a company who wanted to put some ducts in a road owned by Dublin county council, but after we got their agreement we discovered that we had to get; and pay for, permission from CIE because a railway bridge ran over the road. Eventually I lost the head with them and their "George the 1st" contracts that I asked how much aer lingus pay to fly over their fecking tracks. CIE deserve a thread of their own, perhaps titled "TGBs".

[Gnevin]

I think it is ridiculous to build a house that big and stop on the final wall.  Problem is the GAA dosent need the extra capacity that the final stand would bring.  Always thought it kind of ironic that we stand in the wet all year around until we get our big day out in Croker where we pay treble the price for a seat ... in the wet.  Croke Park should be sold to and rented back from the government, as we need it.  Time to cash in our chips. 

Selling our primary source on income that's a great idea 

[Bogball XV]

I assume the people who posted here for in support of a all seater Croker are different to to the ones who posted that Tickets are too expensive?

Why assume that? 

I think it is ridiculous to build a house that big and stop on the final wall.  Problem is the GAA dosent need the extra capacity that the final stand would bring.  Always thought it kind of ironic that we stand in the wet all year around until we get our big day out in Croker where we pay treble the price for a seat ... in the wet.  Croke Park should be sold to and rented back from the government, as we need it.  Time to cash in our chips. 

Selling our primary source on income that's a great idea 

I do think it's a great idea, most big companies do this sort of thing, it's a great way of rasing finance.  For the GAA it would mean they could build a purpose built 35,000 modern stadium in or around dublin, that could host all those games that are staged i croker that shouldn't be next nor near it - we could even rent it out to leinster or munster rugby for heineken games.
Just because we sell it back to the govt doesn't mean that we couldn't derive income for it, we'd sell it on our terms and have the fai and irfu stop the development of lansdowne.  According to MK they've already started that project, but it's not to late to pull out and the prime real estate down in d4 will command a decent price even in our current recession

[snatter]

Selling our primary source on income that's a great idea 

It certainly is a great idea if you have a fair few hundred million in the bank and still have guaranteed access to Croker when we need it.

To me, the only argumnet against selling it was when it meant something, it was ours, a tribute to the association, etc.
Now that
1. we've lost its marketing power as an exclusively gaelic games stadium and
2. others make more money out of it per match than we do,
all the emotional significance of Croker has gone.

As another posted on here before - why should the GAA have most of its assets tied up in a part time rugby pitch.

[fred the red]

Im not sure that its possible for Lansdowne to backtrack at this stage, it seems pretty well advanced from these recent photos:

[ziggysego]

Didn't even think they were as far on as that to be honest.

[Bogball XV]

It's not looking bad is it?  Even with that, throwing up a few stands doesn't cost too much, but it would be too far gone before we could ever get our act together. 
I reckon we've missed our opportunity here, once lansdowne is up and running it'll be the new 'big thing' and to be fair, it'll be good too, there'll be a great atmosphere in there for the rugby (and the soccer on occasion), as it's a tighter bowl structure, it'll also have the advantage of not having howling winds and rain bother spectators to the same extent.

[ziggysego]

Sure, it'll look more completed, but I can't see it surpassing the awe factor of Croke Park. I'd have more of a sense of pride of Croke Park, than I would have of Lansdowne Road.

[Gnevin]

I assume the people who posted here for in support of a all seater Croker are different to to the ones who posted that Tickets are too expensive?

Why assume that? 

Because seats are more expensive than standing and people are already unhappy with what they are paying .

I think it is ridiculous to build a house that big and stop on the final wall.  Problem is the GAA dosent need the extra capacity that the final stand would bring.  Always thought it kind of ironic that we stand in the wet all year around until we get our big day out in Croker where we pay treble the price for a seat ... in the wet.  Croke Park should be sold to and rented back from the government, as we need it.  Time to cash in our chips. 

Selling our primary source on income that's a great idea 

I do think it's a great idea, most big companies do this sort of thing, it's a great way of rasing finance.  For the GAA it would mean they could build a purpose built 35,000 modern stadium in or around dublin, that could host all those games that are staged i croker that shouldn't be next nor near it - we could even rent it out to leinster or munster rugby for heineken games.
Just because we sell it back to the govt doesn't mean that we couldn't derive income for it, we'd sell it on our terms and have the fai and irfu stop the development of lansdowne.  According to MK they've already started that project, but it's not to late to pull out and the prime real estate down in d4 will command a decent price even in our current recession
[/quote]
Why sell it when we are making plenty of money for it as it stands and if we sold it you we'd loose more than 50% on the income which is generated on non match days via event being held in croker.

[Bogball XV]

I assume the people who posted here for in support of a all seater Croker are different to to the ones who posted that Tickets are too expensive?

Why assume that? 

Because seats are more expensive than standing and people are already unhappy with what they are paying .

seats are more expensive than standing because the gaa set their prices that way, as maguire or someone pointed out, after the seats have been installed that is a sunk cost that the gaa do not need to take account of when setting prices any more, that they do, is because they feel that with more demand for seats they can fleece the punter even more.

I know what you're saying about losing income by the sale and leaseback scheme, but financially it would make sense if the gaa were to embark on another captal intensive project such as a new stadium, it comes down to making your money work for you, I think that if there were a will within the gaa to create a more adequate stadium then this would be the way forward, and knowing gaa people like I do, there's no doubt but that they'll be looking for another big project very soon, they'll have to prove to soccer/rugby that their c**ks are bigger.

Agree ziggy that croker is/will be more awe inspiring, but the atmosphere in the new lansdowne and spectator comforts will be better, in saying that it will be just another soccer/rugby stadium and there's plenty of a similar standard around the world.  The thing about croker is its sheer size, because the pitch is so much bigger, the whole stadium is multiples bigger than a comparable capacity soccer stadium.

[magickingdom]

theres no need to sell croke park, just keep renting it out at every opportunity and come up with a 40k stadium somewhere else