Long Kesh Park takes another step forward

[Gaoth Dobhair Abu]

they should have built it on the outskirtd of dublin

Jezuz, Sammy's face would be a picture at that suggestion... 

[Evil Genius]

At some point in the coming weeks, the architects (HOK) will unveil the finalised stadium plans.
The following statement is notable in that it's the first to shed light on the actual design.

Snatter,
A few days back I took the trouble to compose a post in response to yours, where I outlined the position being taken by the majority of NI soccer supporters over the Maze stadium, more specifically, why we would much prefer a stadium in Belfast.

Do you have any thoughts on it? I appreciate it was very lengthy, so perhaps if you addressed the question of Location - out of town vs. city centre - that would be a start.

And to set the ball rolling, here is an extract from an interview in 2006 by World-renowned sports stadium achitect Rod Sheard, where he makes some interesting points [highlighted]:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/5052920.stm
Last Updated: Wednesday, 7 June 2006, 02:37 GMT 03:37 UK  

Inside the stadium of the future  

The 2006 World Cup sees Germany showcasing some of the best football grounds in the world and their design gives a clue to what the stadiums of the future will look like.
Globally, a new generation of sports stadiums are fast becoming an important symbol of the cultural and economic future of a city and country.

Germany is proud of its stadiums, with the jewel in the crown being the new Allianz Arena in Munich. Not only can it change colour, but architects say its shape and multi-panel roof are the key to the look of the grounds of the future.

Future grounds will be designed as bowls, with an abandonment of the idea of four stands surrounding a pitch, and with roofs. Crucially, they will also return to the heart of the cities, after many years of being sited outside the city.

"They will change, there's no doubt about it," said Rod Sheard, an internationally-renowned architect and leading expert on stadium design who worked with Sir Norman Foster on the new Wembley stadium.

"The big change that's happened in recent years, and will be a real change in the next 20, is that city planners have started to realise how important these buildings are in city centres," he told BBC World Service's Culture Shock programme.

Shape is key

The key experience for many architects planning the stadiums of the future is that of the Stadio Delle Alpi, built for the 1990 World Cup in Italy and now home to Turin clubs Juventus and Torino.

Despite Juventus being one of Italy's most famous and best-supported clubs, the Delle Alpi is very rarely above half full. Some of Juventus' less important fixtures have seen extraordinarily low attendances - in 2001, only 237 turned up for a cup game against Genoa.

Poor visibility, and the stadium's being sited some distance from Turin, are usually blamed.

"Back in the 60s and 70s, they were felt to be 'bad neighbour' buildings and were pushed out of town, and disconnected from the transport infrastructure, meaning they had to be surrounded by a swathe of car parks," Mr Sheard said.

"People now realise that was a totally wrong model, and that these are great buildings to have in a city centre. That is pretty well recognised as the model for the future."

P.S. Before you reply, you might like to take a moment to reflect on the fact that Mr. Sheard is a Senior Partner in HOK, the Architectural firm appointed by the Government to design the proposed out-of-town Stadium at the Maze.....

[T Fearon]

EG,Gwelytah, Sammy G. The stadium is gonna be at the Maze/Long Kesh. Save your energy, no one that matters is listening

[Deal_Me_In]

Mr. Sheard is one of the architects, not one of the people responsible for drawing up the business plan and NOT involved in any of the organisations who are responsible for deciding on the location of the stadium. It is their role to design a stadium that will accomodate everyones needs regarding capacity, which according to the statement from Ulster Rygby will have approx 20,000 on the lower teir which will not affect atmosphere.

[nifan]

2.The couple of dozen OWC Whingers allied to a bunch of meglomaniacal micro economists from Jordanstown have failed, I repreat failed, to identify one viable alternative Belfast location.

Viable in what way - those proposing the maze as viable fall back on the "if they build it theyll sort all the transport out" argument.
Ive yet to be persuaded of the viability of the maze - you yourself have pushed the train link for example, despite arguments about how viable it in actual fact is.

[SammyG]

At some point in the coming weeks, the architects (HOK) will unveil the finalised stadium plans.
The following statement is notable in that it's the first to shed light on the actual design.
No mention of SammyG's favourite moving stands, instead it looks like multiple tiers will be used to make the stadium look less empty instead.

Excellent, good to see that you have now conceeded the argument. There will be no option to change the capacity, which is what I (and anybody else who had studied the plans) has been saying all along.

[Deal_Me_In]

4. There are some outstanding issues relating to Governance and the Business Plan for the Maze Stadium but all parties (Ulster Rugby, GAA, IFA) continue to meet with SIB, DCAL and PWC regularly to work towards a mutually satisfactory solution.

5. As stated by the Minister, Edwin Poots, the Maze Stadium is the only option on the table and therefore we are focusing all our efforts into the Maze Stadium. At no time has a business proposal or governance solution been made available in relation to a Belfast Stadium nor have Belfast City Council ever met with a representative from Ulster Rugby.

I think this point from the URFU statement suggests that issues such as transport, amenities etc etc are being discussed and although no business plan has been unveiled i am confident one will be produced after the 30th June deadline has passed. We can also see that a Business plan for Belfast has never been put together so why demand one for the maze when the other "options" have not produced one or even contacted the parties involved.

[stiffler]

When the maze is built will you attend matches at it Sammy?

[Deal_Me_In]

Excellent, good to see that you have now conceeded the argument. There will be no option to change the capacity, which is what I (and anybody else who had studied the plans) has been saying all along.

No but they have made it possible to vary the attendances by closing/opening various sections of the stadium when required without affecting atmosphere or visability. It will still provide the 20,000 for NI scooer and Ulster Rugby while also catering for the 40,000 GAA fans and other events that may require this attendance.

[SammyG]

Excellent, good to see that you have now conceeded the argument. There will be no option to change the capacity, which is what I (and anybody else who had studied the plans) has been saying all along.

No but they have made it possible to vary the attendances by closing/opening various sections of teh stadium when required without affecting atmosphere or visability. It will still provide the 20,000 for NI scooer and Ulster Rugby while also catering for the 40,000 GAA fans and other events that may require this attendance.

Sorry but that is complete bollix. A 40K stadium with a stand closed is still a 40K stadium. Snatter (and a few others) have been arguing that the Maze would have variable capacity. Anybody who had looked at the plans new this was a lie and now this point has been conceded and will hopefully be another nail in the coffin of this white elephant.

[SammyG]

When the maze is built will you attend matches at it Sammy?

Won't have to worry about it as there's very little chance of it being built. In the last few weeks it's gone from 50/50 (or even 60/40) to being about 10/90 against and moving all the time. We always knew that the Maze wasn't viable and had no business case, now that Poots has been forced to admit this and try and get past the OGC, Audit Office and Robinson, the whole deal is crumbling like a house of cards. 

[snatter]

Evil,

I haven't time to give you the full answer your last two major posts deserve.
To be honest, I'm tired repeating myself to Sammy or challenging his guff.
My detailed replies to you would probably be a rehash of previous posts, albeit with  few quotes to back them up.

Main points would still be along the lines of

1. International studies bear little relevance to optimal location in a divided society like NI.

   Remember how we got here - NI Sports Council lobbied for a new "national" stadium after Scotland and Wales got theirs.
   Belated acceptance by Westminster that NI should get a stadium, subject to all sports agreeing (Look at the 1999 Q&A session in Hansard that I quoted to Sammy a few days ago).
   Recognition that excluding GAA from a "national" stadium sends out wrong signal to GAA's nationalist constituency.
   
   Political backing (and consequent funding ) from UK Govt dependent on above cross community agreement.
   Success dependent on neutral location.
   GAA picks Maze as only suitable neutral location from SIB shortlist, failing to support any Belfast option put to it.
   
   As said before, there is a whole school of ethnic geography that studies just how atypical land use is in NI, compared to non-divided societies.
   Rightly or wrongly, the nature of our divided society will determine stadium location.

   In one of my first posts on this over two years ago, I pointed out to some OWC'er that, yes, a city centre location ordinarily leads to a better atmosphere, etc.
   HOWEVER, NI is still far from being an ordinary society.
   Picture yourself and your family as part of 40k GAA fans travelling into Belfast.
   You wouldn't be relaxed - rather you would have one eye on any bigots hanging round corners, etc.
   You'd cover up your kids jersies and falgs and get them from the car to any stadium as quickly as possible.
   So, for the vast majority of people who would use the stadium, ie gaelic football fans, there'd be no "big match atmosphere", etc.
   
   
       
2. it is GAA fans who would be travelling in largest numbers to any new stadium.

   Genuinely independent studies of transport patterns of ALL fans to any new stadium, based on likely attendances (say on 2005 figures) should have been done a long time ago.

   I reckon that any study would show

   a. that nearly all fans would travel by car.
      Forget all the guff about multi-modal transport nodes that Belfast offers.
      It doesn't matter how many rail stations Belfast has, if there's not a train station in sight across south and west Ulster.

   b. given the above, overall congestion would be reduced by an out of town site.
      Trying to bring 40k supports by road into an already congested city causes gridlock within the city and on the motorway that they're trying to exit.
      Surely properly constructed carparks designed solely to take flow off the motorway to be parked will be more efficient than pre-existing city roads already congested trying to get traffic from a to b.

   c. Your point about mid-week soccer matches is entirely valid.
      But
        i. I'd think that if the Maze / M1 can take 40k coming from S/W Ulster, it could easily take 25k coming from Belfast.
        ii. The needs of 25k mid-week soccer fans has to be weighed against 40k gaa ones struggling to travel through Belfast (see above).
        iii. I do appreciate that, for Belfast based soccer fans, there will be more work involved in getting to midweek matches, and that their enjoyment will be curbed.
             As always in this debate, what's your alternative? YOu either take the govt funding via the Maze, or have to go for a "yourselves alone" approach and raise funds yourselves (much like the GAA did for 100 years).



3. you alluded to your rejection of any multi sports stadium on design grounds alone.
   I think that these issues have become less prominent now that rugby and soccer have successfully been hosted in Croker,a stadium twice the size of the propsoed NI stadium.
   As I said to Sammy, its probably best to leave these aside until HOK publish their proposed design.

   And as stated before, reliance on international practice in determining optimal capacity is shown to be flawed.
   It ignores the extremely high per capita GAA attendances (see 2005 attendance figures) and high female/family support (see ESRI report).
   How in hell did the UUJ come up with a 30k capacity when GAA crowds regularly exceed that figure by some margin (again see 2005 figures).



4. No matter how many more deserving cases exist for public funding, this money (for policical reasons in point 1) is ringfenced for a stadium only. NI plc either uses it, or loses it to the UK exchequer.
   The same argument never stopped Wembley, or any other legacy / landmark projects.
   Even disregarding the above (and you can't really), there's no fair, non-acrimonious way to divide up the money - as explained in previous post.
   
   

5. As stated before, I reckon I'm pretty typical of most GAA fans in that we're not cheerleaders of the Maze.
   We just
    a. see nothing better on the table
    b. are determined that our more popular sports getted treated fairly in this whole debate.
       To misquote some UUJ stooge on the telly last week - "if you were came down from mars and landed in NI, given the noise and dysfunctional media coverage of this debate, you'd swear it was the GAA who were the minor sport here".


Hey that's more than I thought I'd be able to write in a minute or two.
BTw, I don't think we'll agree on many points, given that my starting point is that a shared stadium is generally a good idea, while yours is looking at what's best for each sport and building separate facilities for each.
Imho, the political symbolism of a shared facility will win out, and if it doesn't Prudence Brownwill take the money back and give it to the Scots.

[SammyG]

BTw, I don't think we'll agree on many points, given that my starting point is that a shared stadium is generally a good idea, while yours is looking at what's best for each sport and building separate facilities for each.
Imho, the political symbolism of a shared facility will win out, and if it doesn't Prudence Brownwill take the money back and give it to the Scots.

What political symbolism? You've been asked loads of times but you haven't told us how the Maze represents any sort of shared space. By supporting the Maze you are categorically opposing any chance of a shared space.

[nifan]

Snatter, i dont necessarily agree with everything you say, but a well thought out and put across post of your position

[Evil Genius]

Hey that's more than I thought I'd be able to write in a minute or two.
BTw, I don't think we'll agree on many points, given that my starting point is that a shared stadium is generally a good idea, while yours is looking at what's best for each sport and building separate facilities for each.
Imho, the political symbolism of a shared facility will win out, and if it doesn't Prudence Brownwill take the money back and give it to the Scots.

Fair enough, you've made your point from a GAA perspective (naturally enough), just as I've made mine from a soccer perspective - we'll have to agree to disagree and see what happens*.

However, I would qualify your final conclusion in one very important respect. In an ideal world, I genuinely would like to see a shared stadium, both for the principle of what such a scheme might do to bring people together, but also from the practical standpoint of saving money by avoiding duplication (triplication?) of facilities.

But try as I might, I really cannot see any neutral, feasible location which will satify all three sports, or an acceptable "one size fits all" stadium design, so that we will end up with something which in truth satisfies no-one very much, but costs a fortune.

If I did think this possible, I would even consider it worth it that we are spending £100m+ of taxpayers money, plus diverting a site worth £500m+ for housing etc, when £50m or £60m divvied out between the three sports would allow each to significantly improve their existing facilities to a higher level.

Instead, if built, I can see us ending up with a messy compromise which will see GAA fans saying "OK, but no big deal"; rugby fans saying "Where?" (once or twice a year); and a dwindling band of soccer fans trudging out there, showing little more enthusiasm for the place than the previous residents displayed 

As someone once said, "A Camel is a Racehorse designed by a Committee". Had some local politicians shoved their nose in, that Committee would no doubt have come up with an Elephant. I'll leave it to you to guess what colour...


* - On a happier note, as time goes by, I genuinely do feel that this scheme is becoming less likely, rather than more. Onwards and Upwards!