Today is the anniversary day of our largest home attendance, 55019, in 1949. The largest crowd we have played in front of was 89,345, last year.
[QUOTE="Castro's Coffin, post: 7654902, member: 1018061 The statement football has lost thousands of fans is completely wrong. It may be attracting a different sort of fan...[/QUOTE] You're contradicting yourselves. Football has lost thousands of fans over the years, they are replaced by other people, in bigger numbers as you have correctly pointed out. Football has become a hobby/pastime for masses of Middle class people, those who either attend games or subscribe to Sky Sports. Traditionally football was for the masses of working class people who no longer are able to afford it and these are the thousands I speak of.
To put even more context into it, those puffball crowds were achieved in a rugby city, with two bigger, better and more succesful sporting clubs playing a more popular sport competing for crowds. I don't know what Castro's whining about, we're a big club on the up. A sleeping giant awaking from its deep slumber.
I wonder if a standing section would be considered in any development? Thereby increasing the capacity without the cost the all-seater options. The FA/BPL need to start considering this as an option if prices are to fall for all fans. With a reduced price, compared to seated, this would be a major draw card for many of the younger fans....the people we are trying to attract. How many could we get in the North stand if it was standing only?
Realistically expansion needs to come in the form of safe standing I think it's 1.8 people for every seat so would increase say the north stand by 3,000 ish
Jeez I didn't know it was that many! That's a big increase for presumably minimal structural changes to the stadium.
As I said I dont think it will happen, but, if it did, and we can increase the ground to 34k seats relatively easily and make the North and East standing only then we could have a capacity of 47k eventually. Could we fill that with standing at £10?
As things currently stand, it wouldn't increase the capacity at all, we couldn't even implement it. According to those in the know, where already at the limit for the amount of people that could exit the ground in an emergency. According to the safety people, we'd need to make major structural changes to the stand to add more exits, before we could install safe-standing and it simply wouldn't be financially viable. Though we seem to follow rules that others don't, I'm pretty sure we could double the amount of people in there and still get them out quicker than you could empty the away end at St James Park, but that's what those who'd need to approve it say.
The financial argument's a red herring really, as like seating, the prices are aimed at socially engineering the crowd.
You're contradicting yourselves. Football has lost thousands of fans over the years, they are replaced by other people, in bigger numbers as you have correctly pointed out. Football has become a hobby/pastime for masses of Middle class people, those who either attend games or subscribe to Sky Sports. Traditionally football was for the masses of working class people who no longer are able to afford it and these are the thousands I speak of.[/QUOTE] But they haven't lost thousands of fans. We were getting an average of 37,000 on the 1950s. We haven't lost 13,000 fans. Most of them have died. We now get a different set of fans. You can moan all you like about the modern game, and I do as I would love an end to the sterile atmosphere we have now with spectators sat like dummies demanding to be entertained rather than supporting the team, but it is difficult to persuade those in charge there is a problem when crowds are at their highest for over 60 years. Especially when you consider that 60 years ago there were far lees alternative ways to spend your leisure time and the only hope of seeing any football was to go to a game. Of course a lot of us know an ageing audience means there will be problems in the future but the people running the game only look at what is happening now.
I know your fishing but, 'puffball crowds' were at a time when the two RL clubs couldn't get 4,000 between them. Huyton 800? They may have been more successful in the tiny world of RL but that's not saying much as Widnes have won more then FC and HKR put together twice over and a bit more besides. Not to mention Featherstone and Castleford. Question for you. If Hull is a rugby city (titter) name the twenty, nay thirty, no go on forty biggest crowds the city of Hull has ever seen within its boundary for competitive sport. Clue; its not rugby league.
Grimsby Town intend to turn section of Pontoon Stand into modern safe-standing area... http://www.grimsbytelegraph.co.uk/G...tory-26084201-detail/story.html#ixzz3SrEpHGFd
Exactly...you would think a non-tiered stand like the North one wouldn't have as many restrictions on it as say the away end at Newcastle...if it has then it's a joke.
Trouble is OLM fans don't think of those things. They just think you can alter the seats to the types used in Germany and everything would be fine. And, as you mention, in this country we have bodies and groups who put more.restrictions and rules on these things than elsewhere. Interesting programme on TV about the Colliseum the other week. They used the computer generated scenario for crowd evacuation that is used for modern stadia. Initially the ones in the cheap seats in the Colliseum were getting out at a slower rate but by the time it got to being clear of the perimeter of the stadium the Colliseum was just as good as a modern one. For sight lines, distance from the top seats to the centre of the arena floor etc, it met what is now considered the desired ideals.
It's down to interpretation of the guidance. There's a degree of flexibility in it, and if a suitable argument was put forward, it's conceivable that capacity could possibly increase without structural change. Ultimately, it's how much confidence the guy signing the scheme off has on the conditions.
Is there any stand approaching Newcastle's for height and time to get out of the ground. I was at the back of Wembley in 2008 and it seemed very easy to get out - eventually!
It's not necesarrily how long it takes to get outside, but how long it takes for people to leave the viewing area and enter a free flowing exit system. So it's more about getting people away from the seats and through the vomitaries, or the pitch side exits. The criteria is up to 8 minutes.
Is it a matter of context again? The rugby clubs have always reached capacity crowds. If you were to plonk Wembley in Hull for use by all teams for 100 years between 1900-2000 I've no doubt Hull FC would hold the largest crowd record. Don't see the relevance of throwing the Widnes point in, Hull FC have achieved far more in their sport than Hull City ever will. It's not really a point a city fans has grounds to make. Even Huddersfield have achieved far more in football than Hull City ever will.
The most farcical thing, is that if there was actually an emergency, everyone would just run on the pitch anyway.
