Just been down for a quick look at the latest progress. Looking good. My only slight gripe - if it is one - is that the South Stand is looking a bit smaller than I expected (from when I first looked at the Plans / photos); ie, it doesn't look massively high..... Esp when viewed from the Atyeo End (I'm mainly talking about the Atyeo Cam here). Looks big enough from outside the ground, esp from behind, but curiously smaller "inside". With the whole ground redevelopment costing in the region of £45 million (I think) - I wonder if the South Stand "portion" of that £45 million is quite an expensive rebuild for an end which will ultimately see a gain of less than 600 seats (I believe). I think the old East End held abt 5,500 (though less than that when segregation was in place), whilst the new stand will house about 6,071? Of course, the "main attraction" will be the new Williams Stand I suppose, and all the main "seat gains" will come from that, so I guess things will even themselves out. Well, I had to get my first proper post onboard I think, had to talk about something - so this was it!
Welcome to the board HP, I look forward to some good imput, I enjoyed your humour over in the gas pit, they don't like it up 'em so don't be offended, we have all been there, read our last post thread and you will see you are amongst mates.. Up the City..
"whilst the new stand will house about 6,071?" Can you be more specific please? Certain posters on this board expect a greater degree of accuracy. And welcome
The new south stand will not hold a great deal more supporters than the east end but those supporters will have much better facilities & sight lines that are intended for a seated stadium (not seats bolted to a terrace with shallow steps between them). AG is land locked and as such we simply cannot construct large stands apart from the new Williams. The latter is going to be extremely impressive.
With the Atyeo only for away fans from start of 2016-27 season, and assuming we are doing well in the Championship with good followings from away teams, it should be possible to get actual capacity gates.
Give me the old Eastend any day... can STAND where I want, sing and not be bothered by stewards, where as next season there will probably be more families in the stand, you have to SIT where your season ticket says to and if you don't you'll be removed from the ground.... Whilst I'm over the moon we're getting a new stadium I'm not happy about the way the new Eastend has all these rules.
Welcome HP One thing that strikes me about the new stand is how far it goes back on the Williams side - the Williams replacement is going to be a monster
Yes it is, isn't it? Don't forget though, its also partly because the pitch is being moved several yards towards the new Williams Stand (or in next season's terms, towards the "building site) thats partly why the South Stand comes over so much, but yes - new Williams will be a giant!
that's the bit I cant fathom the point it goes back to, will certainly make the Williams big, Welcome HP
If you look behind the Dolman the South stand protrudes about 3 metres so that's probably to put the stairs into the back of the dolman.
It's called progress Shiny...football is in the entertainment industry and it's competing against a multitude of other social activities. In order to attract bigger gates we need to attract the families and AG was not an attractive proposition for casual fans. It was archaic. I understand the nostalgia of the East End (I used to love it in there when we scored and the crowd surged) but we have to move on. Look at the success of Brighton with their new ground - that's what we need. I just hope that the new surroundings don't mute the atmosphere. Some of the EPL games I watch over here are astonishingly quiet and that would be a shame. I'm looking forward to having a few beers in the new sports bar next time I make it back to the UK. Looks very cool.
