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My view is that the whole stand needs replacing, so I agree its not just about seating. It needs replacing with a modern commercial multi use stand just like the Jarrold (which has offices in it). The Jarrold cost £8m in 2004 and has around 8700 seats.

In 2013, the Chairman said a new stand would cost £30m.

One of those numbers must be near the realistic one.

In terms of how to house the incumbants of the City stand during the rebuild, I have no idea. But would suggest the following short term measures.

a) house the away fans in the Barclay upper (which is what it was built for)

b) maximise the home use of the Jarrold (since there will be no segregation)

c) in the short term (again) seek to house those ST holders elsewhere in the ground and accept some people will be disappointed.

My view is that a 30,000 stadium, would be the kind of space that allows for the ground not to look empty at 26,000 (if we''re in league 1) and to be packed to the rafters in the premier league.

I do not actually know the capacity of the current city stand however.

There should be some thought given about housing the away supporters differently to avoid the loss of seats due to segregation.

All of our discussions have failed to consider the potential push toward ''safe standing'' areas, which would challenge our narrow view of potential capacity matters .

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Some interesting points made amidst the childishness. Purple''s in particular about the prospect of marginal advantage in the Prem. In absolute financial terms the cost of a new stand is no longer significant as income inflation from Sky has far outstripped building inflation. So the only downside is a marginal disadvantage in football investment in the short term before increasing competitiveness in the long run.

The question is more about what kind of club do we want to be? We could get by without a stand by just hiking ticket prices by 10%/15%/20% to whatever the bite point is that stops the ground selling out and get the same effect. We could tread water as we are, squeezing in a few extra here and there or we could bite the bullet.

All have pros and cons, and financially there is not much between them but logistically building a new stand comes with problems that can''t be under-estimated. Lakey''s up and over plan sounds appealing but would cost more in both time and money. Cheapest and Fastest way is to raze it and rebuild in a straight line but for 18 months the club would have to tell season ticket holders they can''t come!

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Here is some guesswork of mine purple, because lets face it, thats all both of us are doing here. And these figures are pure speculation, and likely inaccurate.
We spend, I dunno, 30 million quid totally rebuilding the stand. Losing revenue for part of a season while we do so. We end up at say, 35,000 capacity. Because we only want to do this once, increasing capacity in stages would be much more expensive. Crowds for most games increase to 30,000, and when the big teams roll into town we get 34,000.
Season tickets remain static at todays figures, as it is so much easier to pick and choose your games, and still get tickets.
The unthinkable happens, and we get relegated, and gates drop back to an average of say, 28,000.
Thats 7000 empty seats we have no revenue for, as we continue to pay off the loan we took out.
Its very "cup half empty" but just as likely as a happy ending.

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Couldn''t we buy the hotel corner back and convert that into something like the Community Stand but incorporate a replacement hotel into it somehow not facing the pitch (thus losing only say one year''s revenue for the hotel business, which can''t be megabucks)? That would be 1,500 or so seats and sounds a lot cheaper to me with no need for relocation.

I don''t think we need too many more seats, oversupply would also risk people not renewing STs as there would be more casual tickets available so less need to pay a lump sum for the whole season for some folk.

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Corner infills give an extremely poor return of seating compared to the build cost.

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[quote user="morty"]Corner infills give an extremely poor return of seating compared to the build cost.[/quote]I don''t think that is the only issue with the corner infill. I''m not going to start big on this again, but it is still quite an important thing to get sorted imo and does present an opportunity to fill in a gap in the stadium and add extra seats, if it can be sorted.  I think its worth the extra expense if it means it can make the stadium whole again.   It has to be done sometime.

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I''m a multi use site advocate. Get people in and around the stadium when its not in use. For that reason, I like the hotel being there. On a Monday in mid June, the ground can be a conference venue for business and it needs an on site hotel. Its about the sustainability of the ground long term, mixed use.

And I do think we''ll see safe standing areas in the next ten years. That will mean crowds nearer 30,000 within the existing infrastructure

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I think a fit-for-purpose scheme must be the complete demolition and replacement of the City Stand. The present stand is pretty tired although barely 30 years old and completely out of kilter with the other three sides. Of course a double-decker replacement would have been an ideal choice at the time of the fire but the Premier League TV money wasn''t coming in and no one could have foreseen the full houses we get now. To be fair to Robert Chase over several subsequent years he did take full advantage of the football ground improvement grants that were available at that time to improve other areas of the stadium.LDCs suggestion has it''s plus points but if we want a new stand fit for the 21st century we need to push the boat out. Risky yes, but we generate more income from our corporate activities than we do from all the regular season tickets. Any new structure would take full advantage of that in much the same way as the Jarrold Stand and probably include areas let out to private companies. If the old road outside was incorporated into the design it could be a very impressive stand indeed.The problem of re-locating season ticket holders might not be as bad as it seems. When the Jarrold was being built away fan access was strictly limited and casual seats would have to be similarly severely rationed this time too. The great and the good and some corporates would have to slum it with the hoi-poloi for a bit but the upheaval would be worth it in the long run.Any capital projects are a gamble but to get our capacity up to around 30/35,000 and have a stadium where only one stand would be more than 25 years old would say something about our ambition.I wouldn''t expect anything to start tomorrow but if we can get a foothold in this League and yet still continually fret about relegation season after season nothing will ever happen.

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[quote user="BB"]I''m a multi use site advocate. Get people in and around the stadium when its not in use. For that reason, I like the hotel being there. On a Monday in mid June, the ground can be a conference venue for business and it needs an on site hotel. Its about the sustainability of the ground long term, mixed use.

And I do think we''ll see safe standing areas in the next ten years. That will mean crowds nearer 30,000 within the existing infrastructure[/quote]
Agree re the hotel, it provides steady, non football, year round revenue too.

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[quote user="morty"][quote user="lincoln canary"][quote user="morty"][quote user="lincoln canary"][quote user="morty"]The protests at Carrow road, directed at McNally all seem a long time ago now, and a little bit silly.[/quote]

All helped towards getting rid or Adams, which turned out ok![/quote]It helped, did it?Seeing as McNally was already having Alex Neil watched regularly, I suspect it had very little bearing. And it just ended up looking petulant.[/quote]

Well we don''t know that for sure, and even if he was looking at him, he certainly was pushed into making something happen sooner. For all his great achievements, out of his 4 managerial appoints at city, he''s got it wrong as many times as he''s got it right!

Any way not the time for dwelling on negatives. Currently he''s on form.[/quote]Yes, we do know that for sure, because he said so. And I have no doubt he was only too aware of the situation, and what was needed to correct it, but I guess its whether or not you actually trust him to do his job correctly.Its the board that chooses a new manager, not McNally unilaterally. It is my opinion that there have been times when the board goes with McNally''s plan, and times when they choose not to. Lambert and Alex Neil feel like the twice they have listened to his opinion, and acted on it.[/quote]

Oh Morty, you do apply childish logic when supporting your personal views in a discussion. Either that, or your one incredibly naive person!

Yes we do know "because he said so" lol. He isn''t likely to say anything else is he! And your opinion is the board decided to listen on two occasions, and thought "nah your all right" on the other two! Lol. McNally takes responsibility for all appointments whether successful or not. End of.

With regard to foundations, it is more than possible to build around the old stand and incorporate the existing structure into new foundations built for the new tier. There are many ways the loads of a new stand can be transferred away from the existing foundations, however the most cost effective way would probably be to remove and rebuild. But the foundation issue is a bit of red herring.

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[quote user="lincoln canary"][quote user="morty"][quote user="lincoln canary"][quote user="morty"][quote user="lincoln canary"][quote user="morty"]The protests at Carrow road, directed at McNally all seem a long time ago now, and a little bit silly.[/quote]

All helped towards getting rid or Adams, which turned out ok![/quote]It helped, did it?Seeing as McNally was already having Alex Neil watched regularly, I suspect it had very little bearing. And it just ended up looking petulant.[/quote]

Well we don''t know that for sure, and even if he was looking at him, he certainly was pushed into making something happen sooner. For all his great achievements, out of his 4 managerial appoints at city, he''s got it wrong as many times as he''s got it right!

Any way not the time for dwelling on negatives. Currently he''s on form.[/quote]Yes, we do know that for sure, because he said so. And I have no doubt he was only too aware of the situation, and what was needed to correct it, but I guess its whether or not you actually trust him to do his job correctly.Its the board that chooses a new manager, not McNally unilaterally. It is my opinion that there have been times when the board goes with McNally''s plan, and times when they choose not to. Lambert and Alex Neil feel like the twice they have listened to his opinion, and acted on it.[/quote]

Oh Morty, you do apply childish logic when supporting your personal views in a discussion. Either that, or your one incredibly naive person!

Yes we do know "because he said so" lol. He isn''t likely to say anything else is he! And your opinion is the board decided to listen on two occasions, and thought "nah your all right" on the other two! Lol. McNally takes responsibility for all appointments whether successful or not. End of.

With regard to foundations, it is more than possible to build around the old stand and incorporate the existing structure into new foundations built for the new tier. There are many ways the loads of a new stand can be transferred away from the existing foundations, however the most cost effective way would probably be to remove and rebuild. But the foundation issue is a bit of red herring.[/quote]
Firstly, for Gods sake, will you please download another browser?
So now you are implying mcnally lied to us?
No honestly, it is the whole boards decision. Allegedly dave voted against the adams appointment, and was overruled.

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The cost-benefit analysis of expanding a football stadium is always going to be tricky. It''s perhaps most difficult to fairly account for some of the benefits of expansion eg a potentially better atmosphere, attracting new fans (particularly younger ones), increased goodwill from not having to ''turn away'' fans and the general prestige that having a bigger and nicer stadium brings.Someone mentioned that the rebuilding would be a good calculated risk, and this is a good way to view things imho. The naysayers seem to be especially paranoid about the risks of the impact to the playing budget and the implied risk of relegation. But they seem to be making a somewhat contadictory argument if they fail to account for the same risks in the case that we do not expand Carrow Road. In other words, what would be the costs of non-expansion in terms of lost revenue, reduced budget etc?We managed to stay up under Lambert with a vastly reduced budget, so I think that the risks of a more modest reduction are somewhat overplayed (albeit the latter would be for more than one season). I would argue that poor football, unrelated to budget, rather than a marginal reduction in the footballing outlay is a bigger risk to our Premier League status. If we can avoid spectacular own goals such as employing managers like Hughton or Adams, then I say we should go for expansion.

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[quote user="morty"][quote user="lake district canary"][quote user="TCCANARY"]

 Isn''t the biggest problem how the ground will be redeveloped? As there''s a very small amount of non-season ticket holders seats available what do you do with the season ticket holders when their seats are not available?The primary candidate for change would be The City Stand (had to stop myself from calling it The Main Stand) and that must be about 90% season tickets holders, where do they go whilst it being rebuilt?

[/quote]

I think that ultimately the City Stand will be

built over the top of, with the upper tier not affecting the lower tier that much.  Much cheaper than demolishing the existing stand completely and possibly even allowing the city stand to still be in use during the building process.  Its not so far fetched, as the main foundations would be outside the City Stand, with any supports needed in the present stand engineered with the minimum of disruption during a close season or between matches.  Underneath would be a walkway/road as at Old Trafford.   Could be done and the main thing in its favour is the fact that the space is there to do it in the road outside.

[/quote]Yes it is that far fetched, the club have previously stated that the foundations are not suitable to just add another tier, and the only option is to demolish and completely rebuild.[/quote]

the club may have said that but fairly sure anything is possible in actually constructing such a stand. just cost a few more quid.

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[quote user="morty"]Here is some guesswork of mine purple, because lets face it, thats all both of us are doing here. And these figures are pure speculation, and likely inaccurate.
We spend, I dunno, 30 million quid totally rebuilding the stand. Losing revenue for part of a season while we do so. We end up at say, 35,000 capacity. Because we only want to do this once, increasing capacity in stages would be much more expensive. Crowds for most games increase to 30,000, and when the big teams roll into town we get 34,000.
Season tickets remain static at todays figures, as it is so much easier to pick and choose your games, and still get tickets.
The unthinkable happens, and we get relegated, and gates drop back to an average of say, 28,000.
Thats 7000 empty seats we have no revenue for, as we continue to pay off the loan we took out.
Its very "cup half empty" but just as likely as a happy ending.
[/quote]

One would need to know more than I do about the financial implications, which is why I am not arguing for expansion but only putting the argument for expansion.But in general there is a reason why clubs do this, and it is that if you can bear the cost then you have a money-generating asset for life. It would, for example, be fascinating to know how it has worked out with the South Stand. The old regime took the sensible decison to double to 8,000 rather than stay at 4,000 or treble to 12,000.That cost us around £9m to build and a great deal more in terms of interest payments. That was the cause of the majority of our external debt.But from the moment we paid off that debt a couple of years ago, for how ever many decades we stay at Carrow Road, any money produced by those extra 4,000 seats became pure profit. It doesn''t matter if we find ourselves in the second tier from time to time, or even the third, because the probability is we will  have enough seasons in the top tier.

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[quote user="BB"]I''m a multi use site advocate. Get people in and around the stadium when its not in use. For that reason, I like the hotel being there. On a Monday in mid June, the ground can be a conference venue for business and it needs an on site hotel. Its about the sustainability of the ground long term, mixed use.

And I do think we''ll see safe standing areas in the next ten years. That will mean crowds nearer 30,000 within the existing infrastructure[/quote]

I saw (wasnt attending) and saw a jehovah witness gathering there. must have been 5 thousand there

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The stadium expansion question is asked every year at the AGM and the Supporters Forum.The answer is always the same and amounts to something like this........... "The logistical and financial implications are daunting and having come close to a near death experience the last time we built a new stand, we do not want to put ourselves in that position again".Personally speaking I think it extremely unlikely that I will see a 35K capacity ground in my lifetime.But I could be wrong[:D]

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[quote user="ricardo"]The stadium expansion question is asked every year at the AGM and the Supporters Forum.The answer is always the same and amounts to something like this........... "The logistical and financial implications are daunting and having come close to a near death experience the last time we built a new stand, we do not want to put ourselves in that position again".Personally speaking I think it extremely unlikely that I will see a 35K capacity ground in my lifetime.But I could be wrong[:D][/quote]I take it you missed the 1963 game against Leicester in the FA Cup, Ricardo? [:|]

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[quote user="quentin"][quote user="ricardo"]The stadium expansion question is asked every year at the AGM and the Supporters Forum.The answer is always the same and amounts to something like this........... "The logistical and financial implications are daunting and having come close to a near death experience the last time we built a new stand, we do not want to put ourselves in that position again".Personally speaking I think it extremely unlikely that I will see a 35K capacity ground in my lifetime.But I could be wrong[:D][/quote]I take it you missed the 1963 game against Leicester in the FA Cup, Ricardo? [:|][/quote]No mate, I was there.There have only ever been 4 40k attendances and I was at 3 of them. The one in 1950 was before my time.In the entire history of Carrow Rd there have only been 22 attendances over 35K.

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[quote user="ricardo"][quote user="quentin"][quote user="ricardo"]The stadium expansion question is asked every year at the AGM and the Supporters Forum.The answer is always the same and amounts to something like this........... "The logistical and financial implications are daunting and having come close to a near death experience the last time we built a new stand, we do not want to put ourselves in that position again".Personally speaking I think it extremely unlikely that I will see a 35K capacity ground in my lifetime.But I could be wrong[:D][/quote]I take it you missed the 1963 game against Leicester in the FA Cup, Ricardo? [:|][/quote]No mate, I was there.There have only ever been 4 40k attendances and I was at 3 of them. The one in 1950 was before my time.In the entire history of Carrow Rd there have only been 22 attendances over 35K.[/quote][Y] You know your stuff, Ricardo.Good reasons for the return of standing in the terraces. 

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[quote user="ricardo"]The stadium expansion question is asked every year at the AGM and the Supporters Forum.The answer is always the same and amounts to something like this........... "The logistical and financial implications are daunting and having come close to a near death experience the last time we built a new stand, we do not want to put ourselves in that position again".[/quote]Blaming our troubles on the building of a new stand rather downplays the prior influence of hiring Grant, Roeder and Gunn and the general shambles the footballing side of the club was in back in 2009.If the board can implement a decent footballing strategy and learn from their mistakes, then adding capacity ought to be a fly in the ointment rather than a millstone around the club''s neck.

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[quote user="quentin"][quote user="ricardo"][quote user="quentin"][quote user="ricardo"]The stadium expansion question is asked every year at the AGM and the Supporters Forum.The answer is always the same and amounts to something like this........... "The logistical and financial implications are daunting and having come close to a near death experience the last time we built a new stand, we do not want to put ourselves in that position again".Personally speaking I think it extremely unlikely that I will see a 35K capacity ground in my lifetime.But I could be wrong[:D][/quote]I take it you missed the 1963 game against Leicester in the FA Cup, Ricardo? [:|][/quote]No mate, I was there.There have only ever been 4 40k attendances and I was at 3 of them. The one in 1950 was before my time.In the entire history of Carrow Rd there have only been 22 attendances over 35K.[/quote][Y] You know your stuff, Ricardo.Good reasons for the return of standing in the terraces.  [/quote]Yes, safe standing would be good for those that want it. Personally speaking I can no longer manage to stand for an entire game so it wouldn''t be any good for me. Whether they could convert the bottom tiers behind the goals to safe standing, I don''t know but it is a possible way of increasing the capacity. On the other hand surely it would have to be a cheaper price than a seat so would it be financially viable?I would love to see a bigger ground but from what McNally and Bowkett said at the last AGM, I can''t see it happening any time soon.

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Safe standing means that the "seats" can be used as seats or terrace. Therefore to achieve 30,000 attendance around 5000 "seats" would have to be of that type ( which can be made into standing areas ).

The ground would still have 27000 seats. But 5000 of those would be suitable to be used as standing areas to provide the capacity gain to 30000 when needed.

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Not with you there BB.

I presumed that with safe standing you could get more people into the ground than at present without any expansion.

i have been told however that you can only have one person standing where one seat used to be so in effect there is no net gain.

Perhaps somebody who knows the actual facts on this matter could advise?

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Mr J.

Feel free to check out the facts on this matter by following this link (I don''t know how to make it clickable) but that website is very helpful.

http://www.safestandingroadshow.co.uk/the-proposal/the-proposal-continued---the-sums

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I think If we were able to get the club into a Stoke sort of position of consistantly avoiding the relegation battle and we had a strong core squad, perhaps after 3-4 seasons it might be something the club would be willing to gamble.

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I don''t understand why if the Jarrold cost £9m, even allowing for inflation, replacing the CS in its entirety would cost over 3 times as much? If we di just knock it down and replace it pretty much like for like surely the construction cost would be about £10-12m, the cost of one decent international standard player?

If the CS was completely redone then it would give the club a chance to really boost the corporate hospitality and catering/conference facilities side of things which would be potentially generate more sustainable income should we get relegated again.

As to relocation as others have said just restrict away fan numbers (that may require permission from the Prem Lge) and fill up the unallocated casual seats. But at the end of the day there may not be too many to displace or who could not be accommodated and if push came to shove why not just say that in the interests of long term development certain STs will not be available for one season but will get priority rights or discount rights to a new seat in a brand new state of the art stand? I don''t think its rocket science.

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I am not so sure people would be very happy with being told they basically cant watch their team for a season, with the reason being " its for the greater good"

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No they wouldn''t, nor would I. But it wouldn''t be very many and they could be looked after when the new stand is built, even given a free ST for a year or two. Any annoyance will soon fade, it''s only football and life isn''t perfect. So there''d be "noise" from some quarters but in the scheme of things you just have to take the flack for a bit and move on taking a longer term view.

Or, lets say you have 4000 in the CS and only 3000 seats elsewhere. Offer a good pricing or deal on the new stand, food and drink discount etc and a first choice of seat option and you could get a lot taking up a short term absence voluntarily. But the club has access to the sort of people who could up with something creative so as I said before I don''t think it beyond the wit of man to sort it out.

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