Main Stand. Have we missed a trick?

[GenerationA47 747]

Don’t know if others on here have been involved with construction-type projects this last year. Having professionally experienced the knock-on interruptions/changes in materials, labour, programme time and costs as a result of the global and national restrictions and shutdowns , I’d not have wanted to handle those extra uncertainties in a new £multi-million build.
One which didn’t even have planning permission, plus the inherently uncertain financial return. This was the flip side of the absent crowds.

[Greavsy 2,412]

3 hours ago, GenerationA47 said:

Don’t know if others on here have been involved with construction-type projects this last year. Having professionally experienced the knock-on interruptions/changes in materials, labour, programme time and costs as a result of the global and national restrictions and shutdowns , I’d not have wanted to handle those extra uncertainties in a new £multi-million build.
One which didn’t even have planning permission, plus the inherently uncertain financial return. This was the flip side of the absent crowds.

Agreed, Its not like Delia can nip down to Jewsons for the required materials. 

[GenerationA47 747]

2 minutes ago, Greavsy said:

Agreed, Its not like Delia can nip down to Jewsons for the required materials. 

😁

Or that they’d have been available if she had.. or affordable any more!

For an urgent project at home last June, we paid some chancer /saviour 3x usual cost of plaster bags, and had to pick them up from his yard miles away. Nothing in stock anywhere

Edited March 16, 2021 by GenerationA47

[Greavsy 2,412]

58 minutes ago, GenerationA47 said:

😁

Or that they’d have been available if she had.. or affordable any more!

For an urgent project at home last June, we paid some chancer /saviour 3x usual cost of plaster bags, and had to pick them up from his yard miles away. Nothing in stock anywhere

Good point, there was a plaster shortage,  remember that now.

I do have an image of Delia out in the yard, hard hat, and bag of plaster over her shoulder. MWJ, having a quick smoke as they load up. 

I need to get out more!

Edited March 16, 2021 by Greavsy

[TheGunnShow 5,932]

Can certainly understand the "fortune favours the brave" argument that is the crux of the OP's post, along with the obvious downtime we have with fans not being able to visit the ground. I agree with the finances though - essentially, I think a lot of people forget a couple of salient points:

1. Gate receipts has not been the huge earner for larger clubs for some time. The TV's where the real money is. Unfortunately it calls the tune as well. Need to be in the Premiership consistently for all of that. Not to mention that transfer fees are not always the big spend, you need to look at signing-on fees, wages and bonuses over time.

2. Our parlous financial state before selling Maddison. That was due to gambling on veteran / battle-hardened players and then Farke mopping up the mess. Such an expansion of the stand would essentially be a similar financial gamble, but on the infrastructure. Furthermore, related to point one, it's a gamble on something that doesn't yield as much revenue  compared to getting into the Premiership and sucking on the teat of TV/prize money there.

3. I'd be up for a bond scheme, but as others have said, a lockdown with the corresponding effect on employment and as yet unknown long-term effects thereof, that would be parlous. A nice idea in theory, but might not get the interest as people are needing cash for other things right now.

I'd like us to do it, absolutely. But a quiet spell when fans can't visit and when a source of income is stopped is not that time.

[Nuff Said 5,089]

2 hours ago, Greavsy said:

Good point, there was a plaster shortage,  remember that now.

I do have an image of Delia out in the yard, hard hat, and bag of plaster over her shoulder. MWJ, having a quick smoke as they load up. 

I need to get out more!

I think we all do!

[Wings of a Sparrow 1,410]

I can’t get the image of Delia with a hat hard-on out of my head.

What am I saying, I mean a hat hard-on.

I’ve done it again!

Edited March 16, 2021 by Wings of a Sparrow

[HazzaJet 252]

At the moment I would only say to do it if we were an established Champions/Europa League side or if Delia sold the club to a billionaire who was willing to give us their own money. At the moment the financial cost of Covid is a serious matter and the likelihood that if we did do it you would probably only see us signing free agents this summer - Gibson and Giannoulis would be sent back to their parent clubs and Max, Todd, and Emi will all be sold 

[K Lo 221]

On the subject of Carrow Road:

I only recently found out that the road the runs in front of (behind ?) the Geoffrey Watling stand and over Carrow Bridge isn't the original alignment of Carrow Road.

It used to run behind the Main/Jarrold stand and then over a previous bridge cited just lower down the river.

 

[The Gingerking 5]

8 minutes ago, K Lo said:

On the subject of Carrow Road:

I only recently found out that the road the runs in front of (behind ?) the Geoffrey Watling stand and over Carrow Bridge isn't the original alignment of Carrow Road.

It used to run behind the Main/Jarrold stand and then over a previous bridge cited just lower down the river.

 

I believe that was from YouTube and this recently uploaded vid by the wonderful 'lost norwich'

 

[Darth Vadis 150]

20 hours ago, PurpleCanary said:

From memory the Bowkett-McNally quote came to £50m. £30m for the work and £20m in interest.

£50m 😬 Didn't realise it was that high

[K Lo 221]

12 minutes ago, The Gingerking said:

I believe that was from YouTube and this recently uploaded vid by the wonderful 'lost norwich'

I've never seen that video before ! Thanks for that.

It was from archiuk.com
https://www.archiuk.com/cgi-bin/build_nls_historic_map.pl?map_location= Norwich Norfolk&search_location=Norwich, Norfolk, TG2308, TG 23 08&os_series=1&is_sub=&pwd=freesearch@freesearch.com&latitude=52.623931&longitude=1.293276&postcode=

Edited March 16, 2021 by K Lo

[The Gingerking 5]

Forgive me, but unusually for a Tuesday, with subtle encouragement from the wife, I've indulged in a early evening glass of fine Scotch and all is now feeling very relaxed and well.

There has been so many decent replies and contributions on this subject over the last couple of days. Just wish to thank everyone.

I have to say, after many years of infrequent observation on this board, this return has been a thoroughly pleasant and enjoyable experience. Cheers indeed.

Your average pinkun msg board calibre Norwich City fan never ceases to impress me with both their insight and knowledge on any particular subject, let alone on subjects even tenuously connected to the club. Also, the care shown in writing replies, remarkable.

If I may draw consensus from the many replies, I would say that whilst the majority of posters would undoubtedly like to see this project happen (at some point), despite what appears a prime opportunity to carry out the work, a similar and clear majority would still be highly cautious in view of being absolutely sure to continue to 'make ends meet' financial in what clearly remains a highly uncertain time. As I said in the opening post. It was a devil's advocate question that has as intended, produced some very interesting and worthy responses.

I think if I'm honest, not just on the subject, but in life in general, whilst I wouldn't consider myself gambler,  I have at points no doubt been a 'caution to the wind' type of chap. Like most, I have taken some financial gambles in life. Needless to say, some paid off, some didn't. There was a degree of risk and uncertainty in many cases, but I took those decisions with a longer view of moving forward and general progress in life. It's important to say that some of that progress was in terms of financial wealth, but notably some additionally meant progress in terms of status, security or with a view towards expanding future opportunities.  

With that in mind, regarding the Stadium/ Main Stand, this may be an unpopular opinion, but I think for me, that even in the worst case scenario that it meant the sale of a prized piece of 'human capital', I think I would still have to have a good think about it.

At some point you have to at least consider (or are likely forced anyway) to move at that abundant amount of current 'human capital' wealth (what, let's face it, 100million plus right now, has it ever been so high?) into a physical asset capital that may well last 50+ years. I think with an optimistic vision of the future, one would expect it to eventually pay off. When I say 'pay off', I don't necessarily mean in terms of clawing back the investment. As pointed out in another great reply, revenue from seating as a proportion of income has become increasing small, and we would be waiting till hell freezes over to recoup the cost in that way, I mean in terms in terms of status, future opportunities and to keep moving the club, to keep the club growing.

It doesn't make business sense on the spreadsheet is what the accountants amongst you will think. Quite right too. There is no way that we are going get that money back in the next 5 years, and not from bums on seats regardless. Without some sort of incredible unforeseen success on the pitch or something or some other miracle source of income we are taking a financial gamble. That doesn't make sense in terms of risk is what the insurance folk amongst you will think. Crikey, we are still in the midst of the biggest crisis the country has faced since WW2 and you want to expand a stadium(?!). We don't even know if, when, how, in what capacity, in what numbers any fans will returns and yet you want to space for 7k or so more(?!).

However, project sponsors or project managers amongst you may take a different view. When building a business case for any project one is is not looking any single aspect and whether on the surface wholly positive or negative. The business case looks at the future benefits of the project as a whole. The benefits in this case are not likely be financial for a good period of time (if indeed, ever), so you have to build your business case looking at different factors.

I mentioned in the opening post that the reason I was raising at this time was because it appeared an opportune moment without fans in the stadium. This is a business case factor. Without the usual losses incurred and without effectively losing out to our competition who are also currently handicapped in this manner, it would seem a great time to do it (that's assuming of course, that plans could be completed expediently).

The status of the club is another factor. I have no doubt that Norwich are now easily within the top 25 supported clubs in the land. Their international following clearly continues to increase due to DF's period of relative success and the also the terrific foreign players that ply their trade here currently. We surely have a decent clutch of Finnish supporters right now, I can tell you that from YouTube comments on matches alone. We are very easy on the eye in terms of playing style (well, Pep thinks so) and I see the club continually winning plaudits from neutral admirers for the outstandingly well run organisational structure. I don't think many of us would disagree with that currently. Though the stadium/ Main stand particularly, could not be described as poor by any means (bias me here, in fact still finds it rather pleasant), I have been to many stadiums that are clearly superior in terms of both capacity and facilities. Taking off the old yellow and green tinted glasses, there is definitely more than 25 of them in the land and we are slowly falling down this particular status ladder. Realistically, it's time to upgrade the Main Stand and move us forward. All other aspects of the club have moved forward in recent years. Shiny new scoreboard aside, the stadium really hasn't. When I see that 1980's single tier stand on any televised match, I can't switch off the part of my brain that is saying 'wow, in this day and age, doesn't it all look rather quaint'. For me, it doesn't send the right message in terms of marketing the club or attracting sponsors or investment any longer. It's not a bad old stand in essence, indeed, I've had some great times in there, but I simply believe we are bigger than that now and it's time to seriously move this matter on. I guess that's another factor in the business case, gaining security via attracting future sponsorship and investment. I'm sure there are more positive beneficial factor's other than financial, indeed, I would encourage folks to list them, however I've run out of time here.

With all of that said however, I can't pretend that there is not a great deal of 'heart' in debating for speedy development of the Main Stand. Perhaps those who make their cases focussing primarily on the pocket or the risk to future operations can see it with a degree more sobriety than me (certainly right now 😉).

It's that giddy little lad inside that is still marching down Riverside Road amongst the crowds whilst holding his Dad's hand and gazing up at those towering floodlights ahead. That unique match day excitement growing as we get swept along towards the ground. He is still longing to repeat the experience once again, but maybe with a huge shiny new stand that dominates the skyline and catches your eye from the train station and beyond. Something we could all be proud of. Something that could perhaps hold in the noise of matchdays to come. 

Thanks again folks.

 

Edited March 16, 2021 by The Gingerking