Expanding Falmer Further

[drew]

A monday night on telly with the hint of crowd trouble, and it still did sell out. Give us top flight football and Arsenal at home with Arsenal bringing 10,000 then 45,000 / 50,000 would be a breeze for a club that can can 30,000 for Wolves in an end of season nothing game.

What is it with this fixation you have with 30000? Exactly which seasons have you identified where the club regularly had 30k crowds?

Over the history of the club we have 30k+ on 21 occasions, excluding last year when I dont think we actually had a 30k crowd as they now report tickets sold rather than actual attendance. That works out at about one crowd of 30k every 5 years the club have been in existence! Again, ex last year for the reasons mentioned, our highest average was 25,264 in 77/78, the only time the average has exceeded 25k! Ex last two years, we have only had 5 seasons when the average was above 20k and 4 of those were in the Mullery/Ward years!

With regard to the wolves game you conveniently ignore the fact that the tickets were sold before it became a meaningless fixture!

 

[drew]

Not true. Check the attendance figures for the last few games.

I think we all know we didn't actually get 30k through the door!

 

[Wozza]

A monday night on telly with the hint of crowd trouble, and it still did sell out. Give us top flight football and Arsenal at home with Arsenal bringing 10,000 then 45,000 / 50,000 would be a breeze for a club that can can 30,000 for Wolves in an end of season nothing game.

I think we should worry about getting into the top flight first...

 

[Blue Valkyrie]

I think we should worry about getting into the top flight first...

The thing is, Palace haven't worried about their ground capacity and are now in the Premier League, and now it's too late to do anything before next season, so they'll miss out on the gate revenue.

I reckon it's best to worry about getting into the top flight at the same time as worrying about potential ground expansion - just have different people worrying on each task

 

[TrickyOne]

Have to be honest the club has added an xtra row at the back of the north already with no consultation. The space between seats has been reduced n prices go up.....not quite what mr perry promised. Im not so keen on watching the game over other peoples shoulders!!!!

 

[Puppet Master]

Shouldn't we wait for the new ground novelty factor to wear off a bit first?

 

[BHAZiggy]

Interesting about the signs for North Upper though

The North Stand Upper is simply the newly extended wing of the the West Stand, centre.

 

[HastingsSeagull]

I'd like to see us squeeze that 30,750 out to 32,000 by filling in corners and things but that is enough for now.

Need to check that in 2-3 years we are still selling out at Champ level before looking to DRASTICALLY alter stands etc.

 

[Easy 10]

You can forget the roofs/arches ever being moved to accomodate an additional tier(s). As others have said, you'd have to take the entire stadium to pieces. Those arches are buried deep underground in concrete thrust-blocks. The arches are connected to each other by a "ring of steel", and are leaning back against each other, precisely counterbalancing each other in order to support the weight of the entire roof. The whole roof is being pulled up and held in place by the outward leaning of the two arches.

To deconstruct and raise that roof would carry such astronomical costs that any resulting increase in capacity (IF it was filled) would take many many years for the club to start reaping the benefit from. Not to mention the fact that such a major project would probably take well over a year, maybe two, to complete. Where are we going to play while thats going on ?

Non-starter. I doubt very much any additional tiers are possible for either end either, what with the 2nd floor concourses required to serve them as well. Best you can hope for is a few extra seats scattered in the corners somewhere.

 

[8ace]

It's the same in all the stands. We actually lost seats when they converted the back of the ESL to 1901. No-one has ever explained what happened to them and how it didn't affect our capacity.

Not sure they are like this in the WSU



From about 1 min in.

 

[Nottseagull]

Give it 10 years of domination in Europe and then we can build a new stadium for 100,000 supporters to fill

Err...where?

It's the same in all the stands. We actually lost seats when they converted the back of the ESL to 1901. No-one has ever explained what happened to them

Did Newhaven get them?

 

[Randsta]

Err...where?Did Newhaven get them?

Knock down shoreham power station and pop it there!

 

[The Large One]

It's the same in all the stands. We actually lost seats when they converted the back of the ESL to 1901. No-one has ever explained what happened to them and how it didn't affect our capacity.

They never converted the back of the ESL to 1901. The 1901 packages were sold long before the seats went in.

Our 'capacity' and the 'number of seats' aren't necessarily one and the same.