[Albion] New Car Park @ the Amex (VIP's only)

[brighton_tom]

Downing (the developer) bought it in January 2024 for £16.65m. Nice little earner for Mr Bennett

Yeah, I assume if a sale to Tony was ever possible he thought nearly £17m plus the cash needed to build a hotel or carpark on it was not value for money. Or maybe the Bennett's asking price was even higher in previous years.

 

[jonny.rainbow]

First the Sycamore Gap tree and now this.

Stop the madness. Save the white beam six!!!!

 

[A1X]

View attachment 201887

First the Sycamore Gap tree and now this.

Stop the madness. Save the white beam six!!!!

Are we at least going to plant some blue beam trees in the middle?

 

[amexer]

Sorry I meant the club, they made a mistake in not buying it from the Bennett’s initially although now there is planning permission for student flats it would be very difficult to turn down a future application for a hotel/offices for example.

They are applying for a building because of shortage of parking. Ut would be odd to then apply to build over present parking area

 

[Stuart Munday]

They are applying for a building because of shortage of parking. Ut would be odd to then apply to build over present parking area

You could build up, car park underneath, hotel, Terrace part 2, monorail station above, all sorts of possibilities.

 

[Jeremiah]

No idea on feasability of adding in that to an existing building (unlikely is my guess but i'm not an architect)
And yep. There's escalators at some grounds - eg: Spurs. (and the O2 , and Wembley) which is nice.
But most have stairs.

There actually are lifts in the West Stand but they are service lifts - but you can use them for emergencies.
When the mobility of my Dad became an issue -then a long standing WSU ST holder - the club found him (and me) tickets in the ESU where there are lifts available to fans / those that struggle with stairs. I'm still there. !

No need to add them to the existing building. Build them outside , like the proposed car park, and have walkways across adjoining them to WSU concourse with turnstiles at the foot of them. Jobs a good 'un.

 

[Easy 10]

If they can build / afford the car park how about a couple of lifts/escalators at either end of the West Stand for supporters ? Looking at the age of a lot of the supporters on the West Stand Upper concourse at present I give it about a couple of seasons more and there will be a huge drop off of season ticket holders up there as we are all to old to get up the stairs ( me included !)

For those who go to the away games do grounds such as Newcastle / Spurs / Arsenal have stairs only for the Upper Stands ?

Its primarily a safety issue I'd have thought. If you struggle with stairs and need a lift to get up to the upper tiers, then what happens in an emergency ? Because lifts won't be an option to get back down again, certainly in the event of a fire.

My dad eventually switched from WSU to WSL when the stairs got too much. Its just what the crusties have to do.

 

[Jeremiah]

Its primarily a safety issue I'd have thought. If you struggle with stairs and need a lift to get up to the upper tiers, then what happens in an emergency ? Because lifts won't be an option to get back down again, certainly in the event of a fire.

My dad eventually switched from WSU to WSL when the stairs got too much. Its just what the crusties have to do.

If that stands as an argument you wouldn't have lifts anywhere. I'd prefer an escalator myself.

Large amount of us crusties up there now , so the Club needs to be selling a fair amount of ST's to the younger generation otherwise it will be near empty in a few seasons.

 

[Easy 10]

If that stands as an argument you wouldn't have lifts anywhere. I'd prefer an escalator myself.

Large amount of us crusties up there now , so the Club needs to be selling a fair amount of ST's to the younger generation otherwise it will be near empty in a few seasons.

Well I stand to be corrected, but I don't know of any stadium that has lifts for supporters to use to the upper tiers. And any building you go into that has lifts ALWAYS has signs saying "do not use in an emergency". I've been in enough office fire drills to know that.

Escalators would be nice, but they take up a MASSIVE amount of space. I've used them at Wembley before, but it wouldn't be feasible at the Amex without some major restructuring. Can't see that happening somehow.

 

[Superseagull]

I seem to remember seeing on the very first plans for the Amex shown at a presentation at Hove Town Hall there was going to be a bridge access it the West Upper level or at least the lounge level from the University access road. It got binned off in later redesigns when they reduced the steel usage and height of the roof of the east and west stands as part of reducing stadium build costs.

I thought the club were looking to buy parts of the University owned land opposite the West stand which would maybe make more sense to build a car park for the elite VIPs and staff. They could then access West stand using a new bridge. Saves in messing around building a small multi story car park on the lower level outside the West stand.

 

[Stuart Munday]

I seem to remember seeing on the very first plans for the Amex shown at a presentation at Hove Town Hall there was going to be a bridge access it the West Upper level or at least the lounge level from the University access road. It got binned off in later redesigns when they reduced the steel usage and height of the roof of the east and west stands as part of reducing stadium build costs.

I thought the club were looking to buy parts of the University owned land opposite the West stand which would maybe make more sense to build a car park for the elite VIPs and staff. They could then access West stand using a new bridge. Saves in messing around building a small multi story car park on the lower level outside the West stand.

The bridge in the original plans were to the East Stand from the embankment which I think was to be used by a college/university which was then scrapped. I heard a rumour last year that they were looking to move the offices in the North Stand to there, whether that is true or not, who knows.

There are strong rumours that the women’s ground will be built on the rugby pitch next to the stadium and I would have thought that buying the derelict land above this would be a no brainer especially as Brighton University are in a worse financial position than previously thought.