Could Maine Road have been redeveloped better?

Frances Lee had plans to make it a 45k stadium there was a wright up and pictures in a program some one must have it?! It was about 15 or 16 years ago that it was in a program
 
peoffrey said:
Pigeonho said:
Would have been too difficult to redevelop it all into something modern. I look at Spurs and Villa's stadiums now, full of 60's designed concrete slabs - awful. Swales saw to it that we couldn't redevelop it anyway, because his attempts were fucking awful. Will never forget the opening of the Platt Lane stand, (Umbro). Oh my fucking god what a monstrosity. The Kippax too, could have been done 10 times better than that. No, it was time to move onto better things. I miss Maine Road though, that's for sure.
Click to expand...

And me. More Pubs in the area, too. Had some great times round there.

The COMS is a bit easier from town but it still lacks a feeling of being home, IMHO.
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Maine Road was what it was all about for me. That said though I don't think we would have got taken over by Thaksin, let alone the Sheikh, if we had stayed there. It always felt a bit odd seeing someone with the class of Anelka playing for us at Maine Road, in our shitty Le Coq kits! The games, us moving there - it was all fate in readiness for the Sheikh.
As we go on now though, the memories of the Sherwood, the old Kippax, that stench of fags, piss and beer burps will be what it was all about. Loved all that. As good as football is now and we're more than lucky to have what we have, football in general these days has a plastic feeling to it, can't describe why but its nothing like it was. Just glad I was brought to City in 88' to experience all that for years before the PL came in and things started becoming more and more money orientated.
 
I agree with many of the sentiments on here, bit I am struggling with why people felt there was no room around Maine Road to develop.

When you compare it to Highbury, White Hart Lane, Anfield, Goodison and to a lesser extent Villa Park there was extensive room around the ground.

The fact that much of this was given up to parking and general common areas was not cast in stone and with enough resources thrown at it could have been addressed.

I loved Maine Road and I have some magical memories of it. It had a soul which I'm not sure Eastlands has quite got yet (although it's getting there) but by the end it was a shithole. Swales and Lee can take a bow for that, but if it hadn't been so poorly conceived the move to Eastlands wouldn't have made as much sense and without that there is little doubt that ADUG would have looked elsewhere.
 
Miss it like mad, the character of the place, atmosphere, the pubs, beats eastlands for me. A proper Football Ground.
The land around maine rd ie from the Kippax carpark to Maine rd, was a huge area,
not as big as we have now but still a good size.
I have got that picture somwhere at home of the redeveloped Maine Rd, with the Kippax all the way around, that would of been something special, close to the pitch, more compact, it would of been quality.( ile have a look for it).
Ide say it would of been up around the 50k mark aswell.
Imagine you can only imagine, the noise from the place if that was done.
Getting there with eastlands now though, slowly but surely, but i think its too far away from the pitch and the roof is too high. still its our home and it is improving all the time.
 
In the last season at Maine Rd i went there regularly with work and many times went into the bowels of the place. All my juvenile dreams were shattered as i realised it was a dump.

You could smell the damp all over the main stand, including the changing rooms, which in theirself were pretty grim, all cheap 70's formica everywhere and barely any room. The place was on its last legs and would have cost a fortune to re-develop. And as previous posters have said, the stands that were 'new' were also atrocious. A 4yr old with a load of sticklebricks could have designed something better.

It was comparable with meeting your favourite rock star. They have an aura about them which mesmorises you but when you do eventually meet them you realise what a let down!


The one thing i do miss is the boozers and then the pub crawl back into town down Oxford Rd...:(
 
I think it was Franny Lee who got the deal for eastlands when we were talking about redeveloping Maine Rd.
Apparanley MBC insisted that we needed a new stadium, but Franny being Franny told them we allready had one,no thanks, so when they were building coms if i remember rightly they still wernt sure what would happen to it after the CW Games, i think they offerd it to the rags aswell,
so we ended up getting eastlands on a top deal.
Ime sure it was Franny, am i right.
 
AJ71 said:
Irlamblue said:
I once saw plans for all four stands in uniform. It was the new kippax stand all the way round. These were real drawing/plans, it looked impressive.
like city at that time.. nothing materialised.
i agree with the other chap.. maine round was in a bad position
i love eastlands........ or the etihad arena : )
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Yep, I saw those as well, (I am sure they were drawn up by James H Reeve for inclusion in a fanzine or similar) it would've given us a bigger capacity than Old Trafford at that time, but like you say nothing came of it.

This shows some of the plans.
<a class="postlink" href="http://mcivta.com/club/maine_road.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://mcivta.com/club/maine_road.html</a>
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I had a poster of the plans of the kippax all the way round on my bedroom wall. Thought they gave it out with the official programme one day but can't remember for sure
 
There is no comparison from this:
maine_road_manchester_city_afl03_aerofilms_9271_1215041.jpg


and this:
1994-04_Last_Kippax_MatchFlag.jpg


To this:
maineroadMNR.jpg


We really did have some right idiots running our club didn't we?! Apart from the world's most iconic stadium (Wembley), for decades the premier football ground in England and most of Europe (arguably the whole world) was Maine Road, Moss Side, Manchester.

Re-developments over time have to happen, but the shambles of a stadium we left in 2003 was awful! It could and should have been miles better than it was.<br /><br />-- Thu Jul 07, 2011 11:29 am --<br /><br />I remember going to the new Kippax with my uncle who was an old Kippax regular for 20 years and he said "this is absolutely shit!". I don't think he went back for about three seasons, he thought City weren't the same club anymore. He actually only started going again around 2001.
 
they could have done whatever they wanted to that wonderful stadium even though it looked like a blind architect had drawn it up, as long as they left jack n vera,s cladding on?
 
Always think we should have done something similar to what Arsenal did with Highbury:

<a class="postlink" href="http://www.highburysquare.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.highburysquare.com/</a>

gun__1216034666_highbury_square1.jpg
 
with going there for 30 years some great memories.
i often wondered if it was possible to turn stadium around slightly so kippax backed onto terraced housing and move up into car park, but that would have meant complete demolition and groundshare for couple of seasons, which i very much doubt the vast majority would have been happy with, so meeting that idea halfway, ground demolished and new stadium for us and yes i think we're getting settled there now.
 
AJ71 said:
Irlamblue said:
I once saw plans for all four stands in uniform. It was the new kippax stand all the way round. These were real drawing/plans, it looked impressive.
like city at that time.. nothing materialised.
i agree with the other chap.. maine round was in a bad position
i love eastlands........ or the etihad arena : )
Click to expand...

Yep, I saw those as well, (I am sure they were drawn up by James H Reeve for inclusion in a fanzine or similar) it would've given us a bigger capacity than Old Trafford at that time, but like you say nothing came of it.

This shows some of the plans.
<a class="postlink" href="http://mcivta.com/club/maine_road.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://mcivta.com/club/maine_road.html</a>
Click to expand...

i have somewhere a paper copy of those plans showing each different stage to the final picture in the link, if i knew how to scan and upload i would
 
I said as soon as it was proposed that the size of the stadium would not be big enough if we were ever to be successful, and the capacity should have been raised to at least 60,000 minimum. I am hopeing that the ground will be extended as soon as possible to at least a capacity of 70,000+.
 
When I first went to maine road the scoreboard end was still uncovered & despite them making a complete balls up with the replacement north stand & then a right mess of the platt lane (umbro) to me it still felt special until the old kippax was replaced,
After that it lost its soul, funny thing is I occasionally have dreams of going to the game with my dad with the ground as it was when I first saw it & it makes me realise just how much I miss it.
 
The end of the Kippax, the redeveloped Platt Lane End ruined Maine Road for me and the failure to join the new Kippax to the North and Platt Lane.
Eastlands is everything Maine Road wasn't in terms of a modern stadium tho and I personally would never want to go back.
 
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