Etihad Campus, Stadium Development and Collar Site

[ste.sully]

Re: Etihad Campus & potential new stadium

The Campus is due be finished in two year stages up to 2030. Of course by then I would imagine further plans by other developers will be in place and as such will continue long into the future.

I'm sure you're right and defer to your superior knowledge. FWIW, in terms of what's in the public domain, the document 'Manchester's Local Development Framework - Core Strategy' document, which was adopted by the Council's Executive around 9 months ago refers to plans at Eastlands for Delivery of 5 -10ha of B1a employment land (Note - B1a refers to use as offices), 6ha of leisure and entertainment facilities, and 30ha of sports facilities by 2027, which is where I got the 15 years from.

However, the Core Strategy document only covers a 15-year timespan. That fits with what you're saying in that there could be further areas to be developed beyond the end of that period, especially because the totals slated for development seem low compared to the 200 acres previously spoken about (a hectare is about 2.5 acres, so the above adds up to 115 in total - or have the excluded the 80-ish acres of the training facility?).

The Core Strategy document is here, if anyone's interested: http://www.manchester.gov.uk/info/856/local_development_framework/3301/core_strategy/1

Incidentally, a while back someone was questioning whether the plans for a leisure destination had been quietly dropped. The Core Strategy document from July 2012 contains the last mentions as far as I'm aware. See, for instance:

"[Manchester will become] an international destination for tourism and culture with the Eastlands area of the Regional Centre a national attraction for sport, leisure and recreation" - para 4.1, page 30 out of 250 in the PDF

"The "Collar Site" provides an opportunity for a leisure, recreation and entertainment visitor attraction of national significance. A landmark design will be key to delivering such a prestigious development" - para 8.69, page 74 out of 250 in the PDF

"The scale of the regeneration of this area will be continued with the creation of a visitor destination of national significance" - para 8.72, page 76 out of 250 in the PDF

I was just trawling through some of the planning docs regarding the Northern Hub rail improvements and something caught my attention. One of the paragraphs was:

Regional Centre Links
• 15min pattern Victoria – Oxford Road – Piccadilly – Airport
• Potential to include Salford Central if Liverpool line platforms provided
• Potential for a station at Eastlands with services working through Victoria.

Considering a railway line is already in place from Victoria it has always surprised me how this has been downplayed for a good decade.

If the club expand the stadium then transport improvements may also be required to alleviate congestion. And if the club are interested in creating an attraction of national significance where footfall is needed then a railway station which is connected to Victoria (and also Piccadilly with some modifications on a disused line) is clearly in their interest.

The trams are decent but a train service would add another dimension. "Beating the traffic" would never be uttered again at a City home match with car, walking, buses, trams and trains all available.

 

[kev20971]

Re: Etihad Campus & potential new stadium

The Campus is due be finished in two year stages up to 2030. Of course by then I would imagine further plans by other developers will be in place and as such will continue long into the future.

I'm sure you're right and defer to your superior knowledge. FWIW, in terms of what's in the public domain, the document 'Manchester's Local Development Framework - Core Strategy' document, which was adopted by the Council's Executive around 9 months ago refers to plans at Eastlands for Delivery of 5 -10ha of B1a employment land (Note - B1a refers to use as offices), 6ha of leisure and entertainment facilities, and 30ha of sports facilities by 2027, which is where I got the 15 years from.

However, the Core Strategy document only covers a 15-year timespan. That fits with what you're saying in that there could be further areas to be developed beyond the end of that period, especially because the totals slated for development seem low compared to the 200 acres previously spoken about (a hectare is about 2.5 acres, so the above adds up to 115 in total - or have the excluded the 80-ish acres of the training facility?).

The Core Strategy document is here, if anyone's interested: http://www.manchester.gov.uk/info/856/local_development_framework/3301/core_strategy/1

Incidentally, a while back someone was questioning whether the plans for a leisure destination had been quietly dropped. The Core Strategy document from July 2012 contains the last mentions as far as I'm aware. See, for instance:

"[Manchester will become] an international destination for tourism and culture with the Eastlands area of the Regional Centre a national attraction for sport, leisure and recreation" - para 4.1, page 30 out of 250 in the PDF

"The "Collar Site" provides an opportunity for a leisure, recreation and entertainment visitor attraction of national significance. A landmark design will be key to delivering such a prestigious development" - para 8.69, page 74 out of 250 in the PDF

"The scale of the regeneration of this area will be continued with the creation of a visitor destination of national significance" - para 8.72, page 76 out of 250 in the PDF

I was just trawling through some of the planning docs regarding the Northern Hub rail improvements and something caught my attention. One of the paragraphs was:

Regional Centre Links
• 15min pattern Victoria – Oxford Road – Piccadilly – Airport
• Potential to include Salford Central if Liverpool line platforms provided
• Potential for a station at Eastlands with services working through Victoria.

Considering a railway line is already in place from Victoria it has always surprised me how this has been downplayed for a good decade.

If the club expand the stadium then transport improvements may also be required to alleviate congestion. And if the club are interested in creating an attraction of national significance where footfall is needed then a railway station which is connected to Victoria (and also Piccadilly with some modifications on a disused line) is clearly in their interest.

The trams are decent but a train service would add another dimension. "Beating the traffic" would never be uttered again at a City home match with car, walking, buses, trams and trains all available.

That rail line was there before the stadium, could of easy build a station for the stadium when the stadium was being built, would of been a lot cheaper than the metrolink line which was built 10 years late (meant of been built for the commonwealth games), it's funny the guys in charge of transport planning keep banging on about public transport yet always cock in up, a new stadium that holds 48,000 for football or 60,000 for pop concerts with the public transport options of catch a bus or walk (for the last 10 years)!

 

[tolmie's hairdoo]

Re: Etihad Campus & potential new stadium

Used the tram out to the stadium for the first time yesterday.

25-odd mins from Altrincham, a tram was already waiting to the Campus.

Couldn't believe how quick it was from Piccadilly - very impressive.

Not sure I would use it on a match day on a regular basis, though.

Once you factor waiting in queues and for trams, it's an extra hour getting back at least.

Great for away fans.

 

[petrusha]

Re: Etihad Campus & potential new stadium

I was just trawling through some of the planning docs regarding the Northern Hub rail improvements and something caught my attention. One of the paragraphs was:

Regional Centre Links
• 15min pattern Victoria – Oxford Road – Piccadilly – Airport
• Potential to include Salford Central if Liverpool line platforms provided
• Potential for a station at Eastlands with services working through Victoria.

Considering a railway line is already in place from Victoria it has always surprised me how this has been downplayed for a good decade.

If the club expand the stadium then transport improvements may also be required to alleviate congestion. And if the club are interested in creating an attraction of national significance where footfall is needed then a railway station which is connected to Victoria (and also Piccadilly with some modifications on a disused line) is clearly in their interest.

The trams are decent but a train service would add another dimension. "Beating the traffic" would never be uttered again at a City home match with car, walking, buses, trams and trains all available.

Thanks. That's a great spot. I've been banging on about using the railway for ages, going way, way back on the Vegas thread, so this is of great interest to me. It seems a logical move, but it's interesting to have the first official confirmation of it.

I had an exchange with Gary James about this somewhere - can't remember which forum. He referred to this being something that was mooted when City were moving to the stadium, but the idea was eventually dropped because it was there wasn't really an economic case for it. However, if they're intending to have ten thousand visitors or more coming to the campus on a daily basis, then the economic aspect takes a different complexion entirely.

Of course, it also opens up funding possibilities. Just as it's hoped to pay a fair chunk of the proposed London Underground Northern Line extension to Battersea through a section 106 contribution from the developer of the Battersea Power Station site, I suspect that funding via a section 106 contribution could come into play here, too.

There used to be a station known as Park around the junction where the east Manchester loop (that goes past the Etihad Stadium to the west side) meets the Victoria to Stalybridge line. It's near Ten Acres Lane, where the FCUM stadium was originally proposed. If you put a station there, it would be walking distance from the campus while it could serve trains both on the line going past the side of the stadium and trains on that line out of Victoria to Stalybridge.

I did ask on SSC (I think you post on there, don't you?) a while back what the usage could be of the east Manchester loop line if it were reopened to passenger traffic. The idea was trains from New Mills. I've no idea whether there'd be any scope to use the rail connections more widely - i.e. to have trains coming into Victoria from, say Liverpool and Preston one way, going through to Eastlands and then out to Leeds via Stalybridge and Sheffield via New Mills. Those SSC chaps seem very clever to me and may think of all kinds of reasons why it wouldn't work. However, if this were possible and you could get direct trains from all over the north to the Eastlands station, that would be a fantastic boost to the Etihad Campus.

There's also - and this is another one from SSC - the possibility of tram trains in the future. Isn't there supposed to be a pilot in a year or two in Sheffield for the use of this system in the UK? I think it's a matter of public record that there's an aspiration to run tram trains from Glossop and Marple into central Manchester and then out to Wigan if the pilot is successful. This would entail tram-trains running through Ashburys.

Nerd, whose word I'd take on anything like this, reckons IIRC that the tram-trains would come off the train lines at Ashburys and then run along the street to Piccadilly. Ashburys station would serve the training ground, Beswick Hub and south end of the stadium anyway, but if there's street running to Piccadilly from Ashburys, there may be scope for a station closer to the Etihad Stadium as well.

Anyway, thanks for your post. Issues with regard to transport will be crucial in terms of how this development goes forward. Potentially I think some exciting things could happen in that area, and what you posted was a really interesting find in that regard.

 

[ste.sully]

Re: Etihad Campus & potential new stadium

Building a line and a railway station at Eastlands would be relatively straight forward. The line between the Northern T-junction and southern T-junction near Ardwick already exists - it's just laying some new track that's the issue, shoring up a couple of bridges (the one over the Ashton Canal springs to mind) and creating a junction to Piccadilly if desired.

Makes you wonder why the council pressed ahead with the tram. The blue denotes the line from Victoria to Eastlands, red signals rail lines which are in use and yellow indicates the tram. The snippet of info of a potential railway station was taken from a GMPTE March 2010 paper. You would imagine a railway station would be considered if the club and council want a "365 day attraction of national significance" with associated footfall in the long term.

 

[petrusha]

Re: Etihad Campus & potential new stadium

Building a line and a railway station at Eastlands would be relatively straight forward. The line between the Northern T-junction and southern T-junction near Ardwick already exists - it's just laying some new track that's the issue, shoring up a couple of bridges (the one over the Ashton Canal springs to mind) and creating a junction to Piccadilly if desired.

Makes you wonder why the council pressed ahead with the tram. The blue denotes the line from Victoria to Eastlands, red signals rail lines which are in use and yellow indicates the tram. The snippet of info of a potential railway station was taken from a GMPTE March 2010 paper. You would imagine a railway station would be considered if the club and council want a "365 day attraction of national significance" with associated footfall in the long term.

Cheers. That map is really useful in terms of showing what goes where in terms of the tram and rail lines around the area.

I assume the tram is part of a bigger picture which I hope will include rail as well. I fully agree that a year-round destination would benefit from rail links as well as the Metrolink.

 

[petrusha]

Re: Etihad Campus & potential new stadium

Used the tram out to the stadium for the first time yesterday.

25-odd mins from Altrincham, a tram was already waiting to the Campus.

Couldn't believe how quick it was from Piccadilly - very impressive.

Not sure I would use it on a match day on a regular basis, though.

Once you factor waiting in queues and for trams, it's an extra hour getting back at least.

Great for away fans.

My parents live in Alty and I was hoping at some point when back in the UK to use the tram to go to the match with my old man. He's in his seventies now and has rheumatoid arthritis so couldn't stand for long waiting in a queue. I guess it means that after the game, we'd need somewhere to sit and wait while the queue goes down. Maybe the best thing to do would be to try to book some kind of corporate package where we could sit and have a pint afterwards without any pressure toi clear out.

I'm sure that the long-term plan will be to create facilities around the Campus that will keep a lot of people busy post-match. Then there'll be less of a rush after the final whistle and people will wander along to the tram more gradually.

 

[somapop]

Re: Etihad Campus & potential new stadium

Yes - cheers for posting that map Ste. The more people they can potentially spurt into a leisure attraction the better for the success of building 'Panda World' etc....

With regard to the leisure development Petrusha, you might be able to throw a little lights on this: When Manchester had the 'supercasino' 'taken' away from them (Gordon Brown/house of commons voted it out?) Manchester hired a bigwig lawyer to bolster a legal challenge to the then government (as it had sucessfully bid for the casino and 'won' seemingly fair and square). The govt then promised (I know...) funding for 'alternative regeneration packages' in place of the supercasino. Never quite heard what happened next (aside from a new govt in power and a harsh recession). Is Manchester CC still owed something for this?

 

[Shaelumstash]

Re: Etihad Campus & potential new stadium

Used the tram out to the stadium for the first time yesterday.

25-odd mins from Altrincham, a tram was already waiting to the Campus.

Couldn't believe how quick it was from Piccadilly - very impressive.

Not sure I would use it on a match day on a regular basis, though.

Once you factor waiting in queues and for trams, it's an extra hour getting back at least.

Great for away fans.

My parents live in Alty and I was hoping at some point when back in the UK to use the tram to go to the match with my old man. He's in his seventies now and has rheumatoid arthritis so couldn't stand for long waiting in a queue. I guess it means that after the game, we'd need somewhere to sit and wait while the queue goes down. Maybe the best thing to do would be to try to book some kind of corporate package where we could sit and have a pint afterwards without any pressure toi clear out.

I'm sure that the long-term plan will be to create facilities around the Campus that will keep a lot of people busy post-match. Then there'll be less of a rush after the final whistle and people will wander along to the tram more gradually.

There's plenty of seating in City Square which is right next to the tram stop, and they have post match drinks / entertainment.

 

[somapop]

Re: Etihad Campus & potential new stadium

Used the tram out to the stadium for the first time yesterday.

25-odd mins from Altrincham, a tram was already waiting to the Campus.

Couldn't believe how quick it was from Piccadilly - very impressive.

Not sure I would use it on a match day on a regular basis, though.

Once you factor waiting in queues and for trams, it's an extra hour getting back at least.

Great for away fans.

My parents live in Alty and I was hoping at some point when back in the UK to use the tram to go to the match with my old man. He's in his seventies now and has rheumatoid arthritis so couldn't stand for long waiting in a queue. I guess it means that after the game, we'd need somewhere to sit and wait while the queue goes down. Maybe the best thing to do would be to try to book some kind of corporate package where we could sit and have a pint afterwards without any pressure toi clear out.

I'm sure that the long-term plan will be to create facilities around the Campus that will keep a lot of people busy post-match. Then there'll be less of a rush after the final whistle and people will wander along to the tram more gradually.

I've used it a couple of times with the kids, and was suprised how well managed it was both in and out. The first time I used it I was running late (picking a daughter up from a class in town one Saturday), despite flapping a little on the way up to Piccadilly (I'm ok walking but the daughters not as keen) we joined a 'fluid queue' and was on the tram within a few minutes despite being the busiest time to get to the match and being Piccadilly.
Again, on the way out (post final whistle) we were back on the tram within 10 minutes...but that seems to be a potential bottle neck. Indeed, an area to stay in post match would be ideal...shops/restaurants (dare I say something like the Dumplington Precint) would be perfect. There's plenty of land around there...