North Stand Construction Discussion

[Centurions]

Ahhhh so you are now suggesting Seasoncard holders get kicked out of ESL1 - as well as those those you want kicked out of NS L1 and NS L2 !!

Genius

Is the plan to upset as many supporters as possible in order to relocate a few hundred ‘singers’ to a new North Stand.

These suggestions are starting to get mental. There will be a new stand built with 7000-9000 seats in it. That is sufficient seats for 10 x the amount that will want to relocate.

It's a forum where ideas are floated and commented on, I don't think it was his original idea about the away fans being moved slightly at that. It is a good idea regardless and some change is necessary.

 

[Prophet of Doom]

Your tag suits you.

Have you ever played the role of Corporal Jones ?

As a matter of interest where do you sit and is relocation of interest to you ?

It's not a few hundred singers, it's 1000's of fans in a new home end, which could be a larger 2nd tier? We won't know until the plans are revealed by the club. Unless City can cater for everyone currently sat in the NS and add another 6000-8000 City fans, there will have to be changes in the seating arrangements and possible relocations.

Where is the evidence that thousands will be moving. How can you possibly know how many would be interested in relocating. In my opinion it will be hundreds not thousands.

For starters the new NS top tier won’t be safe standing so why will people move from safe standing area to a seat on row z in the top tier. Secondly, many will want to stay closer to the away fans. Thirdly some won’t wanna move no matter what.

If when they plans are announced they take declarations from thousands of fans that they want to relocate I will be convinced.

 

[Centurions]

... How can you possibly know how many would be interested in relocating. In my opinion it will be hundreds not thousands.

...

Did the irony not occur to you when you posted this?

 

[Gone for a Burton]

It certainly wasn’t my suggestion, but I, like many others, are fast followers. It will work.

I suggest that peeps don’t paint themselves into an inescapable corner over this.

The club have got one last opportunity to get this right for the MAJORITY.....they won’t be able to please everyone !!

 

[jrb]

Where is the evidence that thousands will be moving. How can you possibly know how many would be interested in relocating. In my opinion it will be hundreds not thousands.

For starters the new NS top tier won’t be safe standing so why will people move from safe standing area to a seat on row z in the top tier. Secondly, many will want to stay closer to the away fans. Thirdly some won’t wanna move no matter what.

If when they plans are announced they take declarations from thousands of fans that they want to relocate I will be convinced.

So your opinion is 100’s. Where’s your evidence that only hundreds will relocate?

Safe standing was one of many options discussed. Between the lot of us we must have discussed every option and scenario. Nothing wrong with that.

As I keep on saying, this is a discussion thread and nothing more. Just because we discuss things it doesn’t mean those things are going to happen.

Nobody knows what the expanded North stand is going to look like or whether it will be seating, safe standing or both

Do you honestly think if City market the North stand expansion as our ‘new home end’, people who relocate there and get a (safe standing ) seat there are going to sit down throughout the match?

I have already stated lots of fans won’t move from SSL1, 111, 110, 109, etc

Some reasons.

1. Next to the away fans.
2. Have sat and stood there for years.
3. Friends and family there.
4. Easy entry and exit at that end of the ground.
5. Busses parked up to get back into town quicker.
6. Local pubs like Mary D’s and the Townley close by.
7. Chippy’s close by.
8. The new bar area at the back of 115.
9. Etc.

For all we know City might make NSL1 safe standing, keep NSL2 as it is, but with padded seating, and a new corporate restaurant/bar at the back, and build a higher and continual home end above that. Again, all guesses. One thing is for sure with City, nothing is off the table, everything will be looked at and evaluated.

Off the top my head. Some of the issues the club has faced with expanding the North stand.

1. A 3 tiered North stand mirroring the South stand.
2. A 2 tiered North stand with a larger 2nd tier.
3.Relocating the family stand from level 1 or leaving it where it is.
4.Relocating NSL2 fans or leaving them where they are.
5.Adding safe standing.
6.Creating a new singing section.
7.Creating another corporate area.
8.Season ticket availability, Platinum, Gold , Silver.
9.Match ticket availability.
10.Season ticket prices.
11.Relocation windows. First refusal.
12. Etc.

There are numerous issues the club has had to discuss and grappel with. No doubt some of the decisions made won’t please everyone. People will be disappointed with what the club are proposing. Or they will be happy with what the club are proposing.

As for me, I’m happy to discuss anything on this thread whilst waiting for the plans to be made public by the club. Only then will I be happy, annoyed or indifferent to the proposals for the expanded North stand.

 

[Dodge]

I’m sure many of you fellow FOCs remember the singing part of the old Kippax stand. If you’re too young to remember, facing the pitch, it was in the top left corner of the stand, right next to the set of railings between the home and away fans, and above the tunnel, shown in the picture.

It’s hard to try and even guess the amount of singers in that corner, but it must have been in the 1000’s. Once the chants got going they would spread across the rest of the Kippax with 1000’s of other City fans joining in with the chants. And because the roof was low and cathedral shaped internally, the noise and atmosphere would carry and spill out across Maine Road.

The highlight chants for me were, Here we go, Let’s all have a disco, and we’re City, we’re barmy, we’re off our f*cking heads. When those 3 chants got going everyone would be piling into each other, you’d be carried up, down and along the Kippax by the sheer number of people moving in different directions, and more often than not you’d end up in another part of the singing section, and you’d have to make your way back to where you were originally stood, if you could get back there, as everyone was so close together . Magaical times. :-) Sadly never to be involved in again.

View attachment 65766

Outside the back of the Kippax singing corner, the tunnel entrance, and next to the stairs, left, leading to the away end. Before the hill was paved it used to be grass with a concrete and stone top. I used sit up there before the match and at half-time watching and enjoying all the chants, banter and swearing that took place between City fans and the away fans either side of the metal railings.

View attachment 65767


Click on the link below for a great read and some fascinating old pictures of the Kippax.

‘The North End was a similarly obvious name for the terrace to its left’

Kippax | Jimmy Sirrel's Lovechild

Playing down at Maine Road It’s impossible to separate Maine Road from Moss Side, in history or in memory. The story of one is the story of the other. That was not always a positive thing…

jimmysirrelslovechild.co.uk

Thanks for posting that JRB, great memories of the Kippax.

Just walking through the tunnel got the heart pumping. Got a bit of a lazy lob on thinking about it now....

You'll never take the Kippax.

 

[Prophet of Doom]

So your opinion is 100’s. Where’s your evidence that only hundreds will relocate?

Safe standing was one of many options discussed. Between the lot of us we must have discussed every option and scenario. Nothing wrong with that.

As I keep on saying, this is a discussion thread and nothing more. Just because we discuss things it doesn’t mean those things are going to happen.

Nobody knows what the expanded North stand is going to look like or whether it will be seating, safe standing or both

Do you honestly think if City market the North stand expansion as our ‘new home end’, people who relocate there and get a (safe standing ) seat there are going to sit down throughout the match?

I have already stated lots of fans won’t move from SSL1, 111, 110, 109, etc

Some reasons.

1. Next to the away fans.
2. Have sat and stood there for years.
3. Friends and family there.
4. Easy entry and exit at that end of the ground.
5. Busses parked up to get back into town quicker.
6. Local pubs like Mary D’s and the Townley close by.
7. Chippy’s close by.
8. The new bar area at the back of 115.
9. Etc.

For all we know City might make NSL1 safe standing, keep NSL2 as it is, but with padded seating, and a new corporate restaurant/bar at the back, and build a higher and continual home end above that. Again, all guesses. One thing is for sure with City, nothing is off the table, everything will be looked at and evaluated.

Off the top my head. Some of the issues the club has faced with expanding the North stand.

1. A 3 tiered North stand mirroring the South stand.
2. A 2 tiered North stand with a larger 2nd tier.
3.Relocating the family stand from level 1 or leaving it where it is.
4.Relocating NSL2 fans or leaving them where they are.
5.Adding safe standing.
6.Creating a new singing section.
7.Creating another corporate area.
8.Season ticket availability, Platinum, Gold , Silver.
9.Match ticket availability.
10.Season ticket prices.
11.Relocation windows. First refusal.
12. Etc.

There are numerous issues the club has had to discuss and grappel with. No doubt some of the decisions made won’t please everyone. People will be disappointed with what the club are proposing. Or they will be happy with what the club are proposing.

As for me, I’m happy to discuss anything on this thread whilst waiting for the plans to be made public by the club. Only then will I be happy, annoyed or indifferent to the proposals for the expanded North stand.

Good points raised JRB and totally agree that until the plans are released it’s purely guesswork by all of us on how the new stand will be filled.

I just think it’s fantasy that it will be filled by thousands of singing relocators. Maybe promoting relocations will take off. But I have my major doubts that many blues will leave for a lesser seat no matter what the incentive.

I know I come across as ultra negative on here but I really hope whatever happens works. And fair play to 1894 and anybody else engaged with the club to try and make the atmosphere better.

 

[Keeper!]

It certainly wasn’t my suggestion, but I, like many others, are fast followers. It will work.

I suggest that peeps don’t paint themselves into an inescapable corner over this.

The club have got one last opportunity to get this right for the MAJORITY.....they won’t be able to please everyone !!

You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time.​

The decision will be a question of $, all decisions come down to that, the club are not building this extension out of the goodness of their heart, it's a cold hard business decision and so it should be.

 

[Gone for a Burton]

Agreed.

However most of the 'thought through' suggestions on here are sensible,practical,with long term benefits and will probably be within the projected cost framework.

The club finally have the opportunity to create something permanent for noisy fans to call their own,something that could transform the matchday experience, something that could produce unforseen benefits beyond simple an improvement in atmosphere.

IMO this is the most important element of the campus development to legacy fans who will be pleased to see 'external' developments but probably won't be the most regular 'consumers'.

They want City fans to be put first, the biggest home end possible, SS2 &3 to be a second home end and away fans to be bent round ES1 & SS1 corner like we are at Spuds & Arse.

It can be done,it is affordable and imo now needs the will of the fans and the club to come together to deliver it !!

 

[blueloon]

Agreed.

However most of the 'thought through' suggestions on here are sensible,practical,with long term benefits and will probably be within the projected cost framework.

The club finally have the opportunity to create something permanent for noisy fans to call their own,something that could transform the matchday experience, something that could produce unforseen benefits beyond simple an improvement in atmosphere.

IMO this is the most important element of the campus development to legacy fans who will be pleased to see 'external' developments but probably won't be the most regular 'consumers'.

They want City fans to be put first, the biggest home end possible, SS2 &3 to be a second home end and away fans to be bent round ES1 & SS1 corner like we are at Spuds & Arse.

It can be done,it is affordable and imo now needs the will of the fans and the club to come together to deliver it !!

Important to not get too carried away. There are a lot of factors to consider. I believe the club will do enough due diligence around this. We sometimes get over obsessed about the things we have not got rather than what we have got. The reality is we have had a better stadium then the majority of the league for a long time. I have no doubt post this redevelopment project this will continue to be the case. I would say atmosphere is an important consideration, but there are other things that will drive the decision making more. I hope I'm wrong, but I think we are never going to achieve the same atmosphere that are seen at other grounds. We have been very fortunate and from the outside it sometimes feels like some of our fanbase have become very entitled. Take a second to appreciate how good we have had it. The game has changed, our own situations have changed. A lot of our future fanbase come to the game to watch quality football. In the scheme of things how many people truly want to go to games to create an atmosphere that in reality is created by moments on the pitch?