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Post by mehewmagic on Mar 7, 2019 20:20:32 GMT
BTW - general point.
Given that current capacity is 12,000 and HUGE amounts of land is 'wasted'*, would be interesting to see what could be possible with less change than some people seem to be assuming.
I guess one big issue is retaining terracing as a lot of our capacity comes from that.
* - e.g. dribuild is about a third of the length of the pitch, west stand is maybe half length, both of which MASSIVELY curtail conference/meeting/event space. South stand is two thirds. Both small seated stands are not an efficient use of space (not complaining as such, just saying that 500 seats for the space they take up is not efficient if you're trying to get capacity and quality up)
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Post by Gastafari on Mar 7, 2019 20:29:05 GMT
Its London. Things get built there. In fact things get built in most places. Bristol is the exception. I’m a builder , in Bristol and loads gets built here. You can’t blame Bristol , blame Bristol Rovers. Why would you blame Rovers about the lack of a decent concert arena? Cricket ground? Swimming Pools? Decent City Centre? Transport links etc? They're not Rovers fault are they? Bristol is a backwater. Always has been, always will be.
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Post by socrates on Mar 7, 2019 20:42:37 GMT
I’m a builder , in Bristol and loads gets built here. You can’t blame Bristol , blame Bristol Rovers. Why would you blame Rovers about the lack of a decent concert arena? Cricket ground? Swimming Pools? Decent City Centre? Transport links etc? They're not Rovers fault are they? Bristol is a backwater. Always has been, always will be. Bristol’s not a back water at all. It’s a massive thriving city.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 7, 2019 20:57:24 GMT
Sadly that deal was done before we even played at The Mem. We were committed to complete the deal after we acquired ownership. Genuine question. When was that done then? Trubshaw close looks quite new. I remember many years ago when Bristol rugby had an entire trg pitch out the back, sideways on, and assumed that the land had been redeveloped relatively recently. Prior to Rovers moving to the Mem the rugby club had the Centenary Stand rebuilt in a deal which gave the builders an option to purchase the land which is now Trubshaw Gardens. After Rovers had acquired the stadium following the demise of the old rugby club the builders took up their option to purchase for the sum of £500k which had already been agreed. Rovers were unable to stop this.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 7, 2019 21:00:10 GMT
What restrictions though, if Ashton Gate is used 24/7 why can't a redeveloped Mem be used to the same extent? I seem to recall Mike Turl, who seems to be behind Solihull Moors rise up the leagues, plans included the Mem being a self financing community stadium. All we seem to have at Rovers is "can't do" owners, it really does my head in given the potential of the club. Why can't somebody check a chance that investing in a new stadium will eventually pay off. Yes. That touched a nerve with me. To paraphrase & amend a famous line; the only thing needed for failure to win is for good people and good ideas to be sidelined. The restricted hours excuse was a red herring used not to build the Blackthorn End which was granted planning permission around 2004 ish. The truth was there was no money to build it. I have never met a man like Mike Turl with a pencil and a piece of graph paper for working out finances. He also has a great power of persuasion when people believe in him.
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Post by womble on Mar 7, 2019 21:28:19 GMT
I’m a builder , in Bristol and loads gets built here. You can’t blame Bristol , blame Bristol Rovers. Why would you blame Rovers about the lack of a decent concert arena? Cricket ground? Swimming Pools? Decent City Centre? Transport links etc? They're not Rovers fault are they? Bristol is a backwater. Always has been, always will be. Arena - Marvin’s fault. Swimming pools - 50m pool at Hengrove, only a few years old. Cricket ground - Glos have international T20/one day games at the ground and you can see the massive floodlights (which some of the locals weren’t happy with) from the Mem. Bristol is one of the few areas out side London to pay into the exchequer more than it receives. It’s not an accident that Bristol keeps winning awards. It’s because we have never been able to raise the money, that we don’t have a new or re-developed ground. It’s pointless to pretend otherwise.
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Post by Gastafari on Mar 7, 2019 21:40:28 GMT
Why would you blame Rovers about the lack of a decent concert arena? Cricket ground? Swimming Pools? Decent City Centre? Transport links etc? They're not Rovers fault are they? Bristol is a backwater. Always has been, always will be. Bristol’s not a back water at all. It’s a massive thriving city. Its not massive. London's massive. Its the 6th biggest City in England though, when you put Bristol's facilities up against Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds and Sheffields, there's no comparison, they put Bristol's completely to shame. Then put Bristol's facilities up against Newcastle's, Nottinghams, Leicesters which are smaller cities, even Milton Keynes which has half the Population of Bristol again they put Bristol's facilities to shame. Its a backwater.
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Post by womble on Mar 7, 2019 21:56:27 GMT
Bristol’s not a back water at all. It’s a massive thriving city. Its not massive. London's massive. Its the 6th biggest City in England though, when you put Bristol's facilities up against Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds and Sheffields, there's no comparison, they put Bristol's completely to shame. Then put Bristol's facilities up against Newcastle's, Nottinghams, Leicesters which are smaller cities, even Milton Keynes which has half the Population of Bristol again they put Bristol's facilities to shame. Its a backwater. A ‘backwater’ that per head of population, is the most economically successful English city outside London. Perfect? Certainly not, but virtually every other city on that list would like to be as prosperous.
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Post by farmygas on Mar 7, 2019 22:19:52 GMT
I’m a builder , in Bristol and loads gets built here. You can’t blame Bristol , blame Bristol Rovers. Why would you blame Rovers about the lack of a decent concert arena? Cricket ground? Swimming Pools? Decent City Centre? Transport links etc? They're not Rovers fault are they? Bristol is a backwater. Always has been, always will be. Yep. Certainly no cricket ground in Bristol that I know of. Unless of course it's miles away from Horfield. Must be.
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Post by Gastafari on Mar 7, 2019 22:21:17 GMT
Its not massive. London's massive. Its the 6th biggest City in England though, when you put Bristol's facilities up against Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds and Sheffields, there's no comparison, they put Bristol's completely to shame. Then put Bristol's facilities up against Newcastle's, Nottinghams, Leicesters which are smaller cities, even Milton Keynes which has half the Population of Bristol again they put Bristol's facilities to shame. Its a backwater. A ‘backwater’ that per head of population, is the most economically successful English city outside London. Perfect? Certainly not, but virtually every other city on that list would like to be as prosperous. Yet we've got facilities that are literally 3rd World. Manchester, Liverpool and Leeds are in another stratosphere to Bristol in pretty much every way imaginable. No comparison. Nottingham has one 30,000 capacity Football stadium, another 20,000 capacity and a near 20,000 capacity Test Match Cricket venue, plus a 10,000 capacity indoor Arena. Leicester has a 32,000 capacity Football Stadium, a 25,000 capacity Rugby Stadium, plus even their Arena of 3,000 is far better than anything Bristol's got. I won't bother with Newcastle as just like Manchester, Liverpool and Leeds its in another stratosphere in terms of infrastucture. Whats prosperous about Bristol exactly? Extorniate house prices that average people can't afford. Great. Give me the facilities of those places over a so called "Economically successful" Bristol any day of the week.
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Post by Topper Gas on Mar 7, 2019 22:27:58 GMT
Bristol’s not a back water at all. It’s a massive thriving city. Its not massive. London's massive. Its the 6th biggest City in England though, when you put Bristol's facilities up against Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds and Sheffields, there's no comparison, they put Bristol's completely to shame. Then put Bristol's facilities up against Newcastle's, Nottinghams, Leicesters which are smaller cities, even Milton Keynes which has half the Population of Bristol again they put Bristol's facilities to shame. Its a backwater. Out of interest what facilities are we missing, apart from the arena, which is down to BCC turning down planning applications? We'd have either a decent stadium at the Mem or the UWE if we had the money to build it. THE ALQ's bought the club to build the UWE but still couldn't even pull that off.
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Post by lpgas on Mar 7, 2019 22:48:51 GMT
GD Dunford told me that it was possible to develop the Mem but they didn't want to as there would be too many restrictions on it What restrictions though, if Ashton Gate is used 24/7 why can't a redeveloped Mem be used to the same extent? I seem to recall Mike Turl, who seems to be behind Solihull Moors rise up the leagues, plans included the Mem being a self financing community stadium. All we seem to have at Rovers is "can't do" owners, it really does my head in given the potential of the club. Why can't somebody check a chance that investing in a new stadium will eventually pay off. He told me that with a good sized stadium there was no reason why in the future Rovers wouldn't get gates of 25,000 plus, and for that we needed a new stadium
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Post by lpgas on Mar 7, 2019 22:52:43 GMT
BTW - general point. Given that current capacity is 12,000 and HUGE amounts of land is 'wasted'*, would be interesting to see what could be possible with less change than some people seem to be assuming. I guess one big issue is retaining terracing as a lot of our capacity comes from that. * - e.g. dribuild is about a third of the length of the pitch, west stand is maybe half length, both of which MASSIVELY curtail conference/meeting/event space. South stand is two thirds. Both small seated stands are not an efficient use of space (not complaining as such, just saying that 500 seats for the space they take up is not efficient if you're trying to get capacity and quality up) Build and 7,500 seater in the car park (Main stand). Moved the ground over build a 6,000 all seater on the West side. A 5,000 at the Thatchers end; 1,600 at the South end. Max 21,500. Not big enough. Just think how hard it is to park with 9,000
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Post by socrates on Mar 7, 2019 23:47:40 GMT
Its not massive. London's massive. Its the 6th biggest City in England though, when you put Bristol's facilities up against Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds and Sheffields, there's no comparison, they put Bristol's completely to shame. Then put Bristol's facilities up against Newcastle's, Nottinghams, Leicesters which are smaller cities, even Milton Keynes which has half the Population of Bristol again they put Bristol's facilities to shame. Its a backwater. A ‘backwater’ that per head of population, is the most economically successful English city outside London. Perfect? Certainly not, but virtually every other city on that list would like to be as prosperous. Yeah totally agree: It’s easy to blame the place we live in on Bristol Rovers being a poor club without enough clout, money, ambition or know how to build a stadium but you’ve only got to look at what the shitesters down the road have done to see what can be done if the money and ambition is there. Bristol is definitely not a backwater it’s a thriving city one of the biggest in England and it’s got numerous opportunities for those with money and ambition. Thing is when have we ever had a combination of money and ambition ? And that’s it in a nutshell , Wael arrived very ambitious but his family don’t want to spend the money and now it seems he’s lost ambition. Higgs was ambitious but was a fool , the dunfords were ambitious but could only just about keep the club afloat whilst giving us stability and fight. One day we might have it all but until then it’ll just be talk and drawings and plans meanwhile Bristol expands and becomes an even greater bigger more expansive place filled will ever growing opportunities whilst Bristol Rovers just about survive. That’s all I’ve ever seen in my time.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 8, 2019 0:07:30 GMT
I’d just be happy to see permanent stands, one behind the goal, where the mead king stand is, remove the Bristol energy stand and add a roof and cover the away end. Then drill seats into the terraces and that’ll do me just to make the most of what we have already!
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Post by Deleted on Mar 8, 2019 0:11:45 GMT
We put a roof above the blackthorn through raise the roof - why did we stop there? Maybe we need an old school mind set and need to stop relying on this board/owners. 🤔
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Post by Icegas on Mar 8, 2019 0:39:25 GMT
A ‘backwater’ that per head of population, is the most economically successful English city outside London. Perfect? Certainly not, but virtually every other city on that list would like to be as prosperous. Yet we've got facilities that are literally 3rd World. Manchester, Liverpool and Leeds are in another stratosphere to Bristol in pretty much every way imaginable. No comparison. Nottingham has one 30,000 capacity Football stadium, another 20,000 capacity and a near 20,000 capacity Test Match Cricket venue, plus a 10,000 capacity indoor Arena. Leicester has a 32,000 capacity Football Stadium, a 25,000 capacity Rugby Stadium, plus even their Arena of 3,000 is far better than anything Bristol's got. I won't bother with Newcastle as just like Manchester, Liverpool and Leeds its in another stratosphere in terms of infrastucture. Whats prosperous about Bristol exactly? Extorniate house prices that average people can't afford. Great. Give me the facilities of those places over a so called "Economically successful" Bristol any day of the week. I agree 100% with your point, but Bristol as a city to live in is far from being a backwater place and offers much more to the people that live here than many of those other places named do.Its only the sports facilities and arenas, and to a degree transport systems that put us to shame.A piece of land becomes free in and around Bristol and its brought and is built on...Sadly tho just for housing and business units.This is not the same in sheffield and other north citys. Why do so many people from outside Bristol choose to move here? Outside London Bristol has the most non City Born natives living here than anywhere else.This is proberly why as a city building new sporting arenas never get done.
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Post by Gassy on Mar 8, 2019 8:14:04 GMT
Really enjoying the discussion on here, it's rare that I read every post in detail, I normally skim (unless we win 4-0 because then it's just awesome) but this has been a great discussion. It's also rare that I agree with all points of view. Bristol in terms of sporting/concert facilities is a joke, without doubt. Unfortunately it's Lansdown that is moving the city forward, rather than both clubs &/or the council help. Bristol in general is an excellent place to live. It's not wonder its consistently in the top places to live. The only places that compete (that I've been to) are Sheffield & Manchester. Also cracking cities. London is a league of its own, but also has many many problems of its own due to its size & tourism etc. As for the redevelopment of the Mem. I think the only way really (without a full scale redevelopment) is if that East stand became absolutely massive. It's the only way the attendance could be made up. The stand would have to be really high spec too with the ability for conferences, executive boxes galore, bigger/better club store, huge restaurant/catering facilities, huge bar etc. I think people are underestimating how much seats take up as well. The Blackthorn end holds roughly now 3,500? If we put seats straight in its place now, it would easily drop by half immediately. I think with the issues of local residents, restrictions etc then long term the Mem is not our home. Corporate brings in a huge amount of money for football clubs and not being funny, who wants to hold a conference & dazzle clients in Horfield? Who would also want to do it if the view from the stand is of 3 small ugly stands & someone else's back garden behind it? I do wonder how much government/FA/investment funding we could get it we really maxed out a new home. Someone said about roughly £2.5m from the FA? What about other schemes when you build 'green' stadiums etc? Putting a hotel as part of the stadium & selling that to Hilton (for example), incorporating flats into the stadium (like the New Mem had) which increased investment. Potentially a few schemes like this could lower the bill? Interestingly I live right outside a brand new build in Bratislava. They've incorporated a sky scraper & apartment block into the whole building which the government basically then paid half for the commerce growth. The stadium also includes & underground car park: www.skslovan.com/_obrazky/full/0/23168.jpgAnyway, they had the opening last weekend. It holds 22,500 - it was amazing, but also so depressing to think we could have this: imgur.com/VPsFeXr (taken from my mobile) Btw, does anyway know the rough specs of the Mem? I'm an amateur stadium designer in my spare time on SketchUp - I'd be curious to see what I could fit into the Mem space if we did stand by stand
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Post by Topper Gas on Mar 8, 2019 8:24:51 GMT
I mean no offence by this but can't honestly see why posters waste their time planning on what we could do at the Mem when it seems pretty clear the owners have no intention of spending any of their money at the Mem as, if they, did they'd never get their money they're "invested" in buying the club back. Plus we had a very good plan for a new stadium at the Mem anyway.
Assuming the ALQ are here for the long term the big question is do they intend just watch us slowly decline whilst we're stuck at the undeveloped Mem, or actually intend in building us a new stadium else where.
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Post by Gassy on Mar 8, 2019 8:30:19 GMT
I mean no offence by this but can't honestly see why posters waste their time planning on what we could do at the Mem when it seems pretty clear the owners have no intention of spending any of their money at the Mem as, if they, did they'd never get their money they're "invested" in buying the club back. Plus we had a very good plan for a new stadium at the Mem anyway. Assuming the ALQ are here for the long term the big question is do they intend just watch us slowly decline whilst we're stuck at the undeveloped Mem, or actually intend in building us a new stadium else where. No sentence started like that has ever not meant to offend someone. Why do posters waste their time? Seriously? As I said, it's a hobby I like doing in my spare time, I've created a few. But never done it on the Mem. The New Mem requires we leave for 2 years, a stand development doesn't. Out of interest, and no offence meant by this but why do you waste time writing on a forum? Probably because you enjoy it? Perhaps other people enjoy speculating, who are you to judge or rule that they're wasting their time?
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