Why I hate the North Stand

I've always thought it was too big, and the gaps in the corners are the single biggest reason for the terrible atmosphere at Oakwell. That was somewhat confirmed to me by my visit to Tynecastle yesterday. The capacity is just shy of 19,000 - officially 4k less than Oakwell, but probably about the same as our working capacity once we take into account the part of the West Stand that's out of action plus the tickets in the North that we're apparently not allowed to sell. Tynecastle has two identical stands at either end, probably roughly the same size as the Ponty, but both close to the pitch, completely enclosing it. The way the sound stays in is incredible - a real cauldron of noise. The football on offer was certainly no better than what we see at Oakwell, and the home fans were very frustrated with their side before they opened the scoring. "Tippy-tappy *****" was the general opinion. Personally I thought they were ok!

At the South end of the ground Oakwell is great, and I'd hope and expect the new West Stand to join up with the Ponty in some way. But what to do at the North end to get rid of the huge gaps, I really have no idea. We could fill in the corners, but that would probably increase our capacity to over 28,000 - not really anything we need.

I'd also point out that Hearts seen to have absolutely no issues splitting one of their ends between home and away fans. It's something only we seem incapable of.

 

New West stand have a missed something/misread I thought they said they were doing lots of important maintenance work that probably wouldn't be visable and no plans to change the west stand yet as good for another 10 years?
P.s not trying to be funny about it just genuinely wondering if I missed something as I didn't read the full statement etc

 

you’ve not missed anything mate

 

Not going to be built tomorrow, but Steve Houghton stated that the current one has a viable life-span of about ten years. So a new one will definitely have to be built in the short to medium term.

 

I thought I'd missed something and we were bringing the bulldozers in for a minute, yes it will need replacing in time or have to be closed, I think its all subjective to league position.
Personally like to see an identical corner piece to the one between ponty and East between East and North awful gaping gap that is, not sure on cost but it wouldn't over inflate capacity and would give a payback with hospitality etc.

 

I think that would definitely be a way forward.

 

What I hate about the north stand is the new electronic boards never get through a full game working perfectly.

Said sponsors who pay to use them and don't get what they have paid for.

 

The north stand has by far the best acoustics in the stadium. I'm a bit lost why you hate the north stand because we only have one corner stand and a tiny relic down one side of the pitch.

It's a bit like saying you hate the east stand because the west stand bogs are ****.

 

Too big, too far from the pitch. Something like the arrangement below is far better for the atmosphere and overall feel of a medium-sized stadium like ours.

 

But the size of it isn't a problem because it has the best acoustics in the ground. 300 away fans yesterday and it sounded like 1000.

What we need is to get shut of the west stand and fast.

The corner between east and north could really be filled in extremely quickly and cheaply by putting a metal sheet from one stand to the other and putting a giant advertising board on it.

 

It was an interesting comment by Houghton. Viable for another 10 years? It's not viable now, half of it is shut. No idea how someone can conclude that something that is already broken has another decade of use left in it.

 

And if it is kept for another 10 years then who is going to pay for a new one? The council won't as they've already said that the agreement is cost neutral to the council and the club surely wont because at that point there will only be 20 years on the lease.

Also considering how much we are told the west stand costs to maintain currently it's very worrying that the entire maintenance budget appears to be dedicated to keeping that one stand open

 

You must be sat very close to them to think that. I sit at the back of the Ponte and hardly heard a peep from them apart from when they scored. Second half when we had a good go at them, I thought the atmosphere in the Ponte was brilliant but then again, I'm jn the middle of it.

 

Nope. Nowhere near them. I think the acoustics of the Ponty end are just so bad that people in it can't really hear much. At the last home game people in the Ponty end were saying they didn't hear the IRA chant coming from their own stand but it was extremely loud in the east stand which is much further away obviously. It's also a common complaint from people in the Ponty end that they can't hear pa announcements.

Yesterday the away fans were chanting 'your support is f'ing ****' and 'football in a library' at us.

 

I completely agree about the West Stand. Not so sure about sticking a metal sheet between the East and North though. It's a huge gap, could look quite amateurish, although it's still probably better than what we've got at the moment. If we were to go down that route, the most logical thing to put there would be a proper big screen. The one at the minute is ludicrously bad.


Longer term, another hospitality section would probably make sense. The corner stand looks great in my opinion, though I'm not sure how much money it generates.

 

As I understood it there should be grants available.

 

I thought that the structure itself was fine, just there are no facilities on the north side.

 

I've said a few times that if it's was up to me I'd build something that looks like the Ponty end corner stand but has different functions.

Ignore the rather crude drawing but it would look like this with a scoreboard across the front of the upper area.



On the ground floor level would be a supporters bar. Or if emergency access needs to be maintained it could just be an open area with gates at the back which again would keep the sound in.

First floor, a more relaxed family friendly lower end version of hospitality, I'm thinking comfortable cafe rather than full on restaurant. I assume it could easily have a door in it to the existing hospitality level for hatred services. I guess the current corner stand does too actually.

Upper floor a proper kids zone. It's right next to the family stand so an ideal place for a kids zone with access straight into the concourse.

Basically it would be an ideal hub for families. Comfortable catering on one floor to get families in early and eating in the cafe style catering section then upstairs to the fun zone and straight into your seating area.

Could be used to make it so much more family friendly and get the next generation in

 

Brentford's quiet family zone for kids with sensory issues is very impressive. Maybe something like that could be an option?

 

Definitely. I'd love us to have something like that. Could be a very good use of the remaining balcony space on the first floor. Put glass across the front of it and they've got their own viewing area.