Multi-Sports Stadium for North?

Johnny_the_fox

from the bbc
Multi-sport stadium on horizon

With an announcement expected next week on a possible multi-sports stadium for Northern Ireland, BBC NI political correspondent Gareth Gordon visits a Premiership ground which could be a possible model for the new facility.

From the M61, it looks like an alien space craft has landed in the grey suburban expanse of Horwich on the outskirts of Bolton.

To football fans, it is known as the Reebok Stadium - where 28,000 people can watch the once old-fashioned Bolton Wanderers in futuristic splendour.

Soon, something like it may just beam Northern Ireland sport into the 21st century.

The prospect of a bright shiny new stadium in the province has been a political football for longer than any game you care to name.

Back in January, Tony Whitehead of the Strategic Investment Board, a Liverpool fan who helped rescue the troubled Wembley Stadium project, was asked by NIO Sports Minister Angela Smith to establish whether a stadium for Northern Ireland was commercially viable.

Ms Smith and Finance Minister Ian Pearson will begin to consider the report within days, and an announcement is expected next week.

The vision of the Reebok is bound to loom large within its pages.

Tony Whitehead has been on a guided tour. It is the kind of model he must replicate in Northern Ireland if the stadium project is ever going to happen.

"We are unlikely to get a stadium built completely by private sector or sponsorship or income generation, " he said.

"Most stadia are built with some sort of public sector capital contribution. Clearly we are looking to try to limit that in this situation."

In other words, it must pay for itself and to do that it must copy the Reebok example, which in the words of Alan Duckworth, chief executive of Bolton's holding company Burnden Leisure, is "very much a hotel that's shaped like a football stadium."

He says: "For seven days a week it operates as an hotel and only on match days does it come into use as a football stadium."

The hotel is incorporated into one of the stands.

Under another stand is exhibition space for 4,000 people. Corporate and banqueting business generates between £8m to £9m a year for the football club.

Mr Whitehead said: "At Bolton, you've got the non-football related core income that is driven through things like offices, revenue from corporate hospitality and corporate sponsorship, so that the football side isn't simply the sole generator of income."

It's a model he will have to replicate in Northern Ireland if there's any chance of the stadium getting the go ahead.

But that is not his only problem. The project must have cross community support.

That means as well as accommodating football (the Northern Ireland international team) and rugby (Ulster) he must also persuade the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) to come on board.

And that, given their opposition to sharing grounds with other sports, will not be easy.

"As part of the business plan exercise, all three sports bodies have played their full part, in terms of opening up their books and agreeing sets of assumptions," he said.

"By that I mean realistic sets of assumptions on likely attendance, ticket pricing etcetera.

"If we do move to the next stage and are asked to find the most appropriate site, quite clearly the number one criteria for that will be acceptability to all three sports bodies, both in terms of neutrality for the three sports bodies and also the fan base of the three sports bodies.

"The GAA have played their part in the business exercise. They were very, very generous in giving me a tour around Croke Park about two or three weeks ago.

"On the back of that, the concept we are putting together is designed to accommodate GAA.

"In fact, given the requirements of the GAA because of a bigger-sized pitch, what you could effectively say with this new stadium is that it is GAA-designed and it will also accommodate soccer and rugby."

If this project does eventually get the thumbs up, it will not be called the "national" stadium - that would go against the ethos of the vast majority of GAA fans.

Instead, like the Reebok, it would be sponsored by a company. It is understood discussions have already been held with a number of prospective sponsors in Britain and beyond.

The possibility of major concerts being staged there has also been discussed with music promoters.

Four sites are being considered. Newry, which must be considered the outsider; two in Belfast - the Titanic Quarter in the east of the city and the north foreshore of Belfast Lough; and the favourite, the site of the old Maze Prison, near Lisburn.

But we'll only get to that stage if ministers Smith and Pearson are persuaded a stadium could pay its way.

Tony Whitehead isn't giving much away.

"As a sports fan, I would love this project to happen. As an economist, I am well aware that it needs to stack up," he said.

I would love to see it happen.. especially getting a new stadium before the south get theirs.

only problems are - if they stadium ends up like Windsor Park and is full of bigots...

Muzz

There is absolutely no point in puttin g a stadium in any of the locations you just mentioned. For a start in N. Ireland the majority of bigotry comes from belfast. It needs to be stemed away. Why not put it dead bang in the centre of Northern Ireland. For a change let those from the west not have to travel hours and hours to a sporting event or a concert etc. My place to build the stadium would be like Cookstown where it is obviously going to benfit more people than the likes of building it in belfast. You are an hour from the City airport, 40minutes from the international, you really couldn't ask for much more. Unless the stadium was built on your front door. Even at that it aint much to ask :cool:

Mr_Roger_Bongos

No one really uses that cemetary opposite you muzz, a bit of earthworks and that would be the perfect place for it. But is there enough space for parking though?

THey could do like the Monaco stadium and have an underground carpark underneath! Sorted.

Muzz

Tell you the truth Jim there aint alot of life about that place...not so long ago a two seater plane crashed there...they are still digging and the dead count is at 398. Id imgine it will be awhile before they have finished their search. Supposedly they expect to find more bodies. All skin and bones if you ask me!

Johnny_the_fox

*bump*
Sorry Muzz it not going to be in cookstown..

I agree with you, it should be away from belfast.

6 months later... :rolleyes:

Maze Prison to be replaced by national sports stadium
17/11/2004 - 14:20:21

Northern Ireland’s new national sports stadium will be part of a £1bn (€1.42bn) development planned for the site of the old Maze Prison, it emerged today.

Apart from the 30,000 seat showpiece arena, an international exhibition centre for showjumping events and rock concerts is also in proposals.

One of the jail’s controversial H-Blocks, where 10 republican hunger strikers died in 1981, is to be retained as well.

The 360-acre site near Lisburn in the Co Antrim countryside is bigger than Belfast’s commercial centre.

Plans are due to be put before Stormont Minister Ian Pearson early next week.

With blue-chip companies also being lined up for a section of the vast estate, strategists believe the economic boost from a project that could take 20 years to complete will be enormous.

“There’s the potential for 5,000 jobs,” one said.

The proposals have been drawn up by a panel appointed to transform the notorious jail, where republican and loyalist terrorists were held since internment in the early 1970s until its closure in September 2000.

Key elements of their vision include:

:: a 40-acre sports zone, including a stadium to be used by football, rugby and Gaelic associations.

:: an international conflict transformation centre.

:: a rural excellence and equestrian zone, with showgrounds and exhibition facilities.

:: an office, hotel and leisure village.

:: an industrial estate to attract significant inward investment.

:: artwork and sculptures throughout the site.

Transport networks would also be overhauled under the scheme, with new routes and a motorway link built. Work on this section, at a cost in excess of £20m, could begin as soon as the plan is agreed.

Although British government money is expected to be used, it would recoup some of its investment by selling off land set aside for residential purposes.

Sources believe the whole project will cost £1bn (€1.42bn) over the next two decades.

The most ambitious part of the package is a new stadium to host major outdoor sporting events.

Panel members believe their plans are more attractive than rival schemes suggested for Belfast’s Lough shoreline and the city’s Titanic Quarter.

With London lobbying for the 2012 Olympics, the facilities could be fully built at least three years earlier to take advantage of a successful bid.

“It could form part of the training area for athletes coming over for the Games,” an insider said.

“There won’t be enough room around London so Northern Ireland will be in there if this is up in time.”

The six-member group, nominated by Northern Ireland’s four main political parties and chaired by Ulster Unionist David Campbell, has been working on their blueprint since their appointment in March 2003.

With Democratic Unionist Edwin Poots and former Sinn Féin councillor-turned newspaper executive Mairtin O’Muilleoir also on the board, much of the political wrangling centred on the future use of the prison building itself.

Republican demands for it to be entirely retained as a museum were resisted, while unionists have accepted partial retention of the controversial prison.

One of the eight H-Blocks where paramilitaries were kept at the height of the conflict would be retained under the proposals.

It will be used to hold the public inquiry into the jailhouse murder of loyalist terror chief Billy Wright.

Conservationists from the Environment and Heritage Service also urged the panel to keep part of the prison during 60 submissions studied by the group.

“They wanted it listed after looking at the architectural and historical significance,” one source disclosed.

The structures that escape demolition would be kept neutral to avoid turning them into a shrine, sources stressed.

They would be located close to a special conflict transformation centre studying peace processes both in Ulster and the Middle East.

Experts in the field from places like Harvard University in the United States could be brought in to develop the project.

With its tourism potential a key part of the plans, the panel have suggested new hotels and restaurants for an on-site leisure village.

They expect huge numbers of visitors to both the stadium and a rural excellence zone, which could hold international exhibitions and major concerts.

“This could be an alternative venue, perhaps even bigger than Belfast’s Odyssey Arena, if an alternative market can be identified.”

Mr Pearson, as the Direct Rule Minister responsible for the project, is expected to give his verdict before Christmas.

DannyAu-Yeung

The old maze site is probably the best area mentioned there imo.

Muzz

i concur with dannyau-yeung