Build it and they will come … where to watch Newcastle United? –
Was it just me reading between the lines as Darren Eales spoke at the We Are United event the other week of United assessing its options for additional capacity and thought … are they thinking about leaving St James’ Park?
If we weren’t reading between the lines with Eales words at that event then the survey questions that dropped into our in-boxes yesterday couldn’t have been more explicit about a potential direction of travel. There is a strong sense of it being away from St James’ Park.
A relocation is unquestionably on the table.
We’re told a leading firm of consultants is looking at what can be done on the SJP site and it has been reported separately that company is Populous[1] but as yet there’s no time-line on when they might report back their findings to United and then to us.,
One thing is certain we do need to get more fans through the door for home games and a chunk of those fans have to be the Prosecco quaffing prawn sarnie brigade. I can’t believe I’m writing those words but after lambasting Ashley for allowing the commercial and corporate revenues of United to wither over 14 years it would be a bit of a rum turnaround to suggest those things don’t matter if we want to see the club transformed into a trophy winning machine as it has been sold to us.
There’s a clear financial rationale to drive an increase in our match going revenue and a limit as to what can be paid in the NE so to close the gap on the likes of Man U, Liverpool, Arsenal, Spurs we need a lot more numbers coming through the turnstiles. The demand is there and I understand the queue for executive boxes grows by the day.
Increased capacity might also help to deal with the toxicity developing within our ranks about who gets in and who doesn’t. That is variously poisonous and bitter – I’d love us to move beyond where I fear we’ll get to in those disputes. But those in the boardroom will be naturally more concerned with the money.
For all that I’d be disappointed to leave St James’ Park the only place Newcastle United has ever played its home games … since 1892 and Newcastle West End before that is for completely emotional reasons. Like many of you reading this my old man stood with me as a child on the West Stand Paddock and I have punctuated my life in various parts of SJP – a daft lad on the Leazes / Gallowgate, in the Benches and a parent myself taking my own younger brother daughter to games. I’m now a middle-aged speccy wanker but SJP is a life-story and there are thousands like me – those who came before – the miners, shipbuilders and many of you reading this can trace your family’s lineage back to being fans since the formation of Newcastle United – and SJP sits in a family album for many of us.
TF LONG READ – Time to Move? Options for a New Stadium[2]
You’d have to have a heart like a swinging brick not to feel the emotional pull of SJP and its history it is an umbilical cord of tradition and shouldn’t be easily cut.
We should also understand the importance of the SJP site in creating the stubbornly magnetic, regional life-force that is Newcastle United.
The merger of loyalties (if not clubs, that is historically inaccurate no matter it makes a decent terrace ditty) across the city was the perfect creation of a pyscho-geography with a Geordie institution at the heart of the largest conurbation between Leeds and Edinburgh.
NE1 is accessible and a draw to all parts of Tyneside and the wider NE – reaching out to Northumberland and Durham, across to Cumbria, further south to North Yorkshire and north into the Scottish borders.
It is why Newcastle United is the club of the north and will continue to grow within its traditional catchment areas and out-with, posing an existential threat to our neighbours over time.
I would love United to be able to resolve the boundary issues it has behind the East Stand and Gallowgate End with Leazes/St James’ Terrace combining with the Metro to create complications that could stymie expanding our stadium and getting more supporters through the door.
I have my doubts they can be resolved however. I would hope I’m wrong but I sense the final assessment will be a reluctance to invest lots of money onto a site and stadium which could deliver something that doesn’t fit with what needs to serve Newcastle United for the next 30-50 years. That is the scope of the strategy that must be occupying the minds of those in the United boardroom.
There’s the ambition thing as well and if that if that is as sky-scraping as we’ve been led to believe then clagging extra bits on to the East Stand and Gallowgate could fall way short of what might be in mind over in Riyadh.
Growing Pains – what is possible with a Gallowgate expansion?[3]
Let’s be honest – the Reubens aren’t at United because they have discovered their inner stottie cake. They are property developers and have the ideal expertise to deliver the new training ground the club has already spoken of as in the works, so a new stadium and whisper it redevelopment of the land around it, not to mention the possibilities of new projects on the current SJP and Strawberry Place sites appears tailor made for them to lead on.
We know they have interests in the city already (Gosforth Race-course and Pilgrim St) and it seems obvious why they bought 10% of Newcastle United along with PIF and Amanda Staveley. My mad guess being it is business related? No-one really falls for the smarm and charm do they? Do they? A new stadium and associated projects could possibly be the largest development outside of London.
I am preparing myself for relocation. Now the question is to where?
The timing has been all wrong because the land has been developed already but an opportunity to move across Barrack Road on to the old Newcastle Breweries site would have been ideal – still in Gallowgate and only yards from our ancient home. But that’s gone.
Other sites present themselves but I don’t think I’m alone in the demand to remain in the city centre or as close as damn to it. It is non-negotiable for the majority of us I’d guess.
Tell me if I’m wrong and you fancy a switch to Newburn Haugh or up to the Fosseway or heaven forbid over to Gateshead (I say that with Bensham blood in my veins). I don’t think anyone really wants that.
Leazes Park / Castle Leazes might be ideal from a supporters’ perspective but we reckon without a conservation led protest in opposition at our peril. Who remembers the formidable and incongruously named Dolly Potter and the resourceful No Business On The Moor when we last got here in the late 90s? They faced down no less than developer Sir John Hall.
St James’ Park expansion – East Stand Conundrum![4]
There might be possibilities further up Barrack Road on the site of the current BBC studios and adjacent land which is predominantly low rise and reducing quality commercial buildings. I’m speculating wildly.
The widely discussed Arena site adjacent to the former Calders factory as well as surrounding low quality business units that ribbon the south side of Scotswood Road seems obvious. Land stretching down to Forth Bank currently derelict, once the site of a planned housing development is now vacant. No current plans exist.
Handily it sits marginally outside the city centre adjacent to existing road infrastructure and a 5 minute walk from Central Station (biggest mainline railway station north of Leeds south of Edinburgh and the Metro of course). You really couldn’t pick a better alternative site logistically.
The Calders site would need to be decontaminated after decades of heavy industrial pollution but there has been multiple successful projects that have undertaken similar type work to create new uses for brown-field sites. It’s a reason to do it as opposed to avoid it in my opinion.
The site sitting on the north bank of the Tyne is potentially iconic. There is currently more derelict land on the south of the Redheugh Bridge (ironically the former site of Gateshead FC and failed public housing which stretches along Askew Road’s rail tracks and further down to the Teams).
An ambitious plan on the Arena site could potentially energise the lower west of the city and a long neglected corner of Gateshead. I’d imagine public money would be found to support the development of new infrastructure – maybe it was discussed when top PIF and United honcho Yasir al Rumayyan met with Sunak and Hunt recently in London? That would be a Levelling Up project worthy of the description.
That Newcastle United psycho-geography would be preserved on that Arena site. It has my vote if as I suspect we will decant from St James’ Park.
How big?
I see calls for an 80,000 capacity stadium. That’s as big as the national stadium at Wembley. It would be the biggest club stadium in the UK. Could we fill it? Well, I think so on those big days and nights when England and Europe’s elite comes calling (and Sunderland if we ever play them at home again) but the early rounds of Cup competitions when we draw L1 or 2 clubs? Or even the PL’s lesser lights? I’m not so sure.
My preference would be for a 65-70,000 stadium with potential to add further capacity if we had consistent need for it. In that way the place is always full and the atmosphere maintained. There’s a business need to have a bit of ticket scarcity as well.
THRU BLACK & WHITE EYES – Youth Club – 4/Dec/23[5]
I’d hope any new stadium would be designed with football in mind. Obviously, the potential of the club to attract international events – football, NFL and rugby, concerts should be increased by a move to a new stadium but leaving SJP for something like West Ham’s unloved Olympic Stadium would be disastrous. I know the circumstances are different but I feel compelled to make the point.
Tottenham have the evidence of a great stadium in concrete, glass and steel. That looming home end would be something to at least match for us and thereby respect the culture of those great home ends we’ve had – the old Leazes and Gallowgate but on a whole different level for the modern era.
Taking advantage of safe-standing for a whole bank of supporters – possibly 20,000+ to create a Geordie wall would be something else. Not a bad canvass for Wor Flags and their descendents to illustrate our love for the club upon.
Everton’s emerging stadium has been designed with steep stands and to intimidate the opposition is something to replicate as is the attention to detail which includes acoustics in mind to ensure the noise created is weaponised for our just and righteous cause.
Those are the basics for dedicated, rank and file just gan to the match punters like you and I.
There are other considerations. I doubt a move to a new stadium would allow us to stick visiting fans in the upper tiers as we do now. I’d welcome that – have them closer to the pitch but with those looming stands a claustrophobic intimidation at being surrounded on all sides and from behind and above has a certain appeal.
There would of course be a huge opportunity to expand the corporate sections of a new stadium for which we know there is a huge demand and I’d expect space made available for those international fans (tourists) United is preoccupied with these days.
Add additional conferencing facilities for non-match-day activity alongside additional hotel space in the adjacent areas and you can see the potential. The club could go for an Etihad Campus style development as Man City has but my instincts are that wouldn’t suit that site and they’ll keep a training ground on the suburban fringe of the city. Again, I’m only guessing.
That could have big benefits for the club and the city-region and not many would object to that beyond the die-hards who want to stay at SJP come what may.
We can see United has tried to tart the concourses at SJP up a bit but it is essentially still breeze blocks, gassy piss-water beer and food which looks barely edible to me (food snob klaxon). That just wouldn’t be sustainable if United is going to pull fans into the stadium earlier to exploit their match-day coin and I’d expect the planned Fan-Zone on Strawberry Place can test the water on what fans want from the experience of going to the game.
On-site breweries, craft ales, independent artisan street food style outlets as well as the fast food standards Greggs, McDonalds etc might act to pull supporters away from traditional city centre boozers etc. United might have an eye on the dough we currently pile into the city’s pubs, cafes and restaurants.
Those who were in the US on the pre-season tour were knocked out by what they saw over there demonstrates there is a different paradigm in stadium experience and you know with the Saudis copping for the World Cup 2032 there’s an opportunity for Newcastle United to act as a guinea pig for what’s planned then with stadia design etc.
I have seen a very strong reaction to the survey. Some of it is understandable as the wording and questions are clumsy and preoccupied with corporate and price increases. Some of the reaction is over the top and hysterical.
More analysis of the potential for a huge safe standing style terrace, a family enclosure, better facilities for visiting supporters and community resources to compliment economic benefits to the city would have landed all of this much better. Maybe we are not at that point yet but as a general point, the club’s communications to supporters absolutely sucks at the moment.
Some accompanying reassurance about ticket pricing for the club’s predominantly local and working class support would have gone a long way. It is inconceivable United will be able to charge London prices in Newcastle but I guess they know that as we should understand we’re going to pay more to watch this iteration of our club as opposed to Ashley’s. How much more is the key question.
There’s a certain naivety from those who have put those questions and a lack of understanding at the anxiety this can create amongst supporters who regard Newcastle United as a birthright and way of life rather than a past-time.
If we want an indication of where we’re headed, have a look around the Tottenham stadium this Sunday, look at the plans for Everton’s stadium and speak to the fans of Man City, Arsenal, Liverpool about the experience of being run as a cash generating behemoth. That’s where we’re headed.
But you know, if the club could achieve everything its heart desired at St James’ Park, that would be very nice indeed. What United has to achieve isn’t for the next 5-10 years though – it is a far longer timeline than that and likely this ageing Mag will never see the end of. And on that cheery thought ….
Keep On, Keepin’ On …
Michael Martin, @TFMick1892
References
- ^ Populous (populous.com)
- ^ TF LONG READ – Time to Move? Options for a New Stadium (true-faith.co.uk)
- ^ Growing Pains – what is possible with a Gallowgate expansion? (true-faith.co.uk)
- ^ St James’ Park expansion – East Stand Conundrum! (true-faith.co.uk)
- ^ THRU BLACK & WHITE EYES – Youth Club – 4/Dec/23 (true-faith.co.uk)
- ^ The Golden Triangle (true-faith.co.uk)