General New Stadium Plans - Stratfield Brake

[OUFCwaffle]

It's incredible how you, @Colin B and myself have been talking about this exact development for so long and getting dog abuse for it, yet here we all are talking about seat colours and what food we want served!

I can't even be arsed to say "I told you so" because it only encourages the idiots to try to score points against us all. Those who value the input from behind the scenes will hopefully have plenty more to look forward to in the coming days, weeks and months. These are truly exciting times and we're only just starting. Those who have made this personal against me and others have been made to look like the pathetic idiots that they are.

I just hope that we can all come together to show this club, the board, the players, staff and everyone behind the scenes, how much this means to us all. I know it sounds like a broken record, but Sheffield Wednesday is 12 days away, let's turn up in our thousands for OUR club.

The future's bright, the future's YELLOW!!!

I for one would like to thank you three for your helpful and logical insight into the background runnings of our club. Even without being ITK, you could see that SB was the most sensible location.

 

[bazzer9461]

Houses don't bring anything to the community though. Where as our plan will.

Houses do, somewhere to live

 

[OUFCwaffle]

Bloody hell I spend one weekend away moving house, we put in a dismal performance and I expect to come back to a misery filled forum only to see an 11 page thread of nearly all positive posts about the excellent news regarding the stadium.

Public transport is still a bit rubbish my end, but it'll be a lot easier to get to than Grenoble Road is once I get to Banbury or Bicester. My lad is 18 months old at the moment, so assuming the new stadium is finished ready for the current lease to end he'll be perfect age for a cheeky season ticket for the first year in the new stadium!

Same with my 2 1/2 yo half brother

 

[OX14]

Houses do, somewhere to live

Yes. But I meant they don't bring anything to the table in regards to people who already live in a home close by. Take the North abingdon development 1000 homes going either side of Tilsley Park. When Tilsley was built there was a condition any building couldn't be over a certain height ( less then a 2 storey house) that's why the leisure centre had to build the other side of abingdon, all those people who bought homes across from tilsley in the 90s were told nothing could ever built over there , you will have a field, woodland view forever. Roll on less then 20 years and 3 storey homes going up all around tilsley. Planning has changed a hell of a lot recently.

 

[uptheus]

At the risk of repeating myself

But it was leaked or was this planned.

Are the owners happy how this information has now got into the public domain?

 

[Sarge]

Talking of the 'Bird, Glenn won't be happy.

he may have retired when the move is completed?

 

[unification]

I agree with most of what you have put but we are not a big club and I don't particularly want to feel like we are a big club. What I want is to feel that we are a well run club with a soul who feel part of the community and a club that the community feels part off. All those things you have pointed out are part of this.

Well said. I know we're all excited but we have to temper this with a dose of realism.

Oxford has a population of 152,000 people and Oxfordshire has 687,000 - it makes it the 35th most populated of the 48 ceremonial counties which does reveal a finite level of support since we're unlikely to make much of an impact outside of the county. That's where our community will come from. We're not going to be Liverpool or Manchester United but we can share in our parochial interests and aim to be a Brighton, Brentford, Hull or Bournemouth - middling clubs who through new stadia or good investment, have managed to jump into the next level. Let's not forget that 30 years ago some of those clubs were attracting minor crowds and we're battling for their lives to stay in the league.

There is a chance to right a lot of the wrongs with the Kassam Stadium. Aside from good views, it's a miserable place to watch football. Three stands, open corners, smell of s**t, nowhere decent to drink or eat, 40 minute bus ride/too far to walk from the station and nothing of note to do pre or post-match. If the new investors can promise to make the surrounds of the ground decent, that should attract more people to it. Making it easier to access and get away from after a game, even better. Have a top class, well designed ground that locks in atmosphere, that adds a few on to the total.

I can see our attendances generally going up, as they did initially with the Kassam until realism hit home again. We lost so much momentum when the Kassam opened. The team was still in a form of shock from nearly going out of business that paralysed progress for a good number of seasons. New stadiums often suggest rebirth or a new era - ours saw us finish 21st of 24 in the fourth tier and it got even worse four seasons later.

I hope that the Oxford United team that is due to play in the projected new stadium is in a good place if and when it happens. I do believe that the personnel behind it are as well meaning and savvy as they sound. There's a long old road ahead.

 

[uptheus]

I seem to remember this Flyer and the words 'innovative stadium' on it so given the state of the Kassam often thought about it.

I am pretty confident this time around things are going to be much different

It was innovative from Kassam’s perspective!

 

[Marked Ox]

I’d also add to this a Gladiators/Wipeout style assault course that comes up from under the pitch for halftime entertainment - then we can finally scrap the days of catching footballs in biffa bins!

As long as it is Bomb Dog friendly.

 

[Foley]

I for one would like to thank you three for your helpful and logical insight into the background runnings of our club. Even without being ITK, you could see that SB was the most sensible location.

Agree with that.
It seemed pretty clear that there were 3 or so ITK posters who were trying ( without breaching confidential information) to keep us updated in general terms.
I always found these updates really useful.

 

[AbsoluteZero]

All positive news, but not sure how happy the club owners are about the information leak since there has been no response from the club so far?

Relations with the Council must be at an all time high to even get this considered. But the County Council make up now is very different to what it was 12 months ago, and with an anti-car campaigner in Tim Bearder somehow and rather illogically in charge of the county's traffic he could easily scupper plans on his own with his lack of foresight to develop the County and instead try and ban the car. Bit concerned that the final planning permission decision will come from Cherwell District Council as this seems to be way out of their league who are used to just dealing with market towns in the north of the County and I don't think it is within their capabilities of seeing the bigger picture especially as the main benefits will be felt more in Oxford city itself rather than traditional Cherwell.

Couple of questions for those more in the know than all of us, so please Scotchegg.

Is there a plan for the stadium itself to be used for something other than football so that it gets used for more than 23 league games per season. It makes financial sense to use it for some of the other 342 days in the year but how and what. Another sport? Concerts?

The development itself whilst dominated by the football arena needs to stand on it's own two feet outside of match day, and needs to bring people into the commercial development specifically. Done well it could thrive week by week, although that will probably be to the detriment of other Oxford areas that would offer the same sort of thing. So could there be something different brought in? Maybe a top quality casino or entertainment hall to go alongside the ground?

Finally, how does this affect the already 6 figure investment OUFC has made on the existing training ground facilities, already done with the super support from the Council? Sounds like with this new ground also incorporating community facilities and sports pitches as well we could have the training ground there instead, which means a waste on the current training ground?

 

[Junior_1]

It won't apart from those that to Oxford train station from Oxford, doubt whether many will alight at Oxford for a few pints and risk missing the next train to get them to Sytratfield break on time to get the start of the match. it will either be North Oxford or Kidlington, Plus Oxford is a crap shopping destination.

2 trains an hour as it stands. That’ll be enough.

14-11 and 14-41* ( both take 5 mins )

* taken from the present TT.

 

[Jolteon]

Agree with that.
It seemed pretty clear that there were 3 or so ITK posters who were trying ( without breaching confidential information) to keep us updated in general terms.
I always found these updates really useful.

Heartily concur - it was worth lurking that awful takeover thread for the snippets that did come through from those that knew their stuff - glad most of them have stuck around given the amount of undeserved abuse some have gotten.

 

[Marked Ox]

Talking of the 'Bird, Glenn won't be happy.

We'll have to demand there is a restaurant that specialises in Quince dishes otherwise local demand will drop.

 

[Junior_1]

@Malc why has the consortium takeover thread been locked with a circular link back to itself?
Two different threads
1 - club ownership
2 - new stadium

Guessing Malc wanted to feel important…

 

[Junior_1]

I think the greatest (loudest) objections may come from Summertown and North Oxford ?

Summertown folk didn’t get overly far with opposing the orange hotel that has recently opened opposite the BBC radio Ox base so can’t see them having much of a say on this.

 

[Junior_1]

GB railways might well help improve this . Companies basically management rather than as was under the franchise systems so gvt provide the money/risk ...as part of the green push this should weigh heavily in our favour

Wouldn’t hold to much on that one. But even without, it’ll be so easy to get to and from on the train and at a very good price too.

Get your railcards purchased people!!!

 

[Thomas/Brock/Jones]

Wouldn’t hold to much on that one. But even without, it’ll be so easy to get to and from on the train and at a very good price too.

Get your railcards purchased people!!!

Wait and see , big changes taking place in the railways

 

[unification]

It was innovative from Kassam’s perspective!

It wasn't 'designed' under Kassam's stewardship though. Robin Herd et al would have recruited the architects (ACP Architecture Ltd) and the contractor (Taylor Woodrow).

It is a s**t, mid-90s design though. Too open and too cold and sterile. Plenty of teams don't learn from it either and create unlovable new grounds. Bland offerings I've visited in recent years include Chesterfield, Shrewsbury, Wimbledon's new identikit ground and Doncaster's ho-hum bowl. You'd never seek to build a Kenilworth Road or Underhill nowadays but a bit of imagination to show that you're in a ground that could only belong to one club from the moment you're in it is needed. Brighton's Falmer Stadium, Rotherham's New York Stadium and Stadium: MK are three I'd cite as being new but more memorable than your average four single tier stands new builds that exist nowadays.

Make the design memorable and the day out memorable and more will come.

 

[Junior_1]

Wait and see , big changes taking place in the railways

Indeed we will.


Lots of unions on the railways. Not going to be straight forward.

HS2?