Arsenal's bid for Wembley Stadium

[benmarks1984]

Is this why so many people leave the emitates before the match ends? because tansport is difficult? i live in the US so have yet to make it to an emirates match. If thats the case Arsenal should defiantly look to updating the transport links around the ground as on tv it looks really poor when lots of fans are leaving with ten or so minutes to go.

Even though i love the emitates stadium i do think arsenal2011 makes some good points.

In terms of of the old wembley - gzagee - you say it would cost £600m to redevlop it but thats because they knocked the old stadium down and built a new 1. I got the impression the Arsenal board wanted to keep the twin towers stadium as it was when we played there in CL 98-2000.

Also - Fabrestuta - the CL games at old Wembley Arsenal sold 20,000 tickets at £10 and we managed to get 73,000 against crappy CSKA Sofia. So to fill the 75,000 capacity stadium the tickets would have had to been a lot cheaper then the emirates which would have been good.

If we had played there more often i think the atmosphere would have improved like it has at the emirates, and also the team would have adapted to playing on such a bigger size pitch eventually and results would have improved. We did beat Newcastle in 98 final there aswell as Man Utd in charity shield 2 years running.

I guess its all hypothetical now, but 1 thinks for sure, if we had bought the old wembley we would be debt free right now and with a 75,000 capacity i would be able to get a ticket at the emirates for the first time

[gzagee]

The old Wembley needed updating mate. Make no mistake, it was antiquated. That's probably why The FA (or whoever owned the stadium) was willing to let it go for so cheap. As it was we didn't go for it. That was the best decision in my opinion.
As for Wembley being a great place for the Arsenal, we hardly won the games that mattered when we played there in the CL.
As for the cost of improving the transport links around The Grove, the local council said we'd have to pay the improvements.
The details are on this forum somewhere as we've covered this subject many times in the past.
Have yourself a nose around to get the answers.

[UFGN]

There is never any excuse for leavung early. Stay to the whistle or dont come at all. Theres plenty of folks cant afford tickets who would love to be there so its never ok to leave early

[Est83]

Agreed.

If it was allowed, I'd wait outside the stadium and swap with those fans for the last 5 minutes they miss. They deserve hench slaps to the back of their heads!!!

[SE13]

Old Wembley was an awful ground made worse by the seats having obstructed views. Last time I was there was for a Charity Shield in 99, and it was dire to say the very least, Arsenal never had a prayer of moving there, much as the proposed move to Ally Paly in the 70's.

One thing someone remarked on was shifting people out of Ashburton Grove - The Piccadilly Line runs 28tph with each having about an 1,100 capacity, and that's E/B and W/B (though some do tip out at Arnos) the Victoria runs over 30tph at a capacity of nearly 1,300 each, not forgetting network trains, buses and those walking. When we had full houses at Highbury before the seats came in, people were shifted quite quickly, and that was back in the days when everyone stayed right to the end. Arsenal tube is a slightly further walk now, but can still cope admirably considering the size of it.

[ThereIsBearCum]

Old Wembley was an awful ground made worse by the seats having obstructed views. Last time I was there was for a Charity Shield in 99, and it was dire to say the very least, Arsenal never had a prayer of moving there, much as the proposed move to Ally Paly in the 70's.

One thing someone remarked on was shifting people out of Ashburton Grove - The Piccadilly Line runs 28tph with each having about an 1,100 capacity, and that's E/B and W/B (though some do tip out at Arnos) the Victoria runs over 30tph at a capacity of nearly 1,300 each, not forgetting network trains, buses and those walking. When we had full houses at Highbury before the seats came in, people were shifted quite quickly, and that was back in the days when everyone stayed right to the end. Arsenal tube is a slightly further walk now, but can still cope admirably considering the size of it.

yeah, when I was in England there didn't seem to be too much of a problem when you consider that there were 60,000 people trying to leave at once... I mean, they're hardly just going to disappear
mind you, couldn't stop giggling whenever the automated voice on the tube piped up "this is the line to Cockfosters"