MARSEILLE - Stade Vélodrome (60,031 -> 67,054) - EURO 2016

[Vilak]

Originally Posted by bumdingo

Except this looks like a dogs dinner of a concept. It's 2 seperate stadiums cobbled together

I find myself it looks great but it's sure it's a matter of taste.
Look at the satellite image and you'll see they've done the best with the lack of space behind the goals.
This project, if the money is found, is perfect and covers about every present and future need of Marseille.

[Neda Say]

I'm not sold but why not! It really does look like two stadium on one another! I never considered San Siro to be a masterpiece even when it was a brand new stadium! Maybe it will grow on me!

[secret]

merciiiiiiiiii

[titou]

It seems acceptable to me.
After looking from every picture, it's a very nice stadium from the outside and from the inside, it doesn't seems even the man on the highest seat would be that far from action.
It's not like a seat belt was built around the existing stands, it seems, from what I see in the pictures, that the new belt will be built ABOVE the existing stands, not behind.

[Vilak]

Acceptable????
How much club bosses would die to have this inside the walls of their stadium?
Hey, it's 80.000 seats and as you pointed it, the view seems very good from the upper seats...

Gaudin has been re-elected. Will he keeps his promess to upgrade the stadium?
I think it will be know soon, don't you?

[Neda Say]

Originally Posted by Vilak

Acceptable????
How much club bosses would die to have this inside the walls of their stadium?
Hey, it's 80.000 seats and as you pointed it, the view seems very good from the upper seats...

Gaudin has been re-elected. Will he keeps his promise to upgrade the stadium?
I think it will be know soon, don't you?

Don't forget that the club is up for sale again! Yes again!

[GNU]

Looks a bit strange with this isolated upper tier

[Vilak]

Originally Posted by GNU

Looks a bit strange with this isolated upper tier

Yes, a little bit but they can't do what they want with the existing structure.
As you see in the satelitte pictures, there's not tons of available land to expand in superficy so it's probably the best way they can.

[Vilak]

Originally Posted by lpioe

I don't like the 2nd tier in the project. The proportions just don't seem right. I don't ilke stadiums where the 2nd tier is much smaller than the 1st.

Facade and 'environment' of the stadium look really nice though.

Same answer as above... they have to do the best without too much touching the existing structure.
Ok, to have a 1st tier at 60.000 and a second at 20.000 seems very disproportionnal but again, they do what they can with what they have.

[lpioe]

I just checked Google Earth and you are right. There is virtually no room at all for expansion in the north-eastern corner. So this is pretty much the only way to expand.
I hope to see better renders soon.

[kazetuner]

mmm... i prefer the stadium as it is now.... maybe a roof would be nice , but the upper tier.......

[Vilak]

I still think it will be very efficient as people won't be that far from the pitch.
Of course, from an aesthetical point, the inside of the stadium won't look compact but has its caché.

I think we'll soon hear about the expansion, be it this very project or another.
But I'm still supporting this one. Its not very expensive for what it brings.

[Carrerra]

I wonder how they can support the added upper tiers... I can't see any columns to support the tiers but they can support themselves plus as many as 20,469(=80,500-60,031) people!!!!!!!!!!!!

Is it possible in architecture? Anyone who has the knowledge, please reply...

[wearethefuture]

I would imagine in the corner behind the stands, maybe a bit like what is shown in that concept render, although it looks like he has put executive boxes there instead. The top tier (supported by collums in corners), as i would imagine, would have to be as close (in terms of height) as it can possibly be to the one below it.

Surely these renders are nothing more than purely conceptual, and just done by a fan. I would love to see something like this, mainly due to its unique characteristics, but sadly i do not see this happening. If you think about the viewing angles i think these wouldn't work, as you wouldn't be able to see the nearest touchline to you in certain areas, ie. the corner of the second tier.

They could maybe take away small sections off the backs of the curving stands to make them more suitable for expansion with a new tier (which i am guessing is the only way of increasing capacity.

As you say space is really tight on site, so there would have to be some kind of serious overhang (a tier hanging directly over the one underneath it) in order to achieve the 20,000 increase being talked about, i don't think the design on this page addresses this enough for me and hasn't been thoroughly thought out enough if were to be official.

I can explain more in detail if need be, but i think if u moved the whole of the top tier down quite a fair bit, so as the very last row of seats, at the very back of each stand can just about see the touchline on the farside.

[Carrerra]

Originally Posted by wearethefuture

I would imagine in the corner behind the stands, maybe a bit like what is shown in that concept render, although it looks like he has put executive boxes there instead. The top tier (supported by collums in corners), as i would imagine, would have to be as close (in terms of height) as it can possibly be to the one below it.

Surely these renders are nothing more than purely conceptual, and just done by a fan. I would love to see something like this, mainly due to its unique characteristics, but sadly i do not see this happening. If you think about the viewing angles i think these wouldn't work, as you wouldn't be able to see the nearest touchline to you in certain areas, ie. the corner of the second tier.

They could maybe take away small sections off the backs of the curving stands to make them more suitable for expansion with a new tier (which i am guessing is the only way of increasing capacity.

As you say space is really tight on site, so there would have to be some kind of serious overhang (a tier hanging directly over the one underneath it) in order to achieve the 20,000 increase being talked about, i don't think the design on this page addresses this enough for me and hasn't been thoroughly thought out enough if were to be official.

I can explain more in detail if need be, but i think if u moved the whole of the top tier down quite a fair bit, so as the very last row of seats, at the very back of each stand can just about see the touchline on the farside.

Great explanations! wearethefuture, are you an architect or did you major in architecture at college?

[wearethefuture]

Lol I'm not an architect or studying it (although i was planning on it at one point), i study photography infact. I am just a massive fan of architecture and stadiums in general and have always try to think about the logistics of the designs produced. When i was younger i would always design stadiums (just for fun ) and the main factor that needed to be taken into consideration is the viewing angle. For example; if you have a three tiered stand 99% of the time the third tier will be a lot steeper than the bottom one, this is so that the people in the top tier can see the nearest touchline or lane of running track etc.

Another thing that needs to be taken into consideration, and is very apparent in this case with the Velodrome, are where the fans enter the stand, how they get to the tier, and where they would then exit/enter the stand from and to the concourse, to the steps and then on to their seat. In this case i believe the stair wells would have to be in the corners (as space is tight behind the stands and are not likely to go through the tier below), and the exit/entrances to seats would most likely be low in the tier due to space and support. If this expansion does happen it will be the most interesting stadium expansion i think i have seen (although there are some incredible engineering examples by some of these expanded NFL stadiums), this may have to be some cutting edge architecture and technology to see this expansion become reality.

[Carrerra]

Originally Posted by wearethefuture

Lol I'm not an architect or studying it (although i was planning on it at one point), i study photography infact. I am just a massive fan of architecture and stadiums in general and have always try to think about the logistics of the designs produced. When i was younger i would always design stadiums (just for fun ) and the main factor that needed to be taken into consideration is the viewing angle. For example; if you have a three tiered stand 99% of the time the third tier will be a lot steeper than the bottom one, this is so that the people in the top tier can see the nearest touchline or lane of running track etc.

Another thing that needs to be taken into consideration, and is very apparent in this case with the Velodrome, are where the fans enter the stand, how they get to the tier, and where they would then exit/enter the stand from and to the concourse, to the steps and then on to their seat. In this case i believe the stair wells would have to be in the corners (as space is tight behind the stands and are not likely to go through the tier below), and the exit/entrances to seats would most likely be low in the tier due to space and support. If this expansion does happen it will be the most interesting stadium expansion i think i have seen (although there are some incredible engineering examples by some of these expanded NFL stadiums), this may have to be some cutting edge architecture and technology to see this expansion become reality.

You deserve to be an amateur architect

[Vilak]

Thank you wearethefuture for your explaination.
Hope to hear more of you in the french stadium threads.

You talk about technological records made for some NFL stadiums.
I don't think that for 140 millions Euros, we'll see surhuman technologies appointed to the Velodrome expansion.

What woulld you do, you wearethefuture, if you were asked to design a project to expand this stadium to 80.000?

[wearethefuture]

Well it's definitely a tough one. From what i have seen of the official looking models of a top tier that sweeps above the ones below would be the most efficient way of adding extra capacity. Whether or not is possible i am not sure, effectively they are putting a 20,000 stadium on top of another one, which is most likely to be held up and supported in the corners (although as i have said before, it could be possible to take away some of the seats at the back of the stands that are allready there to provide extra support for the top tier). I don't think i have ever seen such a construction of a floating stadium before, although the way the Santiago Bernabau has been extended over the years has been very ingenious.



The first way i would go about adding extra capacity to the stadium would be to address the covered (main) stand. I would remove the roof and top tier for a start. I'd then extend it either side so that the executive boxes reach all the ways to the corners (as can be seen in the image above they stop at each goal line). I would then add the largest tier that would possibly fit (thus reducing the amount of capacity that would be needed to be added at other parts of the stadium) above the executive boxes (to replace the small one taken away) and extend that all the way to left and to the right as far as it would go, it could even have a slight curve at the back of the tier to complete the overall look of the Velodrome. I think this could add around about 10,000 if done correctly.

Then to gain the other 10,000 would be much more difficult and complex. There are, as far as i can see two ways of going about this. Either take away the less permanent curving extensions that are currently there, and replace them with a new large tier that sweeps around 3/4 of the stadium. Or add a new smaller tier that has be seen in the models and discussed before.

Either way i think extending the main (covered) stand, up to the corners and adding a new tier would be the first phase of the expansion that you would imagine to take place. How would you go about it?

[Neda Say]

Originally Posted by wearethefuture

Well it's definitely a tough one. From what i have seen of the official looking models of a top tier that sweeps above the ones below would be the most efficient way of adding extra capacity. Whether or not is possible i am not sure, effectively they are putting a 20,000 stadium on top of another one, which is most likely to be held up and supported in the corners (although as i have said before, it could be possible to take away some of the seats at the back of the stands that are allready there to provide extra support for the top tier). I don't think i have ever seen such a construction of a floating stadium before, although the way the Santiago Bernabau has been extended over the years has been very ingenious.



The first way i would go about adding extra capacity to the stadium would be to address the covered (main) stand. I would remove the roof and top tier for a start. I'd then extend it either side so that the executive boxes reach all the ways to the corners (as can be seen in the image above they stop at each goal line). I would then add the largest tier that would possibly fit (thus reducing the amount of capacity that would be needed to be added at other parts of the stadium) above the executive boxes (to replace the small one taken away) and extend that all the way to left and to the right as far as it would go, it could even have a slight curve at the back of the tier to complete the overall look of the Velodrome. I think this could add around about 10,000 if done correctly.

Then to gain the other 10,000 would be much more difficult and complex. There are, as far as i can see two ways of going about this. Either take away the less permanent curving extensions that are currently there, and replace them with a new large tier that sweeps around 3/4 of the stadium. Or add a new smaller tier that has be seen in the models and discussed before.

Either way i think extending the main (covered) stand, up to the corners and adding a new tier would be the first phase of the expansion that you would imagine to take place. How would you go about it?

Your words make a lot of sense, the covered stand is currently the smallest. I personally consider that 10000 more seats would put this stadium up there with the best of them if the roof and amenities do follow. Would you make it ball like with an inclined roof! I think it would look sleek.