Terraces vs. All-seaters

[michał_]

Originally Posted by Republica

Theres a reason for the over zealous stewards - nearly 100 people were killed at Hillsbrough.

I do think its gone a bit too far though now. Afterall, it has become clear that while standing back then was dangerous, it was in fact the police's fault.

So bring back standing in the German style.

Claiming Hillsbrough was the fault of terracing is so untrue. It was, as you said yopurself, a combination of factors with prime role of match policing. Similar things may happen, as bigbossman mentioned, in seated stadiums. Do you think all African stadiums where stampedes occured had terraces? Not at all. And let's not forget - it was still an incident. Huge tragedy in terms of scale, but incidental in terms of frequency.

I actually feel that current situation in England has very little to do with those times, it's about forcing/imposing comfort. And comfort equals richer customers - you all know the story of ticket prices differing between year to year.

[Sagaris]

Sitting at football matches?

This isnt the opera. Both terraces and seats can do the job, as long as nobody is actually sitting.

[scukaf]

my butt likes seats

[vernon]

The reason why terracing isn't allowed in England is because of money and money only. They just use safety concerns as an excuse, because in Germany, terracing has not caused any problems. Who is going to pay more for tickets? Those who want to stand and create atmosphere or the corporate/family types who want to have a nice day out peacefully watching sport? The latter of course.

[JimB]

It's so sad to see how the atmosphere at games in England has deteriorated so dramatically.

English grounds used to be among the most intimidating in European football (if not THE most intimidating). After Spurs had beaten Slovan Bratislava 6-0 in the second leg of a European Cup Winners' Cup tie in 1963, Slovan's manager said, "I envy Spurs their supporters. We have never played before such a crowd. It affected our players".

And that sentiment was echoed by all clubs who played against Spurs back in those days. They all wilted in the face of the ferocity and noise generated by the Spurs crowd and they were almost all heavily beaten as a result.

This 2008-09 season, Spurs have played at home against two more eastern European teams - Wisla Kracow and Dinamo Zagreb. And how things have changed. On both occasions, Spurs fans were totally put to shame by the passion and non stop singing of the away teams' fans.

We have forgotten, in England, what it is to support your team. Such a shame.

And all seater stadia are to blame.

[michał_]

Originally Posted by JimB

This 2008-09 season, Spurs have played at home against two more eastern European teams - Wisla Kracow and Dinamo Zagreb. And how things have changed. On both occasions, Spurs fans were totally put to shame by the passion and non stop singing of the away teams' fans.

[...]

And all seater stadia are to blame.

To be frank, Wisla also has an all-seater So does Dinamo, as far as I know. So it's the scope of application then, not the sole fact. And I'm afraid both teams in mention will go the English way with new Henryk Reyman Stadium and Stadion Kajzerica, sadly. I think that, as much as we're simply unable to fight economy and most probably the mainstream media pushing to "go English", we should look for a safe compromise for Central and Southern/Eastern Europe, like Germany. I think that's the best we can get in the long run... though it pains me too.

PS: I must say I was pretty surprised with the chants by Tottenham in London, in the negative way. But my biggest surprise was the fact that after the game, in Poland some media were talking about... horrible behaviour of Polish supporters in England, opposing our "violent and hostile" chanting to the Yid Army's class (I guess a journalist won't hear and see all the "w#nkers" sitting in front of his tv). That makes me feel with morons like these setting the level of public debate, we're just bound to go the English way.

[Republica]

What happened at Tottenham?

Yeh I know that standing wasnt responsible for Hillsbrough, but seating was introduced for safety, theres no doubt about that. However now it has become apparent that it wasnt the tarracing that couased the problem, we need to move back to standing like Germany. I'm not sure how money is responsible - safe standing in areas of the pitch would increase capacity in stadiums and people could then choose between standing, seating and the corporate boxes/ridiculous corporate tiers. That way they can maximise the profits from all comers through price differentiation.

Incidentally, there are areas in most grounds where people stand a lot of the time and arent told to sit. Some grounds are more heavy handed than others.

[michał_]

Originally Posted by Republica

What happened at Tottenham?

I'm not sure how money is responsible - safe standing in areas of the pitch would increase capacity in stadiums and people could then choose between standing, seating and the corporate boxes/ridiculous corporate tiers. That way they can maximise the profits from all comers through price differentiation.

Incidentally, there are areas in most grounds where people stand a lot of the time and arent told to sit. Some grounds are more heavy handed than others.

1. If the Tottn'am question is for me: I'm not a common away game follower, but I have been to a few games and must say I've nver seen that much hostility towards our crowd, neither from away fans in Krakow. I guess it was nothing special in terms of lengauge, but surely I didn't expect the massive exposition of "w@nking" gestures and a few others. And it surely isn't how Polish press picture English fans :P

2. I guess what you say sounds sensible for us but then again "sfae standing standards" don't earn stadiums as much capacity as the "old-days" terraces. Plus, clubs would still have to make some stratification and price these tickets relatively lower if not significantly lower than others. After all football in Britain is really expensive right now (some clubs at least)

[FlyingDutchman]

In the Netherlands seating area's are coming back. Heerenveen was first a couple of years ago and last year my favourite team NAC Breda had got 500 standing places at one of the sides behind the goal (Vak G). This year the other stand behind the goal (B-Side) also got standing places (we were already standing but on or before the seats.) Also some clubs are investigating it, or have the away end is terraces.

After a couple of games in the new season, I now know again what the big difference is with seaters. Standing is so much better!

[bigbossman]

You haven't lived until you have been involved in a 10,000 person cascade down a flight of concrete steps...

Does anyone know the ratio of standing to sitting. It must be somewhere between 2-3 standies to one person sitting. That would still make standing @ the big london clubs grossley expensive. If it's 40 for the cheapest seat at Arsenal then it will be around £13-20 to stand, which is still a rip off.

[Republica]

Originally Posted by michał_

1. If the Tottn'am question is for me: I'm not a common away game follower, but I have been to a few games and must say I've nver seen that much hostility towards our crowd, neither from away fans in Krakow. I guess it was nothing special in terms of lengauge, but surely I didn't expect the massive exposition of "w@nking" gestures and a few others. And it surely isn't how Polish press picture English fans :P

2. I guess what you say sounds sensible for us but then again "sfae standing standards" don't earn stadiums as much capacity as the "old-days" terraces. Plus, clubs would still have to make some stratification and price these tickets relatively lower if not significantly lower than others. After all football in Britain is really expensive right now (some clubs at least)

The wanker gesture means nothing... You'll get that at every game if you look for the people doing it. usually after a goal.

[2005]

As me and my mate's at University always used to say whilst in Warrington "You get dickheads anywhere you"

[spud]

speaking of warrington...warrington RLFC have a new stadium that has both seating and terreraces...

terracing was'nt the problem,poor stewarding & policing was.

[Huskies]

Originally Posted by Chimaera

Well, you could put an extra step on every row, thus doubling the number of rows and reducing them from lets say 80x40 to 40x20 in depth and height. But I don't know whether the structure could hold the extra weight.

Simply removing the seats would create an unsafe situation. The other way round is possible though: that's what was done in my club's stadium around 15 years ago, they transformed standing to seating, just by installing seats every two rows.

why would it be unsafe ? if each row is 40 cm high and 80 deep , if you remove the seats and put in some of those terrace support bows ( the small fences scatterd around you can lean on , dont know what to cal lthem) you have a perfectly fine temporary terrace right ?

im designing an indoor arena as a school project and im making it an all seater - but alot of people want to stand at hockey games in sweden , so i thought this would be an easy way of converting between seating and terracing...

[Patrick]

just to show that terracing is still modern:

this is the newly renovated stadium (Stadion an der Alten Försterei) of FC Union Berlin (2. Bundesliga), which will be opened tomorrow with a friendly against Hertha BSC Berlin. The small main stand will be rebuilt next summer break, in 2010.




This is how it looked before renovation

[bigbossman]

Bring back terracing I say. It rocks!!

Originally Posted by Huskies

why would it be unsafe ? if each row is 40 cm high and 80 deep , if you remove the seats and put in some of those terrace support bows ( the small fences scatterd around you can lean on , dont know what to cal lthem) you have a perfectly fine temporary terrace right ?

They are called crush barriers as far as i know.

[nyrmetros]

Terracing for the USA!

[Luke80]

All-seater but still being allowed the opportunity to stand in certain places. It stays safe.

[HendrX]

In modern oval stadiums it doesn't look good. In some older type stadiums with seperate stands (north east south west) it looks really good!

[Alix_D]

I stand on a terrace every week. People should get the choice.

Originally Posted by Calvin W

How soon one forgets all the tragic deaths from the not so distant past.

Tragic deaths which were caused by a combination of factors, of which terracing was a minor one.