TYNECASTLE STADIUM UPGRADE POTENTIAL - UEFA category 4 granted ( updated/merged )

[Watt-Zeefuik]

4 hours ago, soonbe110 said:

But it hasn’t has it?  At the moment we can’t/don’t sell out home fan seats other than games against the OF and the wee team. The urban myth is that we are growing the fan base - we may be growing the number of season tickets sold but not a lot of evidence that the actual number of people attending our games is growing significantly. If we just make the call now that away fans, all of them, only get two sections of Roseburn we have loads of capacity for all games. Might change in the future but none of us know what’s going to happen. 

 

Here's a plot of our average attendances in the past 25 years, roughly in the all-seater era. 2020/2021 isn't listed for obvious reason and the current season is of course limited by early crowd restrictions. (source: https://www.fitbastats.com/hearts/club_records_league_attendance.php)

 

The line goes up and down with our success. But note that current bad years in attendance, even before the expansion, surpass what a good year was in the past.

 

 

 

 

[Watt-Zeefuik]

I just did a bit more fiddling with the data and it's even more noticeable if you look at our minimum attendance along with our maximum attendance. (I've excluded this year for hopefully obvious reasons)

 

Note that in recent years, our minimum attendance outstrips the average attendances from perfectly decent years in the aughts.

 

Hearts support is growing. Not explosively, but steadily.

[CMc]

Redeveloping the wheatfield feels like the only play going forward. 
 

Theres a wee bit more room to expand the footprint (but not much).
 

Guess we have to hope we are in a position where someone (like James Anderson) could put a bid in for the NBD site if they ever leave. Optimistically, it feels buying the site, then re-selling what we don’t need could make sense. Would imagine the land would be worth many millions though and would need someone extremely hearts focused to used that quantity of capital to support the club rather than turn a profit on the land. 
 

How old is the NBD site? Don’t suppose it’ll be becoming obsolete soon? Guess distillation technology hasn’t moved on all that much. 

[soonbe110]

5 hours ago, Led Tasso said:

 

Here's a plot of our average attendances in the past 25 years, roughly in the all-seater era. 2020/2021 isn't listed for obvious reason and the current season is of course limited by early crowd restrictions. (source: https://www.fitbastats.com/hearts/club_records_league_attendance.php)

 

The line goes up and down with our success. But note that current bad years in attendance, even before the expansion, surpass what a good year was in the past.

 

 

 

 

Looks relatively flat to me, probably slight growth over a 25 year period.  There’s nothing in the graph to suggest that our current stadium isn’t big enough for our needs today and for the foreseeable future. A more telling graph would be one showing home support numbers over the same period. 

[kingantti1874]

9 hours ago, Voice of reason said:

I think big screens on the end trusses like the ones at Watford would be a good investment.

big screens done right. All for this.. 

[kingantti1874]

11 minutes ago, soonbe110 said:

Looks relatively flat to me, probably slight growth over a 25 year period.  There’s nothing in the graph to suggest that our current stadium isn’t big enough for our needs today and for the foreseeable future. A more telling graph would be one showing home support numbers over the same period. 

 

5 hours ago, Led Tasso said:

 

Here's a plot of our average attendances in the past 25 years, roughly in the all-seater era. 2020/2021 isn't listed for obvious reason and the current season is of course limited by early crowd restrictions. (source: https://www.fitbastats.com/hearts/club_records_league_attendance.php)

 

The line goes up and down with our success. But note that current bad years in attendance, even before the expansion, surpass what a good year was in the past.

 

 

 

 

21/22 data ?No way have we averaged 15,800 this season

 

Edit: includes the start of the season when no one was allowed in.. 

Edited April 24, 2022 by kingantti1874

[kingantti1874]

https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/scottish-premiership/besucherzahlen/wettbewerb/SC1/saison_id/2021/plus/1
 

 

[johnking123]

16700 this season. Ok, still empty seats to be seen. But still seats sold! We perform well another couple of season and increase ticket sales by 2000. Then we would seriously have to look at expanding 

[Italian Lambretta]

47 minutes ago, johnking123 said:

16700 this season. Ok, still empty seats to be seen. But still seats sold! We perform well another couple of season and increase ticket sales by 2000. Then we would seriously have to look at expanding 

Does that include the sellick game at start of season?

[soonbe110]

1 hour ago, kingantti1874 said:

https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/scottish-premiership/besucherzahlen/wettbewerb/SC1/saison_id/2021/plus/1
 

 

Assuming an average of 1,500 away fans at home games that suggests about 14-15k home fans on average. If we give up 2,000 seats for two sections plus segregation at most for all away fans then there’s at least 2-3k growth still available for home fans before we have a major issue. 

[johnking123]

Will be interesting to see how many take up tickets for next season. Maybe gauge it a bit more then. But do admit that it does take the football team playing well for a few seasons.

[David McCaig]

1 hour ago, kingantti1874 said:

 

21/22 data ?No way have we averaged 15,800 this season

 

Edit: includes the start of the season when no one was allowed in.. 

And the BCD game v Ross County on Boxing Day as well?

[Daveandal]

It looks like our average attendance has grown by about 3k (probably more) in the last 25 years.

 

That's not earth shattering but it shouldn't be dismissed.  The fact is Tynecastle isn't big enough for certain games already (Europe, Hibs, Celtic and Rangers) but its more than big enough for the rest.

 

Given the difficulty and cost of expanding it probably isn't sensible to do it now but with continued growth we will have no option but to expand in the next 10 years or so. We need to start planning and thinking how that is done now. 

[August Landmesser]

18 hours ago, Goldstone Wonder said:

Guildford Jambo’s seat would finally come to pass!

[chrisyboy7]

On 23/04/2022 at 10:09, jbee647 said:

Simple, it’s only a matter of time due to demand that Hibs allocation will be reduced to Old Firm levels

supply and demand will dictate that 

The club simply cant grow with things the way it is.....Lots of people wont be able to attend as the restrictions are there to see.....If you think things are fine then your very small minded.

 

Please dont judge things on a game that against livingston....we had over 17k here.....Also we have just been through a pandemic....this are looking great.....i hope we can extend and have even more season ticket holders at the games...

 

The best we can do is approx 19k at this moment....not good enough 

[chrisyboy7]

6 minutes ago, Daveandal said:

It looks like our average attendance has grown by about 3k (probably more) in the last 25 years.

 

That's not earth shattering but it shouldn't be dismissed.  The fact is Tynecastle isn't big enough for certain games already (Europe, Hibs, Celtic and Rangers) but its more than big enough for the rest.

 

Given the difficulty and cost of expanding it probably isn't sensible to do it now but with continued growth we will have no option but to expand in the next 10 years or so. We need to start planning and thinking how that is done now. 

The club is now in the best position it's ever been in.....It may have grown more if the stadium had allowed...in 2004 just under 21k applied for a season ticket.

[Daveandal]

1 minute ago, chrisyboy7 said:

The club is now in the best position it's ever been in.....It may have grown more if the stadium had allowed...in 2004 just under 21k applied for a season ticket.

Season ticket sales this year will be very interesting. Over 17k would be mightily impressive.

[chrisyboy7]

18 hours ago, Bongo 1874 said:

Spot on 👍👏. 

 

Yes its spot on....we just cant grow and have almost hit our limit already.. Pitty the main stand wasnt a few thousand bigger

[davemclaren]

1 minute ago, chrisyboy7 said:

Yes its spot on....we just cant grow and have almost hit our limit already.. Pitty the main stand wasnt a few thousand bigger

Planning constraints didn’t allow that unfortunately. 

[kila]

4 minutes ago, chrisyboy7 said:

Yes its spot on....we just cant grow and have almost hit our limit already.. Pitty the main stand wasnt a few thousand bigger

You’re like an obsessed Hibby going on about the capacity of our ground throughout multiple threads since we knocked them out the cup…

[LarrysRightFoot]

10 minutes ago, Daveandal said:

Season ticket sales this year will be very interesting. Over 17k would be mightily impressive.

How many can we sell? I’m sure there will be a limit as some must be retained for public match day sales I would think? 

[Jambo92]

One of the reasons ticket sales will be strong is because of the limited capacity. 

If we had a 25,000 seater demand would drop because fans would know they could buy a ticket 1 hour before kick off.

Look at Hibs, zero incentive to purchase a season ticket apart from loyalty, you can wait till Saturday and pick your seat no bother, even better get £5 tickets thrown at you every few months.

 

Our capacity is fine, our stadium is near perfect for the club. If you want to move to some soulless lego stadium out in Gogar just so you can look at 5000 more seats then you need your head checked.

[davemclaren]

19 minutes ago, LarrysRightFoot said:

How many can we sell? I’m sure there will be a limit as some must be retained for public match day sales I would think? 

Why must some be retained? 

[1971fozzy]

2 minutes ago, Jambo92 said:

One of the reasons ticket sales will be strong is because of the limited capacity. 

If we had a 25,000 seater demand would drop because fans would know they could buy a ticket 1 hour before kick off.

Look at Hibs, zero incentive to purchase a season ticket apart from loyalty, you can wait till Saturday and pick your seat no bother, even better get £5 tickets thrown at you every few months.

 

Our capacity is fine, our stadium is near perfect for the club. If you want to move to some soulless lego stadium out in Gogar just so you can look at 5000 more seats then you need your head checked.

100% 👍

 

[LarrysRightFoot]

1 minute ago, davemclaren said:

Why must some be retained? 

I don’t know but I don’t think I’ve ever tried to get tickets for any ground or game where there hasn’t been some kind of public sale whether it be the nou camp or old Trafford. 

[Nookie Bear]

19 minutes ago, Jambo92 said:

One of the reasons ticket sales will be strong is because of the limited capacity. 

If we had a 25,000 seater demand would drop because fans would know they could buy a ticket 1 hour before kick off.

Look at Hibs, zero incentive to purchase a season ticket apart from loyalty, you can wait till Saturday and pick your seat no bother, even better get £5 tickets thrown at you every few months.

 

Our capacity is fine, our stadium is near perfect for the club. If you want to move to some soulless lego stadium out in Gogar just so you can look at 5000 more seats then you need your head checked.

Yep 👍🏻
 

And if you don’t need a ST to guarantee entry then you see it’s St Johnstone at home in the pissing rain…are you really going to go? If you have a ST you go because you want that value for money, if you don’t then no chance are you paying £20+ for it. 
 

Therefore crowds go down 🤷‍♂️

[Thomaso]

21 minutes ago, Jambo92 said:

One of the reasons ticket sales will be strong is because of the limited capacity. 

If we had a 25,000 seater demand would drop because fans would know they could buy a ticket 1 hour before kick off.

Look at Hibs, zero incentive to purchase a season ticket apart from loyalty, you can wait till Saturday and pick your seat no bother, even better get £5 tickets thrown at you every few months.

 

Our capacity is fine, our stadium is near perfect for the club. If you want to move to some soulless lego stadium out in Gogar just so you can look at 5000 more seats then you need your head checked.

Well said! 👏

[LarrysRightFoot]

31 minutes ago, Jambo92 said:

One of the reasons ticket sales will be strong is because of the limited capacity. 

If we had a 25,000 seater demand would drop because fans would know they could buy a ticket 1 hour before kick off.

Look at Hibs, zero incentive to purchase a season ticket apart from loyalty, you can wait till Saturday and pick your seat no bother, even better get £5 tickets thrown at you every few months.

 

Our capacity is fine, our stadium is near perfect for the club. If you want to move to some soulless lego stadium out in Gogar just so you can look at 5000 more seats then you need your head checked.

I agree to an extent but 25000 isn’t a ridiculous increase, the club want to grow and with that the capacity will need to increase at some stage as well. 
 

25k also opens up increased potential for more semi finals, internationals etc. we are in a good place for transport links (parking is obviously poor) but an increased capacity does have benefits. 

 

At the end of day it’ll be wether we can grow our fan base and crowds and take it from there. Edinburghs population is supposedly meant to grow by X% over next decade or so and hopefully we can tap into that. 

[The Mercer Takeover]

24 minutes ago, Nookie Bear said:

Yep 👍🏻
 

And if you don’t need a ST to guarantee entry then you see it’s St Johnstone at home in the pissing rain…are you really going to go? If you have a ST you go because you want that value for money, if you don’t then no chance are you paying £20+ for it. 
 

Therefore crowds go down 🤷‍♂️

There is a major downside to this logic.

 

If all seats are gone, how do you get the next generation into Tynecastle or expand the support further. How do those working shifts or spending much time working away, get to see their team.

 

Growing the support must be a long term objective and if that involves filling in some corners, so be it. We are working wonders in raising FOH cash, all we need now is some big vision on how we spend it.

 

I

[CMc]

54 minutes ago, LarrysRightFoot said:

I don’t know but I don’t think I’ve ever tried to get tickets for any ground or game where there hasn’t been some kind of public sale whether it be the nou camp or old Trafford. 

Those are the biggest stadia in their respective countries though?

[CMc]

3 minutes ago, The Mercer Takeover said:

There is a major downside to this logic.

 

If all seats are gone, how do you get the next generation into Tynecastle or expand the support further. How do those working shifts or spending much time working away, get to see their team.

 

Valid point, but would guess the counter is an effective buy back scheme, cup games and donating STs for schools.

 

Having a waiting list for STs didn’t do us any harm in 2006. 

[tynietigers]

14 minutes ago, The Mercer Takeover said:

There is a major downside to this logic.

 

If all seats are gone, how do you get the next generation into Tynecastle or expand the support further. How do those working shifts or spending much time working away, get to see their team.

 

Growing the support must be a long term objective and if that involves filling in some corners, so be it. We are working wonders in raising FOH cash, all we need now is some big vision on how we spend it.

 

I

Peoples life’s are always changing and although you have a hard core support I bet you there was 2000 different season ticket holders last year 🤔 due to work, family and money 👍🏻

[soonbe110]

41 minutes ago, LarrysRightFoot said:

I agree to an extent but 25000 isn’t a ridiculous increase, the club want to grow and with that the capacity will need to increase at some stage as well. 
 

25k also opens up increased potential for more semi finals, internationals etc. we are in a good place for transport links (parking is obviously poor) but an increased capacity does have benefits. 

 

At the end of day it’ll be wether we can grow our fan base and crowds and take it from there. Edinburghs population is supposedly meant to grow by X% over next decade or so and hopefully we can tap into that. 

Only once in last thirty years has our average home crowd been above 20k - the season we were at Murrayfield. Other than the derby game we virtually never sell out home seats. Not sure there’s demand there yet. 

[upgotheheads]

15 hours ago, davemclaren said:

I think the supposed short lifespan of the 3 older stands is an urban myth. A good 30 years of life left in them I reckon. 

 

I have never heard of a building haveing a predetermined lifespan. There may may some design criteria in a contract that says that the  building has specific materials that can be expected to last a minimum time, for example electrical wiring which is usually around replaced after 30 years, but steel and concrete can last for centuries. There's still some concrete used in Roman buildings  more than 2,000 years old, and there's a lot of prefabs around Edinburgh that were supposed to be a short term solution to the post war housing problems and are still in use 80 years later. 

[maroon66]

Application submitted to the coucil on Friday to erect new screens.

[upgotheheads]

1 minute ago, soonbe110 said:

Only once in last thirty years has our average home crowd been above 20k - the season we were at Murrayfield. Other than the derby game we virtually never sell out home seats. Not sure there’s demand there yet. 

 

I don't think we will need to use Murrayfield this season because of the pitch size,  but it will be interesting to see what our average attendance for European game is next season, especially if we draw some big teams. If we get a really big team we might chose to take it to Murrayfield though.

[Unknown user]

4 minutes ago, upgotheheads said:

 

I have never heard of a building haveing a predetermined lifespan. 

I have, it seems pretty common.

 

I also remember that the Wheatfield was announced to have a 25 year lifespan, which worried me at the time.

[davemclaren]

1 minute ago, Smithee said:

I have, it seems pretty common.

 

I also remember that the Wheatfield was announced to have a 25 year lifespan, which worried me at the time.

Where was that announced, apart from Hibs.net? 🥸

[davemclaren]

3 minutes ago, upgotheheads said:

 

I don't think we will need to use Murrayfield this season because of the pitch size,  but it will be interesting to see what our average attendance for European game is next season, especially if we draw some big teams. If we get a really big team we might chose to take it to Murrayfield though.

Depends when you have to declare your stadium. 

[upgotheheads]

1 minute ago, Smithee said:

I have, it seems pretty common.

 

I also remember that the Wheatfield was announced to have a 25 year lifespan, which worried me at the time.

 

There may be such a thing as a design life, as in the prefabs, but if a building is physically sound then there's no need to stop using it. Even aircraft which are designed to have a predetermined life (but not a deadline), are still used if they can pass inspections. 

Tynecastle is concrete and steel, so it's difficult to see what is going to deteriorate to any serious extent

[upgotheheads]

4 minutes ago, davemclaren said:

Depends when you have to declare your stadium. 

 

Could you declare one and a backup?

[Unknown user]

7 minutes ago, davemclaren said:

Where was that announced, apart from Hibs.net? 🥸

It would have been in the evening news, what with that existing at the time

[Jambo92]

1 hour ago, LarrysRightFoot said:

I agree to an extent but 25000 isn’t a ridiculous increase, the club want to grow and with that the capacity will need to increase at some stage as well. 
 

25k also opens up increased potential for more semi finals, internationals etc. we are in a good place for transport links (parking is obviously poor) but an increased capacity does have benefits. 

 

At the end of day it’ll be wether we can grow our fan base and crowds and take it from there. Edinburghs population is supposedly meant to grow by X% over next decade or so and hopefully we can tap into that. 

 

Yeah I agree in this current situation but Scottish football can change very quickly. 

To get to 25,000 seats were talking tens of millions of £ to achieve which would affect long term playing budget which likely cause us to decline on field and attendances suffer. 

 

What is important is that Hearts implement is a seat resale program, season seats around the stadium empty this season that could be earning club/fans some additional income.

 

[Sarah O]

1 hour ago, Jambo92 said:

One of the reasons ticket sales will be strong is because of the limited capacity. 

If we had a 25,000 seater demand would drop because fans would know they could buy a ticket 1 hour before kick off.

Look at Hibs, zero incentive to purchase a season ticket apart from loyalty, you can wait till Saturday and pick your seat no bother, even better get £5 tickets thrown at you every few months.

 

Our capacity is fine, our stadium is near perfect for the club. If you want to move to some soulless lego stadium out in Gogar just so you can look at 5000 more seats then you need your head checked.

spot on. 

 

Why spunk millions on improvements for the fans who only turn up during the good times.

 

 

[Unknown user]

2 minutes ago, Jambo92 said:

 

What is important is that Hearts implement is a seat resale program, season seats around the stadium empty this season that could be earning club/fans some additional income.

 

We had one, no one used it

[Bongo 1874]

The day hearts have a 30k seater stadium that will allow us to finally challenge the old firm, I can die knowing I've done my bit, for future generations of jambos. 

 

We will only get better and stronger this club is going place's, Scottish football is hopefully getting stronger. 

 

It's the burning desire i have knowing that one day, we can see Hearts win a league with Celtic and Rangers in it. 

 

A packed Tynecastle singing we won the league **** you Rangers we won the league, we won the league we won the league, **** you Celtic we won the league. 

 

Against all odds we showed we could achieve it, this club is special never give up hope, i love this club and would give my last to see it achieve this. 

 

We need to continue to attract more supporters/fans will follow if we can be successful. 

 

 

[Jambo92]

35 minutes ago, Smithee said:

We had one, no one used it

 

When? I've never been aware of one. If it was ages ago then I'd wager it would be much more popular now.

[kingantti1874]

41 minutes ago, Sarah O said:

spot on. 

 

Why spunk millions on improvements for the fans who only turn up during the good times.

 

 

becuase turning those fans into diehards is how a club grows and gets better.  

 

some good points in this thread however - if we ever want to get closer to the old firm then we need bigger crowds, the only way we get bigger crowds is to expand despite the valid negatives.

 

it’s that simple.  We need to have aspirations to grow the club and the audience.  Simple as that

Edited April 24, 2022 by kingantti1874

[Bongo 1874]

2 minutes ago, kingantti1874 said:

becuase turning those fans into diehards is how a club grows and gets better.  
 

thought that would be fairly obvious

We argue we have a different opinion on Robbie etc, but thank you for understanding and getting it. 

[kingantti1874]

7 minutes ago, Bongo 1874 said:

We argue we have a different opinion on Robbie etc, but thank you for understanding and getting it. 

I expanded / amended my post to better explain.  
 

 I understand the points made.. but it if we want to put permanent clear air between ourselves and the rest! And we want to get closer to rangers and Celtic then we literally need to get closer.

 

It’s not even really a point for debate or opinion, if we want to get closer we have to grow the business side of the club.  We can have debate and opinion on when that needs to happen