Arsenal stadium plans to overtake Spurs would cost ‘hundreds of millions’

Arsenal facing a set of monumental challenges to expand the Emirates and make their stadium one of the largest in the world. Premier League – including the installation of an entirely new roof – but leading architects insist “anything is possible”.

Co-president Josh Kroenke lit a match for fans’ hopes when he revealed internal discussions were underway.

Stadium size and maximizing ticket sales and match revenue are becoming increasingly important as clubs operate on tight financial margins.

Arsenal also wants to capitalize on the success of Mikel Arteta bring the club back to regular Premier League title contenders and Champions League pillars.

One ambitious option under discussion is adding 20,000 seats, but that means “basically you’re adding another small stadium on top,” Nick Tyrer, associate director at architects BDP Pattern and lead designer on the project. Everton’s new Bramley-Moore Dock stadiumtell The paper i.

And “there are countless challenges to make the Emirates one of the largest stadiums in the country,” says his colleague Jon-Scott Kohli, director of architecture at the BDP.

The logistics of expanding a stadium, which was already an architectural feat when it was installed in a very congested area of ​​central London, is 30 percent complex.

“It’s efficient, it all fits together like a nice puzzle,” says Tyrer. “It’s impressive what they were able to do on this cramped site, but the problem with a puzzle that fits together well is that as soon as you want to make big changes, it’s difficult.

“One of the big challenges is to have a sleek roof that is supported in eight places, I think. The entire roof rests on these eight points and if you want to do any expansion you need to remove the structure that is blocking you, but the only way to do this is to remove the roof and install a new roof more wide.

A roof tends to be the most expensive part of a stadium’s construction costs, Tyrer says, and while there are various architectural tricks for improving it, the most cost-effective decision would probably be to build a new one .

“If it’s removing and replacing that, let’s say it’s a new roof, you’re building the new roof on an 80,000 capacity stadium,” Tyrer adds. “You’re talking about the realm of a new project, a new stadium from that point of view.”

There is technology to raise the existing roof while new seats are added, but the problem remains that where the existing columns are located will block the view of the new seats.

And Arsenal may have to borrow an idea from their north London rivals to make it work. Tension rings stretched by a network of cables and subjected to gravity hold many modern stadium roofs in place.

“They work a bit like a bicycle wheel,” says Kohli. “But whereas the bicycle wheel has all the spokes converging in the center, if you can imagine a ring and all the spokes going into the ring.”

Tyrer adds: “It’s the same style of roof as the one at Tottenham. It is mainly the cables that constitute the main structural element, as opposed to your trusses and other elements.

The scale of this work would require an expansion that would take more than a year.

And Arsenal will also have to take into consideration that Emirates’ current roof is designed to accommodate height restrictions imposed by planning authorities when it was built. They would have to justify the increase in height.

The Emirates was the second largest stadium in the Premier League when it opened in July 2006. It cost £390 million. But it has since been overtaken by Tottenham build a new £1.2 billion ground, Western Ham move into the London Stadium and Liverpool expanding Anfield to 61,276.

They will slide further down the ability chart when Manchester City complete an expansion of the Etihad. Newcastle United And Chelsea are considering expansions or building new houses.

Transforming the Emirates into an 80,000-seat facility would exceed Manchester UnitedOld Trafford’s current ability tops the Premier League. It can accommodate 74,310 fans, although plans are being drawn up to either expand the existing venue or build a new stadium.

Nonetheless, based on current figures, this would place the enlarged Emirates behind only Wembleythe national football stadium with a capacity of 90,000, and Twickenham, the 82,000 seat stadium of the national rugby team.

If Arsenal chooses to increase capacity, the cost would likely run into “hundreds of millions”, says Kohli. “You’re almost building another stadium, but you’re building it in the air, so you have all the structure and accommodation that will get you there, as well as everything the council needs for transport.”

It took a lot of negotiations with local authorities for the Emirates to see the light of day. One of the biggest spends on local infrastructure was agreeing to fund a new £60m recycling center on Lough Road.

Arsenal have pledged to invest £1m in local sports facilities after speaking out against initial plans to build a club sports centre. The club also built 3,000 homes in the area, saying 40 percent were affordable housing.

Arsenal had also agreed to fund the upgrade of Holloway Road and Drayton Park stations, costing a total of £7.6 million, but the overall works required proved too expensive and Transport for London instead agreed to pay for the reconstruction of other stations.

Unable to facilitate travel for so many people, Holloway Road and Drayton Park only became post-match exits on match days. This may need to be revisited as part of new plans.

Kohli shows a 3D model of the stadium and its surroundings and points out the existing bridges over the railway tracks that connect the stadium on two sides, as well as the roads that bring fans in and out of the stadium.

“In real terms we are talking about increasing the capacity of the stadium by a third, so all these bridges and exits on these streets will be X meters wide, we still need a third of that to get people out stadium safely,” Kohli said.

“You’re looking at new bridges and platforms across the rail areas. When you start to take that into account, you’re doing very important structural work and you’re basically building new bridges and pieces of the city to keep it connected and you’re improving transportation infrastructure and whatever else the council requires of you because you You’ve made your stadium even taller, it’s not a small project.

“Such an expansion is not just about expanding the stadium, but about changing the entire neighborhood to be able to handle this influx of people. A lot of money was invested in upgrading the Metro facilities when the stadium opened, so you can expect that kind of investment again into what’s already there.

It is believed that Arsenal will start by evaluating and building a business case for the more ambitious options – with the 20,000 expansion being the height of those – and will more likely land somewhere in between.

Arsenal have a waiting list of over 100,000 people for season tickets, but most clubs move away from substantially increasing season ticket availability when more seats are installed.

Individual tickets for matches are sold at a much higher price and fans who buy them tend to spend more money, on merchandise, food and drinks, than regular spectators.

And the Emirates’ hospitality spaces are ripe for expansion, architects say.

“What’s changed over the last 20 years are trends in hospitality,” says Tyrer. “The changing demographics, the way people want to spend their money.

“We are moving away from traditional hospitality. It’s something quite anchored in the existing stadium. The full middle floor of lounges and the full ring of dressing rooms at the rear. Arsenal are taking advantage of their location in central London and many corporate clients are willing to come. This is great for revenue.

“This is where the club could potentially benefit the most from some form of expansion. Something Tottenham does well, something we do at the new Everton stadium: changing the way you approach experiences and spaces.

“Maybe you could do this in the Emirates in a simple way. As sports venues become more and more numerous, they are used every working day rather than once a fortnight. Expand the stadium more from an accommodation point of view and not a capacity point of view.

“You could introduce different experiences, lounges, even a lobby, allowing them to break away from the current system and move towards something a little more dynamic and flexible.”

Kohli adds: “What we learned from working with Everton is that the driving was much more sophisticated. Once you had general admission seating, a corporate box, and maybe an extra lounge with the director’s box. A couple of options for how you might experience the game.

“We now realize that stadiums are in competition with street experiences – bars and restaurants, clubs, other event venues. There is a real desire to create this type of experience in stadiums.

“Everyone is different. Some want to sit in the same seat with the same people, like they have been doing for 10 years. There are others who want to come once a year, splurge for their birthday and bring all their friends. The best stadiums take care of these and everything else.

“It seems like a better return on investment for Arsenal to think of their stadium this way. Maybe they don’t need that many seats like this, but they have to work with what they have. They could probably generate better revenue and a better fan experience by changing things like that without needing to upgrade to a larger stadium size.

But if Arsenal want to go all out and significantly increase their capacity, it’s unlikely anything will be able to stop them.

“You need time, money and political will,” says Kohli. “If they have all three, then absolutely.”