Heres a rejected stadium, I know Ive brought it up before in the old topic, but this is the new forum!

http://glenorchystadium.tripod.com is a site i very quickly whipped up about it, if you wanna see some more - feel free to have a look and if theres anything more you wanna know, well theres endless possibilities so Im sure you can think of at least ONE way of getting the answer!

Heres an artists drawing of what it wouldve looked like, its not very clear because i printed it off from the newspaper negatives in the library, but its good enough I hope!

It was designed to host the proposed Tasmanian AFL team in the late 90s, and was to have a capacity of 30,000 (all seated, 16,000 undercover) but it fell through in 1998.

It was to be located at the Glenorchy showgrounds, where the greyhound track presently is.

Cmon - surely someone has something to say!!

I'll say something. Ummmmmmmmmm........................

No really it looks a great stadium. Very close to the action. The field itself also looks quite big with deep pockets. It reminds me of York Park.

If Tassie did get a side in the AFL (are there any currenbt plans?) do you think they'd still go ahead with this. Considering how York Park and Bellerive have moved in leaps and bounds, I don't know that they would need to.

I think there have been numerous feasibility studies into a tasmanian AFL team, but it never gets beyond that. If you take into consideration the football clubs with the smallest supporter bases, you have sides such as north melbourne, melbourne and port adelaide which each hover from I think (from memory) 160,000 supporters to about 190? Only one of those sides is in good financial shape right now. Now, take into consideration that Tasmania has a population near 500,000, and is considered to have close to the highest football interest of about 25% of the population (these are figures I have come accross in my travels, unfortunately I never file away all these sources ) then that comes up to 25% of 500,000 = 125,000 people who like aussie rules in the state. Now, if you're gonna run a club that isn't a money pit, you'd need 1 in 4 people interested in football to rock up to each and every game. Absolutely pushing it, only way it could be pulled off is if the club were massively subsidized by the tasmanian government.

I must say though, that stadium does really look like a tidy little development, shame it couldn't be built.

Thankyou Jeffles!

There arent current plans to create a Tasmanian AFL team, but if these Hawthorn and St Kilda matches are really well supported, and we gain even more games a year - say 7 or 8, and they continue to get crowds of 15,000 + as well as the Devils in the VFL being well supported, then it could be a huge chance to go ahead, a very viable option for struggling Victorian clubs. I would think that if the team hosted its 11 home matches a year, 7 matches would be played at York Park and probably 4 at Bellerive. But for this to happen, it would mean that both grounds would need to be upgraded to hold 25,000, which is virtually impossible at Bellerive due to the lack of space behind the stands and the lack of parking (even days at Bellerive when maybe 5 - 6,000 are at the oval its difficult to get a good park) and also floodlights constructed, which is also impossible at Bellerive. So my thought would be to upgrade one of the ovals that doesnt have a cricket pitch but has lots of space to extend into, room for floodlights, good corportate facilities and parking, to hold 25,000. I wont go on about it too much, but possibly KGV in Glenorchy could be upgraded with a bigger grandstand on the main wing with extra corporate facilities to increase capacity to 25,000 with 7,000ish seats (we dont mind standing!) which would resemble something like Princes Park in the old days. Ah yeah anyway, and York Park would just need maybe the extension of the main stand to include the Tyson Stand and southern Stand (plans for this are already underway) to increase capacity to 25,000 and have even more corporate facilities.

Some survey I read said that 50% of the population support football in some form or another - I somehow doubt this figure

In 1996, when this plan was being put forward, Football tasmania did a survey of 730 homes I think, and of those 73% said theyd support a Tasmanian AFL team and of that 73% (about 440 households), 33% (about 150 households) percent said theyd be prepared to become members. Now, Im guessing theres about 150,000 households in the state (thats an estimate that I bet is totally off the mark) which is about 200 times the number of households surveyed - so if 150 out of every 730 households were prepared to become members, thats about 30,000 members - if theres 3 in each household thats 90,000 members. Now due to distance from ground etc. that would have to be more than halved, so we'll say 40,000 members - which might still be a slight exaggeration and if you take into account all my mathematical faults, its probably something like 25-30,000 members. Which is more than enough necessary!

Get a good stadium and a struggling Victorian team and BANG

Unfortunately 730 households just isn't a large enough sample size to go on. We're talking about running an AFL side, which requires upwards of 20 million a year in revenue to run. Don't get me wrong, I dearly want a tasmanian side in the competition, the AFL just isn't a truly national competition until there is a tasmanian side, but entering a side would just be such a huge gamble that not many are willing to take now. I mean, either footscary or north will probably go under in a couple of years, replacing them with a risky venture just doesn't make sense.

Having victorian sides play in tasmania is a great idea though. I'd imagine that it brings alot of people over from melbourne to see the games which is great for the tasmanian economy, and it's risk free for them for the most part. If Tasmania could secure 6 games of home and away season AFL per year, say 2 Hawthorn, 2 st kilda and another club or 2 willing to do it, then you've got a pretty good solid apckage of football for tasmanians, and something of that size can be marketted to the public to improve interest in a tasmanian side. Maybe in 10 years who knows.

Too right about the cost of running an AFL team, and it's a pity as well. One idea I once heard of was a half merger, similar to Fitzroy and Brisbane, except home games are evenly shared. Take for instance North Melbourne were suffering terribly off field, and do merged with a new Tasmanian club - 6 home games a year in Tasmania (4 Launceston 2 Hobart Id be guessing) and 6 in Melbourne. Include away games in Melbourne into the Victorian membership package (similar to what Hawthorn is doing) and you have 2 big supporter bases who will support the team at any cost, money coming in evenly from 2 different states and a good mix of players. Training base could be a problem though, maybe Flinders Island or somewhere

But, if they manage 25,000 at all 6 home matches in Tas (150,000) and 35,000 at the 6 matches in Melbourne (210,000) then that equals anything of any other interstate side

Good idea Marcus. That's like the current NRL merged sides St George-Illawarra and Wests Tigers. The clubs and fans get the best of both worlds, albeit in an unusual situation.

Now the next step is to get that through Jacksons thick noggin

good luck, that man doesn't know sh*t from clay. not the person to be at the helm of the what was the greatest sporting league in the world. btw, nice looking stadium, would've been good to have seen a tassie team in the "national" league

The WA Government actualy own the Two afl clubs aswell as the WAFL this is owned through the WA Football Comission and they own the EAGles and the DOckers and thats why we dont have members elected onto boards as the team is not owned by the members. So quite literally you pay your membership to the government another hidden tax, Anyway they need it, The comission is 30 million dollars in debt as although the Governement paid for SUbi it came out of the football comission budget, the government could erase the debt but chooses not too and so is crippling young footballers aspirations to the AFL. Only one WA player drafted this year.

So is it or is it not a good idea for a government to run a football club?

I would think that Football Tasmania (sorry, AFL Tasmania )would run any Tasmanian team, theyre run by the government. Even though traditionally Tasmanian premiers and indeed whole governments have had lifelong involvements in the sport

Hmm thats a hard one, the dockers and the eagles will always be around due to the fact the government owns them. But really for members and fans its not veyr good as they have no say in football at there clubs. The football commission apoints board members and they make the decisions and the members have to live with it. The eagles are the most profitable side in the competition in terms of profit It just they have to give so much money to the Football comission and keeps little for the running of the club. While the Dockers losses are governmental losses so really theres no implications on the football club when there 1 million in debt because the Footy Commision will prompt them up. Its a hard thing to decide and I think for the time being the State Government should maintain ownership over the eagles and dockers.

Interesting call you make Egan. I thought you were an Eagles fan. Basically what you've said is that you like the current situation AT THE MOMENT. Yet at the moment the Eagles are basically subsidising the Dockers.

As the Eagles make money, the Dockers lose it. They have the same owner. Where's the first place the Football Commission would look to when making up the losses be (before aasking the governement)? Their other big profit making asset. Like I said. Interesting call when you think about it.