Barça’s new Camp Nou to rise out of the current structure

FC Barcelona’s Camp Nou stadium holds the distinction of being the largest stadium in Europe with a seating capacity of 99,786. Now Barça has set its eye on making the stadium even bigger.

After Barcelona’s board of directors rejected the option of building a new stadium in January this year, the club has decided to remodel Camp Nou over the current structure to bring capacity up to 105,053. The interior construction of the stadium will rise from 40,000 m² to 104,000 m².

The project, being dubbed as the ‘ENEA’, is expected to cost around £495mn (€600mn) with work beginning in 2017 with a completion date of early 2021.

The Camp Nou will continue to consist of three tiers. The first (lowest) will be completely rebuilt, being more vertical and offering much better views. The second will be the same, although some changes will make it more comfortable. And the third (top) tier, which currently only reaches round a section of the full perimeter will be extended to cover the west side of the stadium too.

Due to these changes, slightly wider seats will be possible, and all of the passages will be at least 1.20 metres wide. All of the seats will be protected from the elements by a roof, there will be a new perimeter ring containing different services, a full range of elevators, and the floors, currently on different levels, will be streamlined, thus avoiding the presence of so many unnecessary stairways. The ENEA project will also provide 5,000 parking spaces as well as a whole range of new commercial and operative features.

 

Phases of construction

The construction is being planned in phases. The work will start in 2017 with the demolishing of the South and North Goal terraces.

The whole process will take four summers and three and a half seasons, but Barça officials assure that the football team will be able to continue playing matches in the stadium regardless.

They explained that in order to limit the inconvenience to fans as much as possible, the construction will be done by phases and zones. In the summer, work will be done on the seating areas, and during the football season, the inner and outer sections of the main construction will be developed.

The project is scheduled to be completed by March 2021.

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