Old Trafford transformation plans in the wind

Article posted by Coliseum, July 30^th, 2024

Image: Coliseum GSVA

The Premier League team Manchester United F.C. is planning to replace their home ground – the Old Trafford in England (UK) – with a 100,000-seater stadium.

‘KHELNOW’ stated that ‘The Red Devils’ could start construction of the Old Trafford by the end of this year. However, nothing is concrete as yet and the club is yet to arrive at a decision on whether to build a new stadium or redevelop the Old Trafford before the end of the year.

The Manchester United are planning to build a new stadium and developing more seats around 100,000 which will see the Old Trafford become the largest arena in the United Kingdom.

The Old Trafford Regeneration Task Force has suggested that it will be a better option to transform the stadium rather than redevelop the existing ground.

The Manchester United Football Club, commonly referred to as Man United (often stylized as Man Utd) or simply United, is a professional football club based in Old Trafford, Greater Manchester, England (UK). The club competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football.

The Old Trafford is a football stadium in Old Trafford, Greater Manchester, England (UK) and the home of the Manchester United F.C. With a capacity of 74,310, it is the largest club football stadium (and second-largest football stadium overall after the 90,000-capacity Wembley Stadium in Wembley) in the United Kingdom and the 12th-largest in Europe.

The Old Trafford Regeneration Task Force was created in March this year to explore options for regenerating the Old Trafford area of Greater Manchester with the development of a world-class football stadium at the heart of the project.

The objective of the ‘Old Trafford Regeneration Task Force’ is to bring together the local leaders and the national experts to examine how stadium development can support renewal of an area of the City with rich industrial history and huge potential for the future and deliver social and economic benefits for the entire region.

‘KHELNOW’ further stated that so far, the club has held four meetings regarding the rebuilding of the Old Trafford and it will see the stadium built on the club-owned land adjacent to the Old Trafford and elevate the community.

However, a final decision is yet to be taken on the building of the Old Trafford, but it is seen as the perfect way to make the arena a world-class venue with surprising benefits.

The United also own an amount of land around Old Trafford and feel it should be remodeled into housing, leisure, business, education, driving investment and jobs, and improving the environment.

The club has been looking for ideas on how to build a perfect stadium and one of the venues that has provided the best idea has been the 70,000-capacity SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles, US.

Since then, they have held plenty of meetings in order to embark on the development which has been privately-funded in the lead-up to their tour and learn from the project.

Collette Roche, United’s Chief Operating Officer, visited the LaLiga team Real Madrid CF’s home ground – the 85,000-capacity Santiago Bernabéu Stadium in Madrid, Spain, to take some suggestions in order to build an ideal stadium. Also, the National Football League (NFL) team Chicago Bears’ Burnham Park (a public park located in Chicago, Illinois, US) Project is another stadium where the club has been extracting lessons to build a wider area.

The Burnham Park concept is about not replicating the old facility (the Chicago Bears home ground – the 61,500-capacity Soldier Field in Chicago) but creating a modern stadium within the confines of the historic structure – juxtaposing the historic colonnades against a contemporary steel-and-glass stadium with an asymmetrical shape, featuring four levels of skybox suites and club seating on one side and cantilevered grandstand seating on the other.

The club under the Co-Owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe has been moving seriously with all the changes happening and now their focus will be on building a new stadium after what transpired last season when there a leaky roof turned it into the Old Trafford waterfall.

The United are set to study various stadiums in the hope of making one of the best stadiums in the United Kingdom and reports are claiming that if the club starts building the stadium this year it will take up to six years to construct the arena.

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