Your New Stadium - Would you want Safe Standing?

Hi all,

As I'm sure you're aware, the Taylor Report that followed the tragedy at Hillsborough in 1989 made it law that all stadia in the top two divisions of English football had to become all-seater stadia. In the 23 years since then, dozens of new stands and stadia have been built to replace old terracing and old stands have been converted to all seater, parts of Blundell Park included.

However, what has become clear since then is that not everybody believes that the all-seater model was the right way to go. Up and down the country, thousands of fans stand in seated areas and many would argue that the atmosphere suffers when fans are forced to sit. What the FSF argue is that in abolishing standing at grounds, football went the wrong way. What should have happened is that the authorities should have taken lessons from Germany.

In the Bundesliga, every ground has safe standing areas. Tightly controlled in terms of ticketing, with crush barriers at regular intervals and all of a modern design, these areas are safe, atmospheric and above all cheap. As part of a tour of Germany I will be going on in February, I intend to go to the match between FC Nurnberg and Hannover 96. The cost of a standing ticket? €12. Compare that with the cost of a top flight ticket in England.

The idea of reintroducing the choice for clubs to provide standing or seated accommodation is one that seems to be growing, with Derby, Aston Villa and now Peterborough throwing their hats into the ring regarding introducing it as an option; the latter has already offered itself as a pilot with the banning of its two terraced ends becoming imminent.

What I would like to know is, what are the views regarding safe standing on The Fishy? A new stadium for Grimsby appears to be drawing closer, would you welcome safe standing areas at the new ground if they were offered? Would you use them?

Feedback would be appreciated.

Standing will never be safe, we could have a repeat of hillsborough or heysel could even have another ibrox where many youngsters died including 5 mates from the same street, but it gets more people in but at a dangerous cost, i am sitting on the fence for this one

Of course standing can be safe and I believe clubs should be allowed to have it back. As long as each step has barriers all the way along and only a set amount are allowed in stand there is zero chance of a crush. It is a lot more safe than going to games were fans stand up all game and can fall over the back of seats when celebrating.

I never sit anyway lol, for as long as they have a certain capacity and keep to that, I don't see why not. Wasn't Aston Villa on about a standing corner at some point in the last 2 years? sure I heard something about it. Maybe just my imagination lol.

Yes. And after witnessing the state of standing at the Stone Roses recently, I know where I feel safer. Standing didn't make Hillsborough unsafe, fences and bad policing did.

I am an old git and like a seat , the bigger the better,

BUT

I understand why some want to stand,

It would be a good idea if a small section could be a standing area at the front of each stand.

Even if we get back to the championship we will have a couple of years to change them back to seating area's

Quoted from aaron rattray

Standing will never be safe, we could have a repeat of hillsborough or heysel could even have another ibrox where many youngsters died including 5 mates from the same street, but it gets more people in but at a dangerous cost, i am sitting on the fence for this one

balderdash. those disasters were not caused by standing. lack of control and bad policing/stewarding and perimeter fencing were mostly at fault. safe standing works fine in germany.

standing at a festival or gig is more dangerous than standing at football

Save standing would work at Blandford Park, If all their fans turned up there would still be 6ft* between them.


*6ft is just under 2 meters for the young ones!

Quoted from aaron rattray

Standing will never be safe, we could have a repeat of hillsborough or heysel could even have another ibrox where many youngsters died including 5 mates from the same street, but it gets more people in but at a dangerous cost, i am sitting on the fence for this one

Liverpool fans weren't entirely blameless for Hillsborough were they?

Quoted from Grantham_Mariner

Save standing would work at Blandford Park, If all their fans turned up there would still be 6ft* between them.


*6ft is just under 2 meters for the young ones!

safe nuclear missile testing would work better