Emirates Stadium

Emirates Stadium

Ashburton Grove
Former names	Ashburton Grove
Standort	Islington, London
Owner	Arsenal FC
Operator	London Borough of Islington & Arsenal
Capacity	60,000
Surface	Grass (113 × 76 metres)
Bauwesen
Opened	July 2006 (planned)
Closed	n/a
Construction cost	£390 million
Architect	HOK Sport
Tenants
Arsenal FC

The Emirates Stadium is a football stadium currently under construction, for Arsenal Football Club in Ashburton Grove, Islington, north London, England. It was informally known as Ashburton Grove before a naming rights deal with the airline Emirates was announced, and that name is still used by some people. The stadium is scheduled to open in July 2006, and will have an all-seated capacity of 60,000, making it the second largest stadium in the Premiership after Manchester United's Old Trafford, and the third largest sports stadium of any kind in London after Wembley Stadium and Twickenham. The overall cost of the project is £390 million, but not all of this is for the actual construction of the stadium.^[1]

The Stadium

The stadium will be a three-tiered bowl with roofing over the stands but not over the pitch. It is designed by HOK Sport (who also designed the Telstra Stadium and the new Wembley Stadium) and the construction is being performed by Sir Robert McAlpine. It is located on the site of the former Ashburton Grove industrial estate, several hundred yards from Arsenal's current stadium Highbury. It sits between Holloway Road and Arsenal Tube stations on the Piccadilly Line; Drayton Park station on the First Capital Connect line is also close by.

Emirates Stadium from a distance showing overall scale and shape

The upper and lower tiers of the stadium will be "standard seating", while the middle tier known as the "club tier" will be premium priced corporate seating. There will be 6,700 seats at this level, which are being sold on multi-year licences. The cost of club tier seats for 2006-07 ranges from £2,500 to £4,750 per season including VAT. This covers admission to 19 league games and any home games Arsenal play in the UEFA Champions League, FA Cup and Carling Cup. The £3,500 "midfield" seats sold out with more than a year before the opening date and the club claims that sales at other prices are going well. It was announced on Wednesday, 24th May 2006 that Club Level had sold out at all price ranges for the inaugaural season.

Immediately above the club tier there will be a ring of 150 boxes of 10, 12 and 15 seats. Box prices start at £65,000 per annum plus VAT, and in this case admission to Champions League and FA Cup games is not included. By taking advantage of the high demand to see them play and relative wealth of their London fan base, Arsenal expect to make more money per season from their premium seating and corporate boxes than many of the smaller Premiership clubs make in gate receipts from their whole ground.

It will also become the first stadium in England to be equipped with HDTV, after Arsenal signed a deal with Sony.^[2]

Name

It was announced on October 5, 2004 that the Emirates Stadium will be known as such for at least the first 15 years after the club agreed a £100m sponsorship deal with Emirates Airline. This sum also includes payments for an eight year shirt sponsorship by Emirates, starting in the 2006-2007 season.

Many supporters continue to use the name "Ashburton Grove" for the new stadium, as Arsenal's former ground, Arsenal Stadium, is almost universally referred to as "Highbury" by supporters, the media and the club itself.^[3]

History

Detail of the roof and supports nearing completion in March 2006

The need for a new stadium

Arsenal had started looking to develop a larger stadium during the later part of the 1990s, as their existing ground at Highbury had a capacity of 38,542 when it became all-seater in 1993, which is lower than the grounds of almost all other European football clubs of comparable stature. Highbury has little room for expansion as the East Stand is built right up alongside a public road and the other three back onto housing; in addition the East Stand is a Grade II listed building. Arsenal had a season ticket waiting list which had been closed for some time with over 20,000 members, and were missing out on a great deal of potential revenue. However, finding a site for a new stadium in London was extremely difficult.

The club were willing to consider a location close to the M25 motorway if necessary, but had a strong preference for a location in the London Borough of Islington close to Highbury. At one stage they had considered moving to Wembley Stadium (Arsenal had played Champions League games at Wembley during the 1998-99 and 1999-2000 seasons) but in the end pulled out of the plans. When the Wembley revamp was given the go-ahead in 2002, there was speculation that Arsenal and Tottenham would move into the new stadium when it was finished, even though the club was pressing ahead with the Ashburton Grove project by this stage.^[4]

Ashburton Grove chosen

Eventually the club selected a site, an industrial estate at Ashburton Grove, which was just a few hundred metres from Highbury as the crow flies. The plan was announced in November 1999, with a scheduled opening date of August 2003; this later slipped back to summer 2006 due to planning and financial difficulties. The Ashburton Grove site had many occupants, the most significant being Islington Council's recycling plant and the Royal Mail Holloway Delivery Office. In order to develop the site, it was necessary to buy out the existing occupants, and pay for their relocation (Arsenal purchased 10 acres (40,000 m²) of former railway land on Lough Road, off Caledonian Road, to house a new recycling plant, while the Royal Mail moved to Hamilton Park); this proved to be very expensive. Some of the site's occupants took legal action in 2002 to attempt to block the stadium, which was ultimately unsuccessful. There was further opposition from some residents' groups, although there was also considerable local support for the scheme.

Bauwesen

Construction of the stadium began in February 2004. As well as the stadium itself, two bridges over the Northern City railway line connecting the stadium with Drayton Park were also built; these were completed in summer 2004. The stadium topped out in August 2005, and is reported to be ahead of schedule and on budget. The club has announced that all of the hospitality boxes have been taken,^[5] and by February 2006 90% of the club tier seats had been sold. The first seat in the new stadium was installed on 13 March 2006 by Arsenal midfielder Abou Diaby.

First match

The first match to be played at Emirates Stadium has been scheduled for 22 July 2006 - a testimonial match for Dennis Bergkamp against his former club, Ajax.^[6]

Finanzbranche

The cost of the stadium (£390m) is a significant sum, even for a construction project of this size. Arsenal had difficulty obtaining finance for the project, and work ceased just after it had begun, before starting again when a £260m loan package was obtained from a consortium of banks.

Arsenal are also relying on additional sources of funding; the remainder of the Lough Road site is being used for new housing, as are the surplus areas around the stadium at Ashburton Grove. Highbury will also be converted into apartments after the club leaves. In total, more than 2,000 homes will be built at the three sites, and the club is counting on the profit from these developments to make a major contribution towards the costs of the new stadium. Other sources of finance include a £15m contribution towards the capital costs of the stadium's catering facilites from catering firm Delaware North, which has a 20 year exclusive contract to run the stadium's catering operation, and up-front payments from sponsorship deals with Nike and Emirates.^[7]

In August 2005 Arsenal announced plans to replace most of the bank debt taken on to finance the stadium with £200 million of bonds and a £60 million loan note. The club's chief executive commented that the new stadium is expected to increase Arsenal's turnover from around £115 million to around £170 million.^[8] This will close or possibly even eliminate the gap in turnover between Arsenal and Manchester United. At 30 November 2005 the club's net debt was £209.6 million.^[9]

References

1. ^ "Key Facts" article on Arsenal.com
2. ^ Arsenal and Sony in HDTV deal
3. ^ Arsenal.com's "Farewell to Highbury" page
4. ^ Arsenal rule out Wembley move
5. ^ Arsenal.com article
6. ^ SKY Sport Online article
7. ^ Arsenal Holdings plc, initial results release for the year ended 31 May 2005.
8. ^ Times Online article
9. ^ Arsenal Holdings plc, results for six months ended 30 November 2005.

External links

• arsenal.com/thestadium - official website for the new stadium
• Ashburton Grove described by sportsvenue-technology.com