doubt it would be extra as speaker poles could then be eliminated, with speakers moving up into the roof. So instead of all the speaker poles you'd have 3 or 4 pillars supporting roof. And looking at the ones on the main stand they arent ridiculously thick ones either. Swings and roundablouts really as, as adey says, we cant afford to do it anyway. But going forwards we are going to have to do something before 2015 franchise round.

Pillars would be a nightmare.... no thanks

How about NL1?

I cant think of one newer stand/stadium that has columns rather than the modern cantilever.

I would expect a solution similar to huddersfield to be used which negates the need for expensive piling and anchoring.

Still not cheap by any means given the size of the popular side.

Odsals problem when it comes to redevelopment is its sheer size, everything is done on a larger scale as the bowl is twice as big as it actually needs to be.

A move to VP looks ever more likely. Let's face it, it's what the council has wanted for decades.

I wonder how much it would cost Westfield to buy out of their agreement to build a shopping centre?

We have a prepared site and potential funding sat in the middle of town (assuming its still like that - I don't live anywhere near Bradford).

What funding?

At the moment, I suspect the value of Westfield's commitment is approximately two bent washers.

No way anyway would any council allow a second stadium to be built within sight of VP - imagine the uproar?. No-one could justify building a new stadium in the city centre anyway on any grounds, certainly not economic. And who would pay for it?

When's that merger with Halifax going to manifest itself?

I sit in the main stand and never notice the pillars. If the option are a) No new stand and supporters standing in the rain or b) A relatively cheap stand erected while we spend the next 40 years discussing the wholesale redevelopment of the site then I'd vote for option b.

We have to move past discussing £200million options and doing nothing.

I gather putting a roof over the popular terrace and related works, bit like a mirror of the main stand, would cost several million (was told that a while ago). It would generate little additional income on its own, so where would the funding come from?

Bear in mind too the layout of the site: the popular terrace does not extend as far along towards the Coral Stand as the Main Stand does, and there is the big bank above the top of the Popular Terrace that is not there in the same way behind the Main Stand. There is also the matter that - IIRC - the Bulls' long lease does not actually cover all the buildings above the Popular Terrace, and one of the transport plans had some of that land being used for the South Bradford transport improvements? You'd almost certainly be looking at new offices etc as part of any development, I think. have I suspect these factors could add to the cost. Anyone know how much the Main Stand cost to build for the 1986 world speedway championships?

I'm not sure whether a lid on the Popular Terrace would by itself be enough to tick all the RFL's boxes for stadium criteria by the time we get to 2015, although you would hope we'd tick most given last time our stadium was rated as being "in need of some improvement" rather than being a "tired old stadium" like the ones who were told they HAD to get a new stadium.

In all seriousness (although I do wish they'd get rid of those bloody speaker poles), I think Adey has hit the nail on the head.

Yeah I may change my mind when I'm p*ss wet through and freezing, but I'd actually prefer to not have a roof than the club waste their own money on building one. As has been said, it will not make any significant money back and certainly won't pay for itself, so the club paying for it would just mean that money could not be spent elsewhere.

Sure, if it's needed for a franchise, it's worth it and does pay for itself. But if not, I'd rather get wet and have the club spend the money on something far more important.

Didn't Peter Hood say last year that they had a back-up plan or plans? Or do they just do nothing, because in effect that is what they have been doing for the last 15 years while all these pie in the sky schemes came and went? And how much has Bradford Council spent on feasibility studies for all manner of projects that never materialised? It would be a real shame for the Club to have done so much work bringing the Fans back and not to have a Plan B for the Stadium!

Surely the extra income would come from people not being put off when it rains, more young people coming owing to a better atmosphere. Most of the kids in the South stand at Leeds don't appear to watch the game but they have a great time singing and pay their entry like everyone else.

We've gone to great trouble and I suspect no little expense to re-engage with families and one good downpour could literally p**s on the whole parade. Mum won't bring kids to catch pneumonia.

I'm not blaming Peter Hood as he could have done little else but champion the OSV but maybe we need to look at (cheap) realistic options.

I would think most of those affected by that who have little kids would either already pay to go in the family stand or not go anyway because it's still going to be cold.

Eventually, it probably would pay for itself with that, but it would take a long long long time.

Oh, isn't it just so predictable, that when things seem to be going so well, we get a punch in the gut over the stadium

Seriously, this can hardly be unexpected can it? When the Council has to make compulsory redundancies across the provision of its services, it would hardly seem likely - removing our most biased of hats - that it is reasonable to spend on something that, at the end of the day, is something of a luxury. Unless there's a sugar daddy on the horizon, and if there is then he's doing a great job of staying off the radar - we look to be well and truly stuck.

I suspect that the next round franchise 'feedback' will be next key 'driver'. Assuming we are safe with our next franchise (I believe that we are OK with our other criteria), then we'll need to take careful note of our feedback. If there is talk of 'need to replace ground with more modern facility' or similar, then we can't just mooch around for two or three years doing nothing. Or, even worse, place our faith is yet another 'pie in the sky' scheme.

It would seem the only two viable options between now and 2015, would be either to somehow scrape together the money for a modest upgrade of Odsal (taking care to do just enough to meet minimum franchise qualifications) or to move to Valley Parade once and for all.

Personally, I'm OK with the latter, but I'm probably in the minority.

When I used to travel to all away grounds I always thought Odsal to be one of the better grounds, & that was before some of the more recent developments. Now, though, all of the poor grounds have been replaced or are looking fairly likely, except Wakey who I fear are doomed. So the bar has obviously been raised but I still think Odsal is acceptable, however the maintenacne costs must be a nightmare. I've said all along that OSV will not happen, about a year ago there was a programme put forward for the development that was impossible to achieve. The club were naive or very poorly advised if they ever thought it would happen to those timescales. I have worked on numerous construction projects when you get the feel early on that you are wasting time & fees continuing, but there are usually some important people who have invested a lot of effort & reputation in the job & bury their heads in the sand. I feel there is an element of this in OSV.
Although a roof over the pop side will make no difference to me attending games at Odsal, I guess the view is it would attract the floating punter who clubs are chasing. Estimates of several million do seem excessive to me. I quoted the total cost of Leigh's new stadium (c£17m IIRC) on a previous thread, we are only talking a roof here. I guess the best bet for the Bulls would be to get into bed with someone like Caddick to build one for them.