The excitment is building over what the final plans of the new PGE Park soccer stadium will look like. There are few definte details and no substainal renderings of what owner Merrit Paulson has in mind. The offical Portland MLS 2011 website has very few specifics but promises fans closer seats to the field, a super awesome video sound system that will blow your mind, new team store, more places to drain the main vein and more places to stuff your face and get your drink on. We will keep you up to date when any Timber stadium news breaks, but until then we will be profiling some of the better stadiums in the MLS.
The city of Toronto built and owns BMO Field the home of Toronto FC. It was built at a cost around $58 million and took a year to build. The opening game was played on April 28th, 2007 to a sold out crowd, the official capacity at BMO is 20,500. The playing surface is turf, but the Toronto City Council voted to install natural grass after this 2009 MLS season. As you can see in the picture above, it has a little European flare with Toronto spelled out in the seats. Toronto has sold over 16,000 season tickets and claims to have over 15,000 people on season ticket waiting lists. The calls for expansion of the stadium have already begun, as they look to build a second deck to the east side of the stadium that would add around 8000 seats.
I have never been to BMO, but the reason I like it is the simplicty of the stadium itself. The fans are right on top of the action on three sides of the field. On the one end with no stands is a large beer garden. The atomsphere is great as just about every seat in the house is taken, which make for a great atomsphere and more watchable on TV. Also, Toronto has learned from the mistake of putting in truf, and is now going foward with ripping it out and replacing it with what God intended, beautiful green grass. Portland has plenty of great green grass around and it should only be natural that we bring it to the new stadium. Portland can learn a lot from looking at what the other stadiums in the league have done.
The excitment is building over what the final plans of the new PGE Park soccer stadium will look like. There are few definte details and no substainal renderings of what owner Merrit Paulson has in mind. The offical Portland MLS 2011 website has very few specifics but promises fans closer seats to the field, a super awesome video sound system that will blow your mind, new team store, more places to drain the main vein and more places to stuff your face and get your drink on. We will keep you up to date when any Timber stadium news breaks, but until then we will be profiling some of the better stadiums in the MLS.
That's about the same size as what PGE park will end up. Definitely agree that we need seating right along the field.
ReplyDeleteWhatever happens with PGE, the roof over 2/3 of the seating is a major advantage over BMO and other MLS Stadia-- it focuses sound, keeps the rain off some of the spectators, and 'closes in' the space, making the whole stadium seem more intimate.
ReplyDeletei hope hope hope hope that all development on the street side of PGE keeps at least some of the fence open for passersby and the ticketless, though the architecture commission referred to the space negatively, reminding us that fencing is 'dead space' when games are not occurring.
I agree PGE already is a slick place to watch football. The roof helps make the place loud and it feels like your being shoved towards the field.
ReplyDeleteI have mixed ideas and feelings about 18th street. I would like to see stands that go from pitch level to the street level. I think a large teamstore/bar/resturant/museum on 18th would be cool and it wouldn't have to run the whole block. A team store with a view of the pitch would be iconic, it would bring people into the store on off days.
The roof over the crowd is something FIFA and the MLS have been pushing teams to implement. FIFA wants the MLS to get on the same schedule as the European leagues some day.
ReplyDeleteBMO Field would look great with a roof over it, but I think Toronto's priority should be to expand the stadium to 30 000.
ReplyDeleteI believe Tickets at BMO Field are already the priciest in the league, if they reduced their price and expanded their stadium, they can easily beat Seattle's attendence record in the future... (heck, if they played at the Rogers centre today, they can sell 55 000 for playoff games).
The natural grass is not just any grass. While the Montreal Impact spent $500 000 US on Saputo Field, BMO Field's natural grass is expecting to cost a whopping $3.5 million US.
The heating and irrigation system will keep the grass at "Premiership" quality all year round, even during Toronto winters. Its more than just a natural grass field, it will likely be the best grass in MLS.