tom_widdows

3rd in the Championship (7 points behind brighton with a game in hand, 5 points behind newcastle). Money from a winning FA Cup Run (Not including TV money) = £3,397,500 Money from Promotion to Premiership - Allegedly £200,000,000 Well done Mr Murdoch

Irritating that one. Need the Jambos to pull their finger out and finish 3rd above Sevco

1996/97 League Cup Greenock Morton 3-7 Aberdeen (Dodds 3, Windass 4) 2-0 up only go 3-2 down and equalising in the last minute. 4 extra time goals

Absolute shed-load of Objections appeared since the start of February. Still another 16 days of public comments to come too

Morton hackers playing mind games

Apparently Celtic are now awarded penalties for kicking the ball into st Johnstone defenders ribs. The consensus of 'if you can't see it then you can't give it' doesn't apply to them Scott Brown is also definetly allowed to do what he likes while defending, especially when its in his own penalty area (And Thomson definitely SAW that)

I see sevco are pulling the same trick their ugly sisters were last season. They declared their attendance as 49,428. (1559 empty seats) which sportscene decided was worthy of highlighting on Final score. However from the TV pics there were a fair amount of noticeable gaps all around. In other news, should the Dons fail to win 2 of their next 5 games then the Tic could actually win the title against Sevco at parkhead. Cops will love that one

MBT hanging on. Are we now going to see an influx of new entrants or perhaps prediction changes? 90 89 88 87 86 85 84 83 82 81 - MBT 80 79 78 77 - Tyrant 76 75 74 - Nellie The Don 73 - BigAl 72 - Edinburghdon 71 70 69 68 - Thomsod 67 - Jute 66 - Manc 65 - rocket 64 63 - Tom_Widdows 62 61 60 59 58 57 56 55 54 53 52 51 50 49 48 47 46 45 44 43 42 41 40

15th

Hopefully a Dons goal will let you hear their commentary Gems Ryan Jacks solo goal a few seasons back the commentary was along these lines 'Well i think Henrik Larsson was the best Celtic player of all time' 'Aye I agree but what about Mcstay, surely he has to be a candidate......I think that's a goal isnt it? 'Think its Ryan Jack. Don't know what was going on there' 'Thats just one of those Goals that happens.'

Didn't think it was as good as 'Walking the Nile' or 'walking the Himalayas'. Decent effort but when I saw it advertised in December I thought he would be walking the entire Pan-American Highway not just Central America. There also didn't seem to be the element of Danger the previous two had even though he walked through drug-lord areas and the Darien Gap.

Currently 1243 documents relating to the Planning Applicaiton 169 Documents actually about the stadium 1074 Public comments (Objections or Support). The most recent support comes from a 'Mr Russell Anderson' Quick scan seems to show more support than objections but how many of either are actually valid is anyones guess (Planning Officer will need a holiday after this one) Consultee comments to date - Scottish Natural Heritage - Seem OK with it provided conditions stated in various documents about protecting/ relocating animal/ Insect habitats are carried out Aberdeen Council Environmental Health - No objections but state site has a history of 'landfilling' so will expect a contamination survey before it goes further. Aberdeen Council Waste Services - Make sure there are enough bins Aberdeen Council Archaeology - No issues BP - No issues as long as you don't mess up our pipelines. Determination Deadline is supposedly 10th May 2017 however its current status is 'awaiting decision' even though the consultation deadline is not until February 17th. I have a housing project in Glasgow that has been 'pending consideration' for 2 years!

Really feel for the Wycombe Goalie. I managed to avoid the scores so match of the day was a bit exciting but as soon as I saw the ball leave is foot when he kicked it up the park I knew a spurs equaliser was coming up. I wonder if the spurs fan who chose to run onto the pitch to celebrate his team narrowly beating a 4th division team is now regretting the inevitable banning order?

Said twitter account has now either been suspended or deleted.

Almost an OF draw but Stubbs must have felt the warm ball and quickly shifted to Caley

Ross County Away on 11th or 12th February Dunfermline v Hamilton Raith Rovers or Hearts v Hibernian St Johnstone v Partick Thistle Ayr Utd or Queen's Park v Stirling or Clyde East Fife v St Mirren Celtic v Inverness CT Sevco vs Morton

Boom. Raith equalise with 1minute to go Amusing to see the Jambos players throwing a shitfit. Ex Don McManus was at least a yard onside when Skacel hit the ball

Albion Rovers away.

Ladies and Gentleman Aberdeen also seems to have caught student halls fever (Glasgow is being swallowed up by them at the moment) If pittodrie is to be sold I suspect this will be site's future http://www.urbanrealm.com/news/6597/Aberdeen_student_housing_duo_win_planning_consent.html

So potential opponents in 3 weeks time Sevco East Fife Dunfermline Ath Ayr Utd or Queens Park Hibs St Mirren Caley Thistle Hamilton Morton St Johnstone Partick Ross County Stirling Albion or Clyde Raith or Jambos Albion or Tic Away trip to Albion (at Clifton Hill. None of this 'move for security' bullshit) would be my choice But failing that East Fife, Stirling or Clyde away for the novelty.

24hrs ago it was 60 Durrants. Not sure what happened but I'm sure it wont be long till a similar situation returns

Increase the height of the South stand and you are making an existing situation worse for neighbouring properties. The flats behind the south immediately have a valid objection which the planners would need to consider very carefully. Making the stands taller unfortunately does not necessarily offset the loss of seats. New Regs about widths of aisles and amount of space in-front of each seat both when folded up and when people are sitting/ standing will apply (part of of this will come under the DDA act and accessibility regs. These are not just for wheelchair users, they cover anyone who has impaired mobility). At the moment the South stand concourses are at the back of the stand. The 'external' one is narrow but as an escape route just for fans is just about passable (existing situation) although I fear in a few seasons the club will be forced to restrict the capacity to obtain a safety certificate. The internal one is also narrow (too narrow for the capacity) and made worse by having the snack kiosks and toilets all along the back. The queues for both restrict circulation. In a new stand all the services, toilets, snack bars etc would need to be moved under the seating area and all circulation routes would need to be designed so that you must purposefully deviate from to reach them eg go through a set of doors. That way should you suddenly have to evacuate the escape routes (vomitories) would not be blocked by people waiting for their Bovril. The internal routes must then lead to a controllable external muster point with escape routes in multiple directions and wide enough for people to escape at the same time as the emergency services are arriving. Ideally this would be a carpark or private road. Unfortunately the south stand is enclosed with a boundary wall forcing people to go in max 2 directions. The minimum emergency vehicle lane width is 3.7m between kerbs. You must then add the width of the pedestrian escape route to that which is calculated based on the number of fans who may be forced to use it. The standard calc for a non domestic building is 5.3 x the occupancy capacity = aggregate width in mm. Very rough calculation and I'd look for someone with stadium design experience to correct me if necessary (I have only worked on medium sized conference facilities), but say an escape route is designed to take 4000 people (worst case scenario ie other escape routes are blocked) then it would need to be 21.2m wide. For 8000 fans this increases to 42.4m. Think about this next time you are leaving the South stand. I could be wrong but I don't think the club have any ownership of Pittodrie Street. Its in a predominantly residential area and residents will accept they live next to a stadium so cant park in certain areas on match days. However suddenly telling them they cant park on the street at all is a serious can of worms and the planners would need to have some serious balls to even consider letting that one through. One of the first rules of redevelopment is you cannot make an existing situation worse. Narrowing that road does just that. You also have to look at the effect of changing one section of a long street with no breaks (all side streets give way to Pittodrie street). To ease the effect of narrowing it along the back of the Main stand I think you would need to start the narrowing process at Ardarroch Road For the club to offer up the DD concourse and their own car-park for residential or visitor parking on non-match days is another legal minefield. The main stand car-park would need to be renovated to a certain standard for a start. The club could then potentially be held liable for any damage to the owners vehicles increasing their own insurance costs. Same would apply for the RDS concourse and would probably be even worse given one of its functions is to allow access for emergency vehicles so the club would then need to have someone patrol the area to make sure your average selfish moron doesn't abandon their car in a stupid place just because 'they will only be 5mins'. Thinking about it now, that 12500 figure is probably reasonably accurate. If all 3 stands ended up with capacities reduced by 50% it would equate to total capacity of 13,922. Add in the now 'necessary' corporate facilities to them and the seating capacity is cut again. Some clever designing and help from the planners could possibly push that up a tiny bit but not much. There is at least one person who used to post on here who has worked on a stadium redevelopment. They will certainly have a better idea of what could be achieved and hopefully will pop their head above the ramparts again.

You can build a new stand on the current footprint of the South stand. The problem is it will not hold the 8104 the current one does. Reasons I can think of for this are as follows The south stand is a former terrace with seats bolted to it. This was done in the 1970s before Heysel, Hillsbrough, the Bradford City Fire etc which brought in new rules about stadium design. Too many folk think the Taylor report was just 'get rid of standing and everything is solved'. Stadium evacuation, circulation for fans/ security/ emergency service personnel, crowd control were all revised having been neglected for decades. Primary evacuation routes should always be through the actual stands with fans escaping onto the pitch being seen as a secondary/ last alternative. In large stands/ stadiums evacuations will be staged so large amounts of fans will need to be held in 'places of safety' whilst other sections are let out to prevent crushes Emergency service vehicles must be able to access all the way around the stadium at the same time as a mass evacuation of supporters is taking place.. Yes you can drive a fire engines along the back of the South stand at the moment but try doing that when faced with 8000 panicking people. Said fire engines would also have to get down Merkland Road/ Golf Road, Pittodrie street all of which could be packed with up to 20000 fans plus other road users. Hibs two largest stands have capacities of 6,407 & 6400 respectively. Hearts Wheatfield stand holds 5,902. FYI their old main stand actually holds 5,100. Tynecastle is a unique redevelopment in that the concourses under the seats for all 3 new stands are actually linked. They are also raised above ground level so you enter the stands halfway up which allows for emergency access underneath the escaping fans. I am presuming there is significant fire proofing throughout so any fire on the actual seating area would take at least 1hr to reach the concourse. This is a clever layout but I do wonder if it would be possible in the current regulations (All 3 stands were built in the late 90s). It reminds me of the Westpac stadium in Wellington which has one massive 'wembley way' style access. Easter Road has a carpark and a private road behind their two biggest stands. The away stand has a fairly large concourse and a wide road with what appears to be primarily commercial use therefore quieter on weekends and evenings. Their biggest issue is the back of the famous 5 which exits right onto Albion place, however the road network allows for diversions so the section directly in front of the turnstiles can be shut on match days. Pittodrie being surrounded by so much residential property effectively rules out buying Merkland Lane and Pittodrie street as it would reduce emergency access for the existing properties. Building over the top of public roads (Athletico Madrid style) is not easy and very expensive. If yer gonna do it the best time is when the road is being constructed before houses are built nearby. I personally would prefer the club stayed at pittodrie and actually reduced the capacity (Much rather a 80-90% full 14-15k stadium rather than a 50% full 20k one.) However the consensus is AFC must have at least 20000 seats and thanks to Aberdeen's obsession with building flats over the last 30 years there is non longer the space available to do this.

Fuck load of public comments on this one. Think the council will regret their current comment system (much easier than some of the other Councils I have to work with) as it is clearly open to abuse People really need to learn how to 'object' to a planning application. Feel sorry for the Planning Officer on this one.

Pittodrie can quite easily be redeveloped in stages (funding dependent). The issue is 3 new stands designed to current regulations will not provide the 15,405 seats the current South, Main & Merkland provide. Sticking with the 4 stand layout I estimate the new capacity would be max 15000. A possible alternative of changing to a 2 stand layout (Braga Style) by rotating the pitch 90degreess could possibly bring 20,000 however it would be expensive as fuck (and thats assuming it would be possible to extend the RDS), Probably end up in legal fights over 'daylighting' issues to the surrounding houses, and even require a ground-share arrangement with the Dundee Clubs for at least part of a season. Also I haven't been to Braga but I presume they don't have North Sea style winds whistling through the open end.