Proposed 20000 seat rectangular stadium in Cairns

[danmiles73]

Sorry if this has been mentioned on another thread, but there is a story in today's Cairns Post about the proposed stadium in Cairns.

http://www.cairns.com.au/article/2011/10/08/185491_local-news.html

Great idea if it gets up. Would guess that it would see one or two Cowboys games a year. After sitting at Barlow Park with 17,000 for a trial in 2005 I can tell you that it isn't the best place to actually see a game. Fingers crossed.

 

[joshreading]

I have been up here just for the week and have been impressed by the amount of NRL Merch around. Interestingly, Broncos stuff seems to far out weigh the Cowboys. I think it would be a great idea, especially as other sides could take low drawing games V Cowboys to Cairns.

 

[Green Machine]

I was in Cairns recently and had a look at Barlow Park. There were signs out the front advising that the ground had a recent upgrade with a grant from the Qld Government. It’s not a bad little ground, but suffers from having a low level grandstand and being back from the playing field due to the running track. A 20k purpose built stadium would be a great selling point for tourists with 2 or 3 NRL games between June and August. Close to Parramatta Park. Might be a good fit for the Eels.
There were ads on the TV for Brothers Leagues Club. Drove past it, but I didn’t have enough time to visit. Seems a pretty big club,

 

[Lockyer4President!]

I have been up here just for the week and have been impressed by the amount of NRL Merch around. Interestingly, Broncos stuff seems to far out weigh the Cowboys. I think it would be a great idea, especially as other sides could take low drawing games V Cowboys to Cairns.

Despite what people say here sometimes, the Broncos are still the biggest team in QLD and that includes North QLD.

 

[Perth Red]

Would make sense for the Cowboys to use this to really claim the town. One pre season game, one regular season game and convincing another team to play a home game there against them would give them a much greater connection.

 

[applesauce]

Be interesting to see if the AFL try to give them some funds to make it oval. They seems to f**k up all our grounds.

Shows the guys at BF are talking bollocks when they say AFL is HUGE in Cairns when the council are trying to attract A-League andeven Super15 sides before AFL sides.

 

[seanoff]

Would be a massive waste of whatever money it cost.

Spend $100m for 2 games a year. Next up a 100,000 seater in broken hill.

Improve the current set up and spend the $50m in townsville.

 

[Green Machine]

Be interesting to see if the AFL try to give them some funds to make it oval. They seems to f**k up all our grounds.

Shows the guys at BF are talking bollocks when they say AFL is HUGE in Cairns when the council are trying to attract A-League andeven Super15 sides before AFL sides.

The AFL are already in there at Cazaly’s Stadium. I think they have Barassi bar or restaurant in their club. A QLD facility that honours Victorians.

 

[Cumberland Throw]

Why is cairns traditional an afl foothold in Qld ??

 

[Perth Red]

Would be a massive waste of whatever money it cost.

Spend $100m for 2 games a year. Next up a 100,000 seater in broken hill.

Improve the current set up and spend the $50m in townsville.

Why only 2 events. reality it could service 10+ games/concerts/events a year comfortably. Having a suitable venue to attract major sport and leasure events is a big plus for the community of that town. They must rake enough in from tourism in that part of the world to justify investing some of it back into facilities for the people who live there. 150k+ live in Cairns, not many less than a city like Hull that has both the KC stadium and Craven Park and double somewhere like Doncaster in the uK that has a this tidy stadium. The sports facilities generally in Australia are so far behind other parts of the world it isn't funny.

Doncaster Keepmoat

 

[beave]

Why is cairns traditional an afl foothold in Qld ??

all the Victorian grey nomads tend to flock there because it's a tourist town.

 

[beave]

Despite what people say here sometimes, the Broncos are still the biggest team in QLD and that includes North QLD.

utter bullshit...........10 years ago maybe, but this day and age the cowboys are still the number one team in all NQ without a doubt.

 

[CC_Roosters]

Would make sense for the Cowboys to use this to really claim the town. One pre season game, one regular season game and convincing another team to play a home game there against them would give them a much greater connection.

I would call shifting 3 of their home games an effort to claim the town. 1 is a half assed gesture.

 

[Green Machine]

Why is cairns traditional an afl foothold in Qld ??

Not so much amongst the locals. Traditional amongst the Victorian ex-pats,

 

[Lockyer4President!]

Why is cairns traditional an afl foothold in Qld ??

It isn't. BF posters who've never been north of Albury tend to talk a lot of shit

 

[Didgi]

Why is cairns traditional an afl foothold in Qld ??

I've also seen that we have a rather large ratio of gays too, you connect the dots.

 

[seanoff]

Why only 2 events. reality it could service 10+ games/concerts/events a year comfortably. Having a suitable venue to attract major sport and leasure events is a big plus for the community of that town. They must rake enough in from tourism in that part of the world to justify investing some of it back into facilities for the people who live there. 150k+ live in Cairns, not many less than a city like Hull that has both the KC stadium and Craven Park and double somewhere like Doncaster in the uK that has a this tidy stadium. The sports facilities generally in Australia are so far behind other parts of the world it isn't funny.

Doncaster Keepmoat

:roll::roll::lol::lol:

what f**king events are you talking about?

it could service 50 events, but they don't exist. it's not a case of build it and they will come. There's no body to come. they'd be lucky to get 1 NRL game and 1 NRL trial.

the Cowboys won't come, esp if the QLD govt build the Robina II. what do you suggest, the NBL, V8 Supercars, F1.

they probably can't support an A-league side, Townsville couldn't. they're not getting an NRL side anytime in the next 100 years. the local RL doesn't need Robina III, it would be the wrong shape for AFL.

concerts and events. lol no. it just doesn't happen often enough. for Cairns to attract 20000 to any concert you'd be talking U2. so they're going to pop in 18 times a year. they only come to aus once a decade.

Doncaster you realise has 2 - 2,500,000 people within 50km. Hull has an urban population of nearly 600,000. there are about 250,000 in the whole of FNQ. so basically anything north of townsville. you aren't seriously comparing the possible catchment of Cairns to those two places.

these flights of fancy are lovely, but the reality is, they don't have any use for it and it would be a colossal waste of money.

 

[Perth Red]

lol Hull has 600k? Geez it must have grown a lot in the decade I've been away and if you want to talk about the 2mill around Doncaster maybe you'd also like to consider the number of sports and events venues that service that 2million! Keepmoat was built for the town of Doncaster and hosts two very small teams.

There is no reason that Cairns couldn't attract 3 NRL games, a S15 game or two, an Aleague game or two and 5-10 concerts/events that could attract 10K+ and therefore be viable.

But then again most major cities here can't even sort out decent facilities so your probably right the likleyhood of a regional city doing so is sadly remote.

 

[langpark]

Build it! Lets brainstorm, what events could they realistically bid for on annual basis?

- A few pre-season trials
- ANZAC Test?
- One or two NRL fixtures
- An A-League match
- Socceroo WC qualifiers
- Concerts
- NRL vs Indigenous All Stars match

 

[seanoff]

lol Hull has 600k? Geez it must have grown a lot in the decade I've been away and if you want to talk about the 2mill around Doncaster maybe you'd also like to consider the number of sports and events venues that service that 2million! Keepmoat was built for the town of Doncaster and hosts two very small teams.

There is no reason that Cairns couldn't attract 3 NRL games, a S15 game or two, an Aleague game or two and 5-10 concerts/events that could attract 10K+ and therefore be viable.

But then again most major cities here can't even sort out decent facilities so your probably right the likleyhood of a regional city doing so is sadly remote.

darwin has offered basically $1m for 2 games a year for the past decade. how many have we got.

1 in 2012. 1 game from a possible 20. with 500K guaranteed money.

what makes you think Cairns will magically attract 3. from who? which S15 game is going there? seriously which one, the Western force? A-League, now you are delusional.

5 - 10 concert events? no way on gods green earth are they getting 5 - 10 concerts a yr that would attract 10000. they'd consider themselves lucky if they get one every 3 or 4 years.


I live in a similar sized place. we get a few events a year that attract more than 10000.

2 AFL games 12000 each if they are reasonable games
V8 Supercars 20 - 25000
Darwin Cup 15 - 20000
NRL (1 game) 10 -12000. (2012)

that's it.

Bass in the Grass is limited to about 6 - 7000. Arafura games opening gets about 8k. the NTFL GFs have gotten 10,000 and 9,000 in the last 2 years. the NEAFL 2nd semi got 6,500.

the last concert here that got more than 10K was Elton John about 4 years ago.


it isn't a matter of affordability, but utility. it wouldn't get used. spending 100m on something that might get adequately used 1 time per year is just not feasible or sensible.

want to spend $100m on sport in Cairns, upgrade Barlow park, Cazaly's, build some basketball and netball courts indoors, a decent indoor pool or 2 and upgrade the local ovals around the place.