20th AFL Team

[Canberra Pear]

I respect your perspective - and its logical - but I’m thinking more the AFL would prefer to give a new area a team (in a perceived non growth area) if they can show a clear commercial path. Unfortunately, I’m not sure if Manuka offers that (I really like the stadium too FWIW).

Why do you consider Canberra a "non growth area"?

Fast-growing population with a large non-AFL supporting population. Kind of the definition of a growth area.

Canberra holds a balance of AFL enough to support the start, but neutral enough to actually grow the pie. It's the Goldilocks option.

Ok, but even an upgrade - why would the government commit political suicide by giving the AFL this and not what rugby fans have been asking for a decade?

I don't think there's anything the ACT Government could do to commit political suicide. They could blow all their money on a giant curling facility and they'd still get in.

But the official funding goal is to replicate Tasmania. Tie in funding for a new stadium and redevelopment into the same package.

If the Bruce gets knocked down/rebuilt, an upgraded Manuka almost has to happen first. The Raiders and Brumbies will need an alternative venue in the interim. Manuka is the only viable alternative, but not at its current capacity.

 

[Badja]

Giving afl a stadium deal and not the Raiders is political suicide. Can’t see it happening.

Allegedly the ACT government are pushing for a "Tasmania" solution for stadiums in Canberra, getting $240 million for a new rectangular stadium and $65 million to upgrade Manuka (adjusted for inflation). Of course despite having similar populations the ACT only has one marginal Labor seat, but it's finance minister they'd be saving so maybe. Also If they fund a new rectangular stadium that opens up a whole lot of prime federal land they could sell, which didn't happen in Tassie.

 

[Badja]

If the Bruce gets knocked down/rebuilt, an upgraded Manuka almost has to happen first. The Raiders and Brumbies will need an alternative venue in the interim. Manuka is the only viable alternative, but not at its current capacity.

The latest word was they were looking to build the new stadium on top of the old raiders HQ on Haydon Drive, which would be better for light rail and wouldn't require leaving GIO until it was done.

 

[erhaltegh74]

The latest word was they were looking to build the new stadium on top of the old raiders HQ on Haydon Drive, which would be better for light rail and wouldn't require leaving GIO until it was done.

They aren’t building a new stadium unless it is made out of Lego. They don’t have the money and it would be announced

 

[Badger17]

I respect your perspective - and its logical - but I’m thinking more the AFL would prefer to give a new area a team (in a perceived non growth area) if they can show a clear commercial path. Unfortunately, I’m not sure if Manuka offers that (I really like the stadium too FWIW).

Giving afl a stadium deal and not the Raiders is political suicide. Can’t see it happening.

In real terms Canberra is a growth area for the AFL and I see no reason why an upgraded Manuka couldn't offer a clear commercial path.

No stadium alone will overcome the partisan single party dominance of Canberra. It'd be a shitshow politically, and cause all sorts of issues for sure (almost certainly wouldn't get up), but voting Liberal is voting against your own interests in a city where the public service and unis are such large and important parts of the economy.

Barr can more or less do what he likes without any fear of Labour losing an election, and trust me, he's extremely aware of that fact.

 

[threenewpadlocks]

Personally, I think building a 20,000+ rectangular stadium for the use case of when the Brumbies get their 6,000 fans to their game is a waste of ACT Taxpayer money.

 

[threenewpadlocks]

If the Bruce gets knocked down/rebuilt, an upgraded Manuka almost has to happen first. The Raiders and Brumbies will need an alternative venue in the interim. Manuka is the only viable alternative, but not at its current capacity.

CP, do you think that if there is funding for a new rectangular stadium, that it will be a Bruce rebuild?

Not only is Bruce currently a bad stadium, it's also in a bad area. Bruce is one of the few suburbs that is hard to drive to and access from all others in Canberra, no pubs/entertainment in the area, bad public transport, etc.

Why wouldn't they just knock down Bruce (and perhaps the AIS), and rebuild a new rectangular stadium (and maybe the AIS, and a new arena for the AIS) together in one new location, like the Civic suggestion?

If not Civic, where is a realistic "good" location?

Would League, Union and Soccer fans see the benefit of Manuka being a "good" location for their games, even if they disagree with the idea of watching rectangular sports on an oval stadium, no matter how hard you try to make their viewer experience better by making the redevelopment of the stadium as multipurpose as you can?

 

[Badja]

CP, do you think that if there is funding for a new rectangular stadium, that it will be a Bruce rebuild?

Not only is Bruce currently a bad stadium, it's also in a bad area. Bruce is one of the few suburbs that is hard to drive to and access from all others in Canberra, no pubs/entertainment in the area, bad public transport, etc.

Why wouldn't they just knock down Bruce (and perhaps the AIS), and rebuild a new rectangular stadium (and maybe the AIS, and a new arena for the AIS) together in one new location, like the Civic suggestion?

If not Civic, where is a realistic "good" location?

Would League, Union and Soccer fans see the benefit of Manuka being a "good" location for their games, even if they disagree with the idea of watching rectangular sports on an oval stadium, no matter how hard you try to make their viewer experience better by making the redevelopment of the stadium as multipurpose as you can?

This debate has been had multiple times, with the end results being it's probably staying in Bruce, but maybe in a slightly better location. The original plan was to build it in civic where the pool currently is, but apparently that space is too small without burying Parkes way, which would be too expensive. According to Andrew Barr there's no other good location in civic so now they're trying to work with the AIS to make that a "destination" with restaurants and pubs. They've spent the least year or so and millions of dollars on a new masterplan covering the AIS, the Bruce TAFE and the former Raiders HQ, that's supposed to be released soon, which should include plans for the new stadium.

The AIS is certainly staying where it is as the Feds have just started spending $250 million on new facilities to get it up to speed for Brisbane 2032.

Other locations mentioned have been elsewhere, but seemingly out of contention, were other places in civic (with city hill being an Aprils food gag that recently took the Canberra Time's fancy), The show grounds, or replacing football park in Woden.

 

[threenewpadlocks]

This debate has been had multiple times, with the end results being it's probably staying in Bruce, but maybe in a slightly better location. The original plan was to build it in civic where the pool currently is, but apparently that space is too small without burying Parkes way, which would be too expensive. According to Andrew Barr there's no other good location in civic so now they're trying to work with the AIS to make that a "destination" with restaurants and pubs. They've spent the least year or so and millions of dollars on a new masterplan covering the AIS, the Bruce TAFE and the former Raiders HQ, that's supposed to be released soon, which should include plans for the new stadium.

The AIS is certainly staying where it is as the Feds have just started spending $250 million on new facilities to get it up to speed for Brisbane 2032.

Other locations mentioned have been elsewhere, but seemingly out of contention, were other places in civic (with city hill being an Aprils food gag that recently took the Canberra Time's fancy), The show grounds, or replacing football park in Woden.

Thanks mate. Outstanding post. I was across some but not most of this.

What made/makes Civic/Acton Waterfront the best of the possible lakefront locations to be suggested in the first place? Were there any other realistic suggestions on the fact that there are some non-housing spaces on the lakefront across Canberra?

And is the footprint of any of the other community sportsfields in Canberra big enough to have stadium seating and a space around it? My understanding of these venues and a quick double check on google satellite says no, but wondering if there's any I've missed.

 

[Badja]

Thanks mate. Outstanding post. I was across some but not most of this.

What made/makes Civic/Acton Waterfront the best of the possible lakefront locations to be suggested in the first place? Were there any other realistic suggestions on the fact that there are some non-housing spaces on the lakefront across Canberra?

And is the footprint of any of the other community sportsfields in Canberra big enough to have stadium seating and a space around it? My understanding of these venues and a quick double check on google satellite says no, but wondering if there's any I've missed.

The pool site is set back from the lake, closer to civic, and was the ALP's original choice, but apparently too small. The Libs suggested the new acton water front, but that's only slightly bigger and also partly on recently reclaimed land, so may not be stable enough to hold a stadium. Outside of that most of the lakeside is federal lands managed by the rather obstinate National Capital Authority, and/or worse than Bruce for transport and pubs/restaurants. Others have suggest the ANU north oval (ANU land and on a flood plain) or city hill (heritage listed and surrounded by a major road). The Action waterfront option seemed the best to me, but considering how poorly thought through all the libs other policies were at that election I wouldn't imagine they'd done much more investigation that just have the idea.

As to other stadia, the federal Libs talked about building Viking park in Tuggeranong out to a broadcast standard rectangular stadium with 10k seats, and McKellar Park in Belconnen host Canberra United.

If you wanted to ignore Manuka and upgrade a community oval the best bets are probably Football park in Woden, Gungahlin Enclosed Oval, or maybe at a stretch Ainslie oval, although the parking and transport links would be terrible.

 

[threenewpadlocks]

The pool site is set back from the lake, closer to civic, and was the ALP's original choice, but apparently too small. The Libs suggested the new acton water front, but that's only slightly bigger and also partly on recently reclaimed land, so may not be stable enough to hold a stadium. Outside of that most of the lakeside is federal lands managed by the rather obstinate National Capital Authority, and/or worse than Bruce for transport and pubs/restaurants. Others have suggest the ANU north oval (ANU land and on a flood plain) or city hill (heritage listed and surrounded by a major road). The Action waterfront option seemed the best to me, but considering how poorly thought through all the libs other policies were at that election I wouldn't imagine they'd done much more investigation that just have the idea.

As to other stadia, the federal Libs talked about building Viking park in Tuggeranong out to a broadcast standard rectangular stadium with 10k seats, and McKellar Park in Belconnen host Canberra United.

If you wanted to ignore Manuka and upgrade a community oval the best bets are probably Football park in Woden, Gungahlin Enclosed Oval, or maybe at a stretch Ainslie oval, although the parking and transport links would be terrible.

Cheers again.

I'm guessing that McKellar Park is not really an option for the Raiders/Brumbies, even if you could get it to the magical 30,000 mark, and even if the transport links are okay? Because it's simply not a good location close to central Canberra, and is further away for the Raiders' current fanbase in the growth southern suburbs of Canberra, Queaybeyan, etc.?

You wouldn't base an AFL team out of Gungahilin, for the same reason.

I do wonder though if Raiders needed to play at Manuka on a temporary basis, whether this means that Canberra AFLW and VFL games would have to be played at Phillip, which would be the Canberra team's training and administration home (that probably wouldn't be up to hosting those AFLW and VFL games).

 

[Badger17]

This debate has been had multiple times, with the end results being it's probably staying in Bruce, but maybe in a slightly better location. The original plan was to build it in civic where the pool currently is, but apparently that space is too small without burying Parkes way, which would be too expensive. According to Andrew Barr there's no other good location in civic so now they're trying to work with the AIS to make that a "destination" with restaurants and pubs. They've spent the least year or so and millions of dollars on a new masterplan covering the AIS, the Bruce TAFE and the former Raiders HQ, that's supposed to be released soon, which should include plans for the new stadium.

The AIS is certainly staying where it is as the Feds have just started spending $250 million on new facilities to get it up to speed for Brisbane 2032.

Other locations mentioned have been elsewhere, but seemingly out of contention, were other places in civic (with city hill being an Aprils food gag that recently took the Canberra Time's fancy), The show grounds, or replacing football park in Woden.

It should be kept in mind that basically every stakeholder apart from the government opposes it being built at Bruce, but all refuse to offer any other viables alternatives other than just to assert that it should be built in Civic without being able to identify a location where one would fit in Civic.

The whole debate is academic anyway, as Labour has no plans of doing it within the foreseeable future. Unless something completely from left field happens, the odds are that Bruce will go the way of the AIS Arena and be closed for safety reasons before anything is done. Then the government will probably do the absolute bare minimum to get it reopened and call it a day for another couple decades.

I genuinely can't see a new rectangular stadium being built before 2040 at the earliest, probably even later. The political will simply doesn't exist to get it done. There's plenty of political support for upgrades to Manuka though, especially if it came with BBL and AFL licenses.

The rectangular stadium situation is getting so bad that it isn't totally unthinkable that the Raiders could be forced to relocate.

 

[threenewpadlocks]

Is there a possibility of the NSW Govt funding an upgrade somewhere outside the ACT border, and thus the NSW economy benefitting from the Raiders being based there?

 

[erhaltegh74]

It should be kept in mind that basically every stakeholder apart from the government opposes it being built at Bruce, but all refuse to offer any other viables alternatives other than just to assert that it should be built in Civic without being able to identify a location where one would fit in Civic.

The whole debate is academic anyway, as Labour has no plans of doing it within the foreseeable future. Unless something completely from left field happens, the odds are that Bruce will go the way of the AIS Arena and be closed for safety reasons before anything is done. Then the government will probably do the absolute bare minimum to get it reopened and call it a day for another couple decades.

I genuinely can't see a new rectangular stadium being built before 2040 at the earliest, probably even later. The political will simply doesn't exist to get it done. There's plenty of political support for upgrades to Manuka though, especially if it came with BBL and AFL licenses.

The rectangular stadium situation is getting so bad that it isn't totally unthinkable that the Raiders could be forced to relocate.

They’ll either fold or relocate. I think the Raiders folding would solve a problem for the NRL

 

[Badger17]

They’ll either fold or relocate. I think the Raiders folding would solve a problem for the NRL

Nah, it'd create at least a couple of massive problems for them.

The loss of the Raiders would basically murder RL in the ACT and a huge chunk of SNSW for one thing.

It's actually insane to think that losing one of the most stable and reliable clubs in the NRL would be a good thing for the NRL.

 

[threenewpadlocks]

Nah, it'd create at least a couple of massive problems for them.

The loss of the Raiders would basically murder RL in the ACT and a huge chunk of SNSW for one thing.

It's actually insane to think that losing one of the most stable and reliable clubs in the NRL would be a good thing for the NRL.

I might be wrong in this, but what's defined as the Raiders region also disproportionally produces more NRL talent too yeah? Among Australian-raised talent that is, not NZ or Pacific scholarship/scouted players etc.

 

[Badger17]

Is there a possibility of the NSW Govt funding an upgrade somewhere outside the ACT border, and thus the NSW economy benefitting from the Raiders being based there?

I guess it's not impossible that the NSW Government could fund a new stadium at the Showground or major rebuild of Seiffert in Queanbeyan, but I extremely doubt it. If they were inclined to spend that kind of money on a stadium it wouldn't be in Queanbeyan.

There's also a whole host of issues with basing the team in Queanbeyan. Public transport between Canberra and Queanbeyan is a joke. Parking would be an issue. There'd be local resistance to the project, and for good reason TBF. Yeah, you could probably shave a significant portion off the Raiders average attendance unless it came with significant investment into infrastructure.

 

[Badger17]

I might be wrong in this, but what's defined as the Raiders region also disproportionally produces more NRL talent too yeah? Among Australian-raised talent that is, not NZ or Pacific scholarship/scouted players etc.

Not so much SNSW these days because of a chronic lack of support and funding, but yeah, as a general rule the bush is significantly overrepresented in NRL players.

 

[threenewpadlocks]

I guess it's not impossible that the NSW Government could fund a new stadium at the Showground or major rebuild of Seiffert in Queanbeyan, but I extremely doubt it. If they were inclined to spend that kind of money on a stadium it wouldn't be in Queanbeyan.

There's also a whole host of issues with basing the team in Queanbeyan. Public transport between Canberra and Queanbeyan is a joke. Parking would be an issue. There'd be local resistance to the project, and for good reason TBF. Yeah, you could probably shave a significant portion off the Raiders average attendance unless it came with significant investment into infrastructure.

And I suppose there's a reduced benefit to NSW if players and staff elect to continue to live in Canberra (as they would) instead of Queanbeyan and spend their money in Canberra anyway.

 

[Badja]

I genuinely can't see a new rectangular stadium being built before 2040 at the earliest, probably even later. The political will simply doesn't exist to get it done. There's plenty of political support for upgrades to Manuka though, especially if it came with BBL and AFL licenses.

The rectangular stadium situation is getting so bad that it isn't totally unthinkable that the Raiders could be forced to relocate.

They've spent something like $10 million dollars on the new masterplan that due out this year. That will layout the timeline., but it will be long before 2040, and any upgrade the Manuka will need to be done in parallel with that plan.

 

[erhaltegh74]

Nah, it'd create at least a couple of massive problems for them.

The loss of the Raiders would basically murder RL in the ACT and a huge chunk of SNSW for one thing.

It's actually insane to think that losing one of the most stable and reliable clubs in the NRL would be a good thing for the NRL.

Do you reckon? If NRL are concerned about West Brisbane and also think that NZ is a significant growth area and they want both, they are going to have to come up with a solution.

Furthermore, how do their licence system work. Would the licence conditions restrict the Raiders from relocating? If their stadium doesn’t meet minimum guidelines, could their licence be revoked?

 

[Badger17]

They've spent something like $10 million dollars on the new masterplan that due out this year. That will layout the timeline., but it will be long before 2040, and any upgrade the Manuka will need to be done in parallel with that plan.

The city to the lake plan came out in 2013 (IIRC) and was meant to deliver a stadium before 2020. The government has funded how many studies into a stadium since then? Something like 5 give or take? Most included estimated timelines for a new stadium. How much money has the government spent on all of this over the years? Way more than $10mil, that's for sure.

Point is plans and timelines don't mean anything. They're just trying to make it look like they're doing something, and keep it in the news for the election cycle. The odds of them actually pulling the trigger on building the thing and breaking ground any time soon are slim at best, especially considering some of the economic realities the Territory faces.

 

[Seedsfan]

I think they’ll do both; a second NZ side and a third Brisbane side with the Raiders cut from the competition due to not having a suitable stadium

PNG will get cut then Christchurch will come in. As soon as there is a change of government the funding will get cut to them leaving them completely unviable

 

[erhaltegh74]

PNG will get cut then Christchurch will come in. As soon as there is a change of government the funding will get cut to them leaving them completely unviable

Maybe. I think considering how much PNG love that game and the political stakes with that decision, it would be hard for them to pull out.

Anyway, back to AFL 20th team chat

 

[Aussie in exile]

PNG will get cut then Christchurch will come in. As soon as there is a change of government the funding will get cut to them leaving them completely unviable

IF that did happen the NRL would just put another team in Queensland