He’s a man with a plan, Eddie McGuire. He always has been. And more often than not he pulls it off.
This latest one, however, which involves replacing Eithad Stadium with a new 60,000 capacity super-stadium next door to the MCG, might not be so successful.
Let’s for a moment go along with the idea that Etihad Stadium should be replaced with something new. Like or loathe that idea, it’s not totally without merit. The stadium isn’t a bad one in and of itself. However, along with Southern Cross Station, is a big part of the man-made, non-traversable wall that exists between the city and Docklands, robbing Melbourne of a potential waterfront aspect to the CBD.
The whole area could be a hell of a lot better.
Of course Etihad would have to be replaced, and Eddie’s plan has the new stadium in the sporting precinct alongside the MCG, AAMI Park and Melbourne Park.
Again, it’s an idea not without merit. Existing transport infrastructure is already in place and it would form another limb of a world-class sporting mecca.
So we’re still with Eddie to a point, but it’s here that the plan goes from the possibly sublime to the absolutely ridiculous.
Have a look at the precinct. Eddie’s plan is to build the new stadium essentially where Hisense Arena currently sits, immediately to the north of Collingwood’s training ground.
That makes precisely zero sense. In fact it’s literally the most troublesome and expensive location within the precinct.
Firstly, Hisense Arena is there. So we level that. But Hisense is still required as Melbourne Park’s ‘second’ court. So we rebuild it, but it can’t move too far, as it still needs to fall within the tennis precinct. So it goes on top of the trainlines.
That’s the second point. Eddie’s plan has us sinking train stations and building enormous platforms over them to accommodate a relocated Hisense Arena, with the new 60,000 seat Stadium Ed also spreading across it. It has to – it’ll take up more room than the existing Hisense, and spreading south would put it on Collingwood’s training centre. Something tells me Eddie would be less eager on relocating his beloved Pies than Hisense Arena.
It wouldn’t be cheap, either. The last time Melbourne put mega-platforms above train lines was Federation Square, and it swallowed five years and half a billion dollars.
It would cover Olympic Boulevard as well. So we’re sinking that into a tunnel. Cha-ching.
Sinking Richmond Station below would be hellishly expensive again, not to mention the expansions it’d require to deal with additional crowds.
Every single train line from the heaving south-eastern suburbs funnels through Richmond. These would all have to stop for an undetermined period of time while the monstrous project is carried out. All major projects are disruptive to some extent. This would grind things to a dead halt.
Then the position itself – aside from requiring all this remediation work, it’s actually not a great spot. It’s not ideal from a crowd perspective – it’s the furthest possible location from the two train stations which service the precinct, Jolimont and Richmond. And it’s right smack-bang in the middle of a world class tennis precinct, which would be compromised for it.
Again, making the considerable assumption that a new stadium should be put in this area specifically, there’s far better spots. You could level Punt Road Oval and build it there. There’s Gosch’s Paddock.
Or of course, there’s the location of Collingwood’s training facilities (which would test how keen Eddie really is on this new stadium).
None of these locations are ideal, but compared to Eddie’s spot, they’re all better locations, far less disruptive to everything else, and would be monumentally cheaper and easier to build on.
So what’s he thinking?
I really can’t see any advantage of putting it there apart from the fact it’s beautifully aligned to the current Collingwood facility.
It’d create a perfect black and white strip: with the club’s home on the Yarra, the new 60,000-seat stadium for home games immediately north, and the 100,000 seat MCG immediately north again for the big games.
The whole zone could become very Collingwood-friendly on match days, with the players able to warm up and down on their own turf then make their way into the stadiums for matches. I’m sure there’d be plenty of facilities available for the black-and-white army too. The whole area would be managed by a combined AFL-MCC ‘super trust’, and I don’t think we need many guesses as to who the president of that would be.
So let’s be honest here – while Eddie may talk of a world-class sporting precinct, his plan is really a world-class Collingwood precinct. With details, compromise and huge expense added for little other reason than to accommodate the club.
Big ideas and ambition are fine, so good on Eddie for having both. But adding extreme cost for no wider benefit, for a state already screaming for infrastructure spend on roads and other projects? Surely even Eddie can’t justify this with a straight face.
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