Calls for West Stand to be demolished after 'near miss' incident

[marconi]

50 minutes ago, BIG D said:

Can you imagine if we’d had fans falling out of the upper tier of stands like at Chelsea and Ipswich in the last few weeks. 

A Bolton fan did. A fact missed by BBC Look North this week.

[Hyde2005]

3 hours ago, Bluesteel. said:

It’s only fans of PL clubs that flippantly suggest this and yes in an ideal world it would have been demolished or changed but there’s been absolutely no chance of that being viable in the last 23 years. If knocking down and rebuilding stands was so easy then it would happen a lot more in the EFL…

exactly this is very little to nothing happening championship downwards . it was almost impossible 3 years ago due to cost now impossible , the same job 3 years ago is now double ,material costs are way higher now.  

[MallorcaOwl]

Safe or not it should be pulled down. The memory of that day will live with us and the football family forever. Demolish it now and build a single tier standvfor away fans with a capacity of 3 or 4 thousand. I realise that we haven't got the funds to do this, and will probably carry on as we are for the forseeable future.

Edited March 16 by MallorcaOwl
typo

[doubleo]

2 hours ago, Jeffjohnsonmyhero said:

Near miss my arse ,I Will tell you what happened that day ,Newcastle fans had tickets in lep stand ,They came down to stand with their down stairs ,So till the stand is knocked down ,Stop any fans sitting in lower ,Tri angle will never be used again .Shut lower lep down and take all seats out.

Good God ! Don’t start blaming fans for not complying with things like seat numbers and common sense. It’s everyone’s fault but theirs, don’t you know.

[MSOwl1]

The stadium looks awful. No investment in the stadium for donkies years. You can see paint peeling on TV on close up's.!!! Its sad. West stand is so old and undeveloped, again not invested in, so yes it's ready to be pulled down. The whole place is sad.

[Bluesteel.]

17 minutes ago, Hyde2005 said:

exactly this is very little to nothing happening championship downwards . it was almost impossible 3 years ago due to cost now impossible , the same job 3 years ago is now double ,material costs are way higher now.  

 Yep and there’s no spare cash at this level. 

[adelphi1867]

14 hours ago, @owlstalk said:

 

 

A spokesman for a Hillsborough survivors’ group has said the Leppings Lane End of Sheffield Wednesday’s stadium “needs to be knocked down” after an overcrowding incident last January was labelled a “near miss”.

 

Newcastle fans reported safety issues before their third-round FA Cup tie against Sheffield Wednesday in January 2023, with some choosing to rip netting from seats to make space.

 

Sheffield Wednesday commissioned a review with Sheffield City Council which recommended increased CCTV and stewarding as well as a significant reduction in capacity to the Leppings Lane end.

 

The upper tier has been reduced from 3,200 to 2,400 and the lower tier from 1,500 to 1300, but no structural changes were suggested.

The Leppings Lane end was where 97 Liverpool fans were unlawfully killed during the 1989 FA Cup semi-final.

 

Sheffield City Council’s sports grounds and events lead officer Matt Proctor told a meeting: “The initial concerns were raised by a journalist’s photograph and we actually reached out to Newcastle United supporters to give their insight into exactly what their actual concerns were about being at that particular end of that particular stadium.

 

“When we received responses from Newcastle supporters they raised different issues to the issues raised by the journalist and we carried out a full investigation.

 

“We classed it as a near miss and alterations have been made to the operation of that particular stadium as a result of the feedback.”

 

Peter Scarfe from the Hillsborough Survivors Support Alliance told i: “Realistically that end needs to be knocked down and rebuilt. It’s a very old stadium, it’s not very well designed, it suited its purpose 100-odd years ago but now it doesn’t align with safety. It needs to be changed.

 

“We tend to go back to Hillsborough quite often, part of the therapy and healing. The stadium hasn’t changed a great deal, it’s still quite a daunting-looking place. It’s still a dangerous stadium, it doesn’t matter whether you reduce it by 50 per cent, it still needs to be policed in the right manner.”

 

Scarfe added: “The Leppings Lane end is so dated and poorly marked. It bottlenecks, it’s on the corner between the river and terraced houses.

 

“It’s not the most accessible area, and then once you go through those turnstiles, there’s no direction to go left, right or down the tunnel. You know the term ‘tunnel vision’, that’s what you see in front of you so that’s where you go.

 

“They have done a few modifications, but not enough, when you hear the announcement that they’ve put extra CCTV in and they’re going to speak to extra stewards, it’s still not enough.”

If we were owned by an Oil rich nation we would be able to replace the whole stadium.

[mildatheart67]

Wednesday have had likely hundreds if millions in income since the diaster ,its been a choice not to to the correct thing.

Walking thru that  tunnel knowing that people died in it is chilling

[OneManBand]

Gerrit knocked darn ffs.

[TheSlicer]

I agree knock it down and build something fit for purpose that wraps round onto the south and north a large one tier stand that can be split several ways to accommodate differing amounts of away fans. 
 

And if the make believe money to do this stretches this far, I’d also suggest having the same colour blue throughout the entire stand. 

[Roscoe P. Coltrane]

1 hour ago, Bluesteel. said:

 Yep and there’s no spare cash at this level. 

QPR's new state of the art training facilities must have cost a few bob.....

[Burnsie]

Just now, Roscoe P. Coltrane said:

QPR's new state of the art training facilities must have cost a few bob.....

and their owners are billionaires 

[Burnsie]

45 minutes ago, mildatheart67 said:

Wednesday have had likely hundreds if millions in income since the diaster ,its been a choice not to to the correct thing.

Walking thru that  tunnel knowing that people died in it is chilling

yup, and yet we've been in massive debt pretty much all that time too!

[Roscoe P. Coltrane]

Just now, Burnsie said:

and their owners are billionaires 

So what 

My point was that their spending on infrastructure 

Unlike our Muppet of an owner whose shot his wad on nowt.......

[akbuk]

It should have been knocked 30 + years ago

[akbuk]

4 minutes ago, Roscoe P. Coltrane said:

So what 

My point was that their spending on infrastructure 

Unlike our Muppet of an owner whose shot his wad on nowt.......

What about the muppets that preceeded him? 

[Kentowl]

15 hours ago, @owlstalk said:

 

 

A spokesman for a Hillsborough survivors’ group has said the Leppings Lane End of Sheffield Wednesday’s stadium “needs to be knocked down” after an overcrowding incident last January was labelled a “near miss”.

 

Newcastle fans reported safety issues before their third-round FA Cup tie against Sheffield Wednesday in January 2023, with some choosing to rip netting from seats to make space.

 

Sheffield Wednesday commissioned a review with Sheffield City Council which recommended increased CCTV and stewarding as well as a significant reduction in capacity to the Leppings Lane end.

 

The upper tier has been reduced from 3,200 to 2,400 and the lower tier from 1,500 to 1300, but no structural changes were suggested.

The Leppings Lane end was where 97 Liverpool fans were unlawfully killed during the 1989 FA Cup semi-final.

 

Sheffield City Council’s sports grounds and events lead officer Matt Proctor told a meeting: “The initial concerns were raised by a journalist’s photograph and we actually reached out to Newcastle United supporters to give their insight into exactly what their actual concerns were about being at that particular end of that particular stadium.

 

“When we received responses from Newcastle supporters they raised different issues to the issues raised by the journalist and we carried out a full investigation.

 

“We classed it as a near miss and alterations have been made to the operation of that particular stadium as a result of the feedback.”

 

Peter Scarfe from the Hillsborough Survivors Support Alliance told i: “Realistically that end needs to be knocked down and rebuilt. It’s a very old stadium, it’s not very well designed, it suited its purpose 100-odd years ago but now it doesn’t align with safety. It needs to be changed.

 

“We tend to go back to Hillsborough quite often, part of the therapy and healing. The stadium hasn’t changed a great deal, it’s still quite a daunting-looking place. It’s still a dangerous stadium, it doesn’t matter whether you reduce it by 50 per cent, it still needs to be policed in the right manner.”

 

Scarfe added: “The Leppings Lane end is so dated and poorly marked. It bottlenecks, it’s on the corner between the river and terraced houses.

 

“It’s not the most accessible area, and then once you go through those turnstiles, there’s no direction to go left, right or down the tunnel. You know the term ‘tunnel vision’, that’s what you see in front of you so that’s where you go.

 

“They have done a few modifications, but not enough, when you hear the announcement that they’ve put extra CCTV in and they’re going to speak to extra stewards, it’s still not enough.”

The legal definition of a near miss is something along the lines of " if certain things had happened differently, there may have been an accident".

Go to any football ground today with a H&S hat on and you will find dozens of examples. 

[room0035]

I have been calling for the leppins lane stand to be demolished for years, there is room behind it to get the safety measure in.

 

Until its gone the stigma will always be there. I would also rename it after an ex player, to try to move on for the disaster always being associated with the name too.

 

But that would mean having a chairman who invests in the club infrastructure, we have had one of these since Dave Richards when he rebuilt the south stand for Euro 96, and when ever its mentioned with the current chairman, we have the same excuse, lets wait till we reach the premier league or as the fans know it never.

[sheffield_dave]

4 hours ago, paulrs said:

Incredibly easy to say with hindsight and totally ignoring the facts that 

 

a) no one was saying that at the time

b) there have been no significant incidents or injuries in the 35 years since

c) that end continued to be regularly sold out throughout the 90s to much bigger capacity than it is now, with no problems - including on numerous occasions by Liverpool fans

d) even after the disaster and subsequent Taylor report the stadium was deemed safe enough to host semi-finals and even a cup final replay in 97 

 

Now I’m not defending that end of the stadium nowadays. If £100m dropped out of the sky, redeveloping that end would be close to the top of my priority list. But nor am I going to sit here in 2024 making statements about what *should* have happened 35 years ago. The whole stadium has been neglected ever since due to decades of mismanagement and underperformance- that’s the problem.

97 people died.

 

Again, regardless of your opinion about whatever discussion points occur in between, a tragic loss of life happened at that end of the ground and that could - arguably should - be all the justification needed to say it should have come down in 89 or at any point in the immediate years since. I really don’t think this is a hindsight thing.
 

Ibrox and Heysel are unrecognisable now. So is Valley Parade. The Lepp looks near enough exactly the same as it did back then, and whilever that’s the case, it’s going to be something that will attract negative attention and negativity to us/the club.

[Worthing_owl]

One day it will probably happen. We aren't and haven't been in a position to spend money out on the ground in years. Spending money on an area for the away fans wouldn't go down well IMO. 

 

In the list of priorities it isn't near the top. We don't sell out the away end that often and if we go to league one it will be even less often.