Re: Salford Carpark : Sat Mar 17, 2012 10:57 am  

red13pjb wrote:

I haven't found the supporters car park at Headingley yet and I've been going 30 years!!! We've only had a handful of games and of course there will be teething troubles. As for a lack of local support, we have not got a winning team. If we start to win a few more then more will come. A new ground will not just bring them in.

You've won 3 and 1 of them was against a top 8 Hull team plus you went well for 50mins against ST's and if you need 8k just to break even i'd of thought the new ground ,best squad you've had for a while would attract more fans i'm not having a dig btw i just thought it would be a "new era" appraoch from all connected to the club rather than "we'll wait till we win X amount of games".

Re: Salford Carpark : Sat Mar 17, 2012 11:19 am  

The car parking at the stadium does seem to be an issue.
I took the advice of the poster who recommended the Trafford Centre Park 'n Ride.
We got there early did some shopping & ate at Carluccio's (fixed price menu good value @ 2 courses for £9.95).
I then had a wee bit of bother finding correct car park for the shuttle bus.
Got there at about 6.50.
I became worried when the Reds fan we talked to there said he'd got the bus there at 7 at a previous game & missed the start of the match since it took over an hour to cover the 2 miles to the ground via the Barton Bridge on the M62 & the single lane road into the car park.
However, the bus reached the ground by 7.20, so no worries.
The fan had also said we should leave about 5 minutes before the end to get an early shuttle bus back to TC.
We didn't & just missed the 1st bus.
Again I was concerned at the numbers gathering for the next bus with no queuing system or stewards to control it.
But the bus came about 10.15, we nearly all got on using the japanese tube tactic of just shoving till we got through the door onto the bus.
We arrived back at TC just after 10.30, straight in the car & back onto the M62 over the Barton Bridge again.
Despite the extensive 50mph limit on the M62 I got back home by 11.25.
You could see that the ground car park was still very full even so late after the end of the game so we'd made the right choice.
But it did cost £1 each way so for 4 passengers it would be dearer than the stadium option, ideal for 1 or 2 in a catr though.
Next time we go I may well try the Aerodrome option provided that the parking area is hard standing & not grass.
I agree with all the other comments about the size of the crowd & the appearance of the stadium.
Finally, I do think that Salford would make more money if they allowed away fans to purchase seated tickets from the away fans home club.

Re: Salford Carpark : Sat Mar 17, 2012 12:59 pm  

You have got to remember that we have 30 years of under achieving behind us and 2 very high profile successful football clubs on our door step. We are in that catch 22 situation where we need to win something to attract new fans but we need the income of the new fans to attract players capable of winning. All we can hope is that the corporate side helps narrow the gap and progress can be made next season on the playing side. Gareth Ellis coming to us might help
Supporters of big clubs often forget how hard it is for clubs like us to operate. Marketing a poor product is hard. You don't seem to understand why locals don't want to go. But would you keep paying your cash with no hope of ever getting any success. The way the game is run there is little hope that we will ever get a level playing field with more teams having a chance of silverware like the NRL!
Lets be honest, how many of you would give up your domination in favour of Salford or Wakefield having a crack at the title one year. Selfishness of wanting your team to win every year drives us all in truth. But that is a lot easier when you support one of the teams that is always up there!!!

Re: Salford Carpark : Sat Mar 17, 2012 4:06 pm  

rhinoms wrote:

What surprised me more was the lack of home support CS i'm sure i read somewhere they need a home average of 8k to break even yet only 6k+ last night and i say at least 2/2.5k were Leeds fans.

The 8000 is to spend the full salary cap rather than break even. There are too many reasons to go into regarding crowds however the club and stadium company have basically blown the chance of starting with a bang by doing little or no promotion of the first few games, and now trying to play catch up crowd wise when we have already missed our big opportunity. We now have no option than to go for the slow build over the 3 year franchise and hopefully start pulling some decent crowds in during this period.

Re: Salford Carpark : Sat Mar 17, 2012 5:03 pm  

Used public transport for the game. seemed to take blumming ages to get there and back from Manchester city centre.

Re: Salford Carpark : Sat Mar 17, 2012 7:22 pm  

Ridiculous amount of time to get out of the car park at the end. Over an hour is far too long. It obviously hasn't been thought about which is inexcusable for a new stadium.
The low crowds are a worry, as are the number of sponsor boards that aren't sold.

Re: Salford Carpark : Sat Mar 17, 2012 7:38 pm  

red13pjb wrote:

I haven't found the supporters car park at Headingley yet and I've been going 30 years!!! We've only had a handful of games and of course there will be teething troubles. As for a lack of local support, we have not got a winning team. If we start to win a few more then more will come. A new ground will not just bring them in.

For starters there hasn't been a general car park for supporters at Headingley since they stopped the parking around the cricket ground decades ago. Nor is there likely to be one given the highly built up nature of the immediate surrounding area.
Secondly, I don't believe they are just teething troubles. The problem is that the exit routes aren't good enough. This can only be helped by improving the infrastructure and not by honing procedures.

Finally your marketing and matchday experience is still amateurish compared to most clubs.

A winning team will help but as long as you tout lone bagpipers wailing along the top of the stand and 4-year-old girls (cute though she undoubtedly was) trying to keep up with other prepubescent amateurs as pre-match entertainment, I think you're going to struggle.
As for the announcer telling the crowd at half-time that 'we've got to have some optimism' (or something along those lines)...enough said.

Re: Salford Carpark : Sat Mar 17, 2012 7:50 pm  

My overall impression of the new stadium was that it had been built with no consideration for traffic management at all.

We paid to park at the stadium - big mistake, it took us 55 minutes to get out of the car park then exactly the same amount of time to get back to Leeds.

I've been to every professional RL stadium in this country and no other ground closes the car parks so that pedestrians can leave without causing a problem to traffic.

As with the parking I found everything a little disorganised - buying tickets, getting through the turnstiles, buying food/drink.

The stadium itself was nice enough but they need to start to get their act together a little more.

Re: Salford Carpark : Sat Mar 17, 2012 8:16 pm  

The overall message I got from last night's visit was "Dont come back" - away fans are generally harder to dissuade than home fans so I worry for Salford's prospects of growing crowds

One road in, one road out - oh dear

It's a cheek to ask people to pay to park when there is no-one is there to organise things, the only thing that mattered to the staff was taking the fivers, then it was leave people on their own - we parked up on the way in and then got moved on to another car park as we had parked in an unofficial car park and on the way out it was a free for all, a lot of angry shouting and horn blowing and we were out after a modest half hour with many cars still left behind

it feels like they made one good stand and then couldn't be bothered with the rest, it's all very separated and open too

the stands behind the goals are shallow and small, poor view and difficult to get an atmosphere going yet this is the main area for home and away fans, surely the stand opposite the main one should be standing for home fans to help generate an atmosphere?

little going on pre-match, not much at half time, i liked the sarcy announcer though he didn't know much about the game

why sell tickets separately from the turnstile and then have a man on the turnstile too?

Re: Salford Carpark : Sat Mar 17, 2012 8:32 pm  

Honestly didnt rate the stadium its too open they should look to close in those corners even if purely with cladding it feels like all the money was spent on the one grand stand then the rest just 3 cowsheds built it lacked any atmosphere atall . This is the trouble with new grounds. Will have to see how langtree park is next week.