True Blue Grit

June 10th, 2020 at 9:21 PM ^

Sorry, demand has already maxed out.  Already many thousands don't show up for each game.  And that's people who have already purchased tickets.  With the current public health situation, even fewer people will be coming out to games.  

707oxford

June 11th, 2020 at 12:01 AM ^

Love it.

Even if the actual stadium is never expanded, the look of adding the three-story Romanesque arches all the way around the stadium is magnificent. 

I know attendance is an issue across the sport in general (especially with public health concerns), but this type of expansion would allow the AD to lower ticket prices at least in the nosebleeds so attending the games can be more accessible to families/etc. Higher capacity allows the AD to reduce ticket prices until they are low enough to legitimately sell out every game and still end up with increased overall revenues, especially when considering all the additional concession sales and the like. 
 

Traffic would suck even worse though. 

MFunk

June 11th, 2020 at 12:27 AM ^

Maybe in 2030 we could entertain this idea but that's a-ways out. 

Really I think stadiums will shrink because the younger generation doesn't even watch full games on TV as a whole like us old folks. Let alone spend a fortune to go be inconvenienced. They are just not growing up with the same passion for live sports as we were... as a group. They get the highlights on their device. Don't need to spend 3+ hours suffering. It's sad, but true I think. 

It will be interesting how this all plays out. 

If I am wrong I am sure you will let me know.... 

 

ak47

June 11th, 2020 at 11:25 AM ^

What would seemingly make the most sense is decks that bracket the current screens on either side, helps trap noise and probably take capacity to like 120k which feels more feasible (its not really feasible) than 150k

MGoStrength

June 11th, 2020 at 11:51 AM ^

I'll bet many UM traditionalists will hate it and to that I say stop living in the past unless you want UM to be a has been, which it kinda already is.  I love it.  I bet it would hold the sound in much better and make the stadium much louder and give a better home field advantage.

The Homie J

June 11th, 2020 at 8:27 PM ^

That's pretty cool, though I don't see it happening.  My main concern re:the stadium is crowd noise.  I hate seeing us and other teams succumb to the road environment at Camp Randall, Ohio Stadium, Beaver Stadium (especially during a White Out), or Kinnick Stadium.  We have so many fans but not that intimidating a home field advantage due to the open air.

My favorite idea instead of a deck or fully-encased press boxes is a quarter or half canopy that wraps all the around.  No need for a dome or roof, but a canopy like those around soccer stadiums in Europe or seen here in the states at Husky Field (Washington), Century Link (Seattle Seahawks), Autzen Stadium (Oregon) or McLane Stadium (Baylor).  Covers a decent amount of seats from the elements, making rainy or snowy games more tolerable without eliminating the elements from the field itself, and would make for nice shade during warmer seasons.  But most of all, finally trap the sound of 100,000 fans and bring us to par with the other tough places to play in our conference.

Frank Chuck

June 12th, 2020 at 3:17 PM ^

Agree.

Michigan's crowd noise is not intimidating. It angers and annoys me a lot. Our 110,000 feels like  60,000 on most Gamedays.

Wisconsin's Camp Randall - with its 80,000 capacity - is louder than Michigan Stadium despite having less than 75% of our 110,000 capacity.

I want structural changes to enhance our acoustics and makes our 110K feel like a vicious pack of  125,000 wolverines about to devour everything in sight like a zerg rush in Starcraft. If it means adding a deck, then sure.

But in essence, make our "more" feel like "overwhelmingly, insurmountably more."

We should incentivize our wine and cheese crowd to be ruthless. Too many passive old timers imo.

We need to do things that make our stadium incredibly intimidating. I want top 5/10 visiting teams to walk into the stadium and feel like they're already down *at least* 10 points before kickoff.