Oh look, the thread police. Make multiple mentions of climate and stadiums, the demand anyone with a counter opinion go elsewhere.
So two points:
1- Just as you claim it is easier for those south of the bridge to get to Mt Smart than NHS, it is easier for those north of the bridge to get to NHS than Mt Smart. It is also difficult to bike from Browns Bay to Mount Smart. You want to campaign for stadium demolitions, campaign for your local stadium, not one that services another community. Try to look at the bigger picture, there is more than just happens in your back yard. Imagine for a moment if Mt Smart or Mt Eden was demolished and the land sold. Then try and imagine how easy it would not be to a) find somewhere to build a replacement and b) get it past the local NIMBYs
2- Newsflash on climate change; it is not an ‘emergency’. Climate change has been an issue for a long time, but it is nether caused by a few football fans driving to a stadium, not solved by stopping them driving to a stadium. The cars that go to and from any stadium in this country wouldn’t even register as a blip on the daily vehicle use if it tripled. There are much bigger causes of climate change than sports fans driving to stadiums.
Sure, but if 1% of football fans internationally who drove this year to stadiums, didn’t drive to the stadiums next year that would be a significant change.
But that’s an urban design question or a behavior question. And yah shouldn’t be drivin if you are drinking, so the solution is to fundraise to buy everyone two beers a game….though I just realized you shouldn’t be cycling either. Thought I’d solved it.
And I think also that this is what I’ve been saying- an Auckland franchise is either a pan Auckland Eden Park activity to unite the tribes or it’s a regional effort- a Shore plus, a Waitakere plus, a Manukau plus, an Ellerslie plus… if it’s a parochial enough regional effort then it survives down turns better imo. If you can bake in 4-5k in a local radius as a base figure that’s a good start.
We might see fewer 20k efforts with fans flying/driving/hitching in from all over as we’d do with ‘Nix Auckland games or we might see more with that kiwi derby. Who knows.
Auckland ain't big enough yet, and the A League no where stable enough financially - for any Auckland team to not be a 'whole of Auckland team'. It would be silly to try to set it up as either a North Shore or central/south Auckland type club. They will need all the fans they can get. Another reason to me why it should be primarily based at Eden Park - the most central location in the Super City.
But yeah sure in 10-15 years (maybe less), Auckland could be at over 2M people, with thousands more living north of the Bridge. The A League maybe very stable. The APL's proposed plan of 20-24 teams over 2 divisions (A1 & A2) maybe working well. Could a 2nd Auckland team (North Shore United) based at NHS be a new franchise? Possibly.
It may not ever have the demographic/social divide of say WSW verus Sydney FC, or Boca verus River Plate - but the North Shore is certainly different enough to central/south Auckland to have a proper derby rivalry for 09 football fans if it ever happened. And again is another reason why suggestions to demolish NHS, could be very short term thinking.