Reduced capacity at Wembley stadium due to engineering works - has anything like this happened before?

[yorkie]

How much capacity is there for coaches? Could it somehow be enforced that some ticket holders *must* travel by coach?

Given many will already do this, how many more would that be, how many are achievable, and how would you enforce this?

I'm only talking about this very specific occasion, and you could do it by post code or something perhaps. Most fans will be local for Southend/Oldham (I had a slanderous explanation for this but it won't add anything to the thread )

How could you actually implement this in the real world? (unless you have any real-world experience in this area, it may be better to stop digging at this point!)

 

[AndyHudds]

There are a lot of events at Wembley stadium. Last weekend was the FA cup at maximum capacity as you mention. The weekend before that was Non-league finals day, this weekend league one/two play off final, next weekend this event, weekend after challenge cup final, weekend after summertime ball, weekend after Dua Lipa, weekend after Linkin Park. That's 8 weekends with events at the stadium in a row based on the Wembley Stadium website, with engineering works the weekend after.

The parties do work together, but TfL need to do the works at some point. Wembley presumably were aware and happy with the arrangement knowing it could limit capacity if more demand than usual for tickets because they'd want to stage the other events as well.

I also would imagine thst there will be large periods where Wembley isn't in use. I bet there wasn't one game/event, without checking anyway, between Christmas and the League Cup final in February, I might be wrong mind. Outside England internationals domestically I bet Wembley Stadium doesn't get much use October to February.

 

[AlterEgo]

Surely the engineering work is planned many many months even year in advance.
Football fixtures sometime are not confirmed until weeks before.

The playoff final dates are confirmed over a year in advance.

 

[Magdalia]

It is 202 miles from my door (postcode) to our home ground. I am a season ticket holder,(that's really a donation as I don't go that often sadly) club member and owner. How do I get to the game under your rule?

That is why I say it is not really practical. Yes, most will come from the environs of the clubs involved but any ex league club is going to have a substantial number of "exiles" who don't.

Being a season ticket holder and/or club member usually means priority for obtaining tickets for the big games.

Most of the people who have supported their teams through the season, or are exiles who have got a season ticket or membership, will get tickets.

The people who will lose out are the bandwagon jumpers who haven't been to a game for years, if at all.

 

[800001]

The playoff final dates are confirmed over a year in advance.

And some engineering work is confirmed and planned 2 years in advance……

 

[AlterEgo]

Being a season ticket holder and/or club member usually means priority for obtaining tickets for the big games.

Most of the people who have supported their teams through the season, or are exiles who have got a season ticket or membership, will get tickets.

The people who will lose out are the bandwagon jumpers who haven't been to a game for years, if at all.

I understand the neutral tickets may still be on sale directly from Wembley?

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 25 May 2025 ==

And some engineering work is confirmed and planned 2 years in advance……

It’s not an arms race!

 

[800001]

I understand the neutral tickets may still be on sale directly from Wembley?

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 25 May 2025 ==


It’s not an arms race!

No one had said it is!
What I’m saying is if NWR/TFL plan work 2 years in advance, surely this Info is shared with Wembley and other sporting places. So that they can then plan then games around those engineering dates!

 

[yorkie]

No one had said it is!
What I’m saying is if NWR/TFL plan work 2 years in advance, surely this Info is shared with Wembley and other sporting places. So that they can then plan then games around those engineering dates!

This is completely unrealistic. It would be the tail wagging the dog.

 

[Egg Centric]

It is 202 miles from my door (postcode) to our home ground. I am a season ticket holder,(that's really a donation as I don't go that often sadly) club member and owner. How do I get to the game under your rule?

That is why I say it is not really practical. Yes, most will come from the environs of the clubs involved but any ex league club is going to have a substantial number of "exiles" who don't.

I get that. That's why I suggested you only do it for people ordering with a local postcode (although Darlo specifically is irrelevant as this is a one off. I also expect it's got an unusually dispersed fan base due to people wanting to escape Darlington )

Given many will already do this, how many more would that be, how many are achievable,

I don't know - that's what I was asking

and how would you enforce this?

Here's the cunning bit - you don't! By the time anyone finds out it's too late...

How could you actually implement this in the real world? (unless you have any real-world experience in this area, it may be better to stop digging at this point!)

See above.

 

[The exile]

This is completely unrealistic. It would be the tail wagging the dog.

In this case the tail is definitely a football match that can be held on any number of days (and indeed at any number of venues if need be). Yes - it might be inconvenient to move it to a different day or deprive fans of “Wembley” if it were to be held at (say) The London Stadium instead - but not half as inconvenient as rescheduling engineering work.

 

[Egg Centric]

Here's the cunning bit - you don't! By the time anyone finds out it's too late...

(There are ways you could more seriously enforce it such as a £200 deposit with every ticket for a local postcode where you have to pick up vouchers on the coaches to get the deposit back, for instance. But for a one off, just pretending sounds perfectly doable)

 

[SteveHFC]

The playoff final dates are confirmed over a year in advance.

The National League Play Off Final date was changed relatively recently (mid-February from memory as I'm not logging into my work email to check for sure) as I was involved in the revised schedules on the Bakerloo Line that are running that day (additional trains running to Harrow & Wealdstone between 1200 and 1900).

Admittedly it was only changed by one day from 31st May to 1st June - but it goes to show that the play-off date wasn't confirmed over a year ago.

 

[800001]

This is completely unrealistic. It would be the tail wagging the dog.

So basically a no win situation

 

[najaB]

so why choose a weekend when an event that has been scheduled months in advance to do engineering works, it's bad from TFL.

Surely that depends on what the engineering work is. There may well be other constraints on when it can be done.

 

[Magdalia]

So basically a no win situation

One team will win, though it may need a penalty shoot out.

 

[AndyHudds]

Surely that depends on what the engineering work is. There may well be other constraints on when it can be done.

You wouldn't do it when 40000 football fans are wanting to turn up though....surely?

 

[Tetchytyke]

You wouldn't do it when 40000 football fans are wanting to turn up though....surely?

There will be many more than that turning up for the events immediately before and immediately after this one.

Sometimes things just have to be done. And this is a good weekend. It’s going to be a big attendance this time around but, in contrast, the 2019 attendance was just 8,000 and even last year’s was only 23,000. There’s a huge difference depending on who is playing and that was only decided last week.

 

[AndyHudds]

There will be many more than that turning up for the events immediately before and immediately after this one.

Sometimes things just have to be done. And this is a good weekend. It’s going to be a big attendance this time around but, in contrast, the 2019 attendance was just 8,000 and even last year’s was only 23,000. There’s a huge difference depending on who is playing and that was only decided last week.

The actual point of all this is why, when there are huge chunks of the calendar year when the stadium is not in use for sporting events or music concerts would you schedule engineering work to be done at the stadiums busiest time when Wembley Park station is there, purposefully, to move large numbers of people to and from the stadium? To me you would schedule that work in or try to when the stadium is not in use? That seems a very logical thing to do?

 

[sprunt]

In this case the tail is definitely a football match that can be held on any number of days (and indeed at any number of venues if need be). Yes - it might be inconvenient to move it to a different day or deprive fans of “Wembley” if it were to be held at (say) The London Stadium instead - but not half as inconvenient as rescheduling engineering work.

No, the tail is very much TfL. They exist to serve the needs of the public, not the other way round.

 

[Flying Snail]

No, the tail is very much TfL. They exist to serve the needs of the public, not the other way round.

The public is a lot more than a bunch of football fans, the people who use and rely on the railways every day are far more important than those wanting to go to a one-off sporting event that they can watch on their telly instead. Engineering work is essential to keep the service running, if it clashes with a football match then tough.

 

[Harsig]

What nobody has mentioned so far is what the actual engineering work is. It is the commissioning of new signalling on the Metropolitan line between Finchley Road, through Wembley Park to Preston Road. The nature of modern signalling systems is heavily software dependent, and so in the first instance the area of suspension required is much much larger than the actual area being resignalled. This is because the software in the signalling control centres affected needs to be updated, preventing any trains operating on lines already controlled from those signalling centres.

On Saturday morning 31st May, the District, Circle, Hammersmith & City and Jubilee lines are all suspended in their entirety, and the Metropolitan line partially suspended for this reason alone. Once the control room software updates are completed most lines will resume operation by Saturday afternoon, with the remaining closure applying to only the stretch of line directly affected by the resignalling.

Nevertheless finding a suitable weekend where such a widespread closure of parts of the underground are possible, even for part of a weekend, must be very challenging as consideration must be given to avoiding as many of the major events that occur across the capital as possible, not just those at one particular venue.

 

[Harpo]

Outside of London, if stadia had to reduce capacity to match rail provision there’d be no matches or concerts.

Anyone who has been to Cardiff’s 70000 capacity Millenium/Principality stadium and been kettled in huge destination-specific queues for occasional 2-5 car trains, might wonder what the fuss is about.

 

[zwk500]

You wouldn't do it when 40000 football fans are wanting to turn up though....surely?

Better than doing it when 90,000 want to turn up....

 

[spyinthesky]

I very much doubt that any ‘fans’ or ‘supporters’ will be disappointed being able to take almost 3 times their average attendance.
As an exile of my home club I have on some occasions been unable to source a ticket due to ticket restrictions and have always thought that the regular attendees should have priority.

 

[Tetchytyke]

The actual point of all this is why, when there are huge chunks of the calendar year when the stadium is not in use for sporting events or music concerts would you schedule engineering work to be done at the stadiums busiest time

As has been pointed out, the engineering work is a huge resignalling project.

“Sorry lads, we’ll have to wait six months to do it, there’s a football match on with an average attendance of 22,000”. Sorry, but no.

As for the highlighted bit, have a look Wembley’s event list. There’s not that much of a fallow period and that fallow period is in the depths of winter.

 

[Magdalia]

There was another option, though it is much too late for it now.

That would have been for the match to be at a different stadium. That's not unprecedented: the 2011, 2021 and 2022 matches were all away from Wembley.

But nearly all of the 20k Southend fans with tickets will want the match to be at Wembley, not somewhere else.

 

[spyinthesky]

There was another option, though it is much too late for it now.

That would have been for the match to be at a different stadium. That's not unprecedented: the 2011, 2021 and 2022 matches were all away from Wembley.

But nearly all of the 20k Southend fans with tickets will want the match to be at Wembley, not somewhere else.

At least half of these 20K can’t even get a ticket for home games at Southend.

 

[AndyHudds]

As has been pointed out, the engineering work is a huge resignalling project.

“Sorry lads, we’ll have to wait six months to do it, there’s a football match on with an average attendance of 22,000”. Sorry, but no.

As for the highlighted bit, have a look Wembley’s event list. There’s not that much of a fallow period and that fallow period is in the depths of winter.

Is engineering work not done in the 'depths of winter'. I'm not really sure what your point is that you're making? I get it needs to be done but just not during Wembley stadiums busy time of the year, surely you can see that and the consternation it's causing?

 

[Tetchytyke]

I get it needs to be done but just not during Wembley stadiums busy time of the year, surely you can see that and the consternation it's causing?

Wembley Stadium’s busy period isn’t the National League play off final, it’s the constant stream of concerts between now and October. Oasis is a big event, Dua Lipa is a big event, this isn’t. Or, more accurately, isn’t usually.

It’s very unusual that so many people want to go to the play off final. Last year’s attendance was 23,000, 2019’s was just 8,000 (and that was before Covid and wasn’t reduced!). There’s only been a couple of occasions when it’s ever been over 40,000. The record is 47,000 and, to prove the point, the year after that record was set the attendance was 15,000.

 

[AndyHudds]

Wembley Stadium’s busy period isn’t the National League play off final, it’s the constant stream of concerts between now and October. Oasis is a big event, Dua Lipa is a big event, this isn’t. Or, more accurately, isn’t usually.

It’s very unusual that so many people want to go to the play off final. Last year’s attendance was 23,000, 2019’s was just 8,000 (and that was before Covid and wasn’t reduced!). There’s only been a couple of occasions when it’s ever been over 40,000. The record is 47,000 and, to prove the point, the year after that record was set the attendance was 15,000.

Last week was the FA Cup final, this weekend is the EFL play off final weekend, next week is the Nationsl League Play Off final, England have 2 home games in the coming weeks and no doubt a summer programme of concerts, so yes, I would say it's a busy period for Wembley, these finals happen every year and I'm sure they book in lots of concerts too.

It is unusual but in effect they are punishing the good people of Southend, although one has to ask where these people are week in week in out if they are so keen on being a Southend fan!!! I guess it's same with any final though, it depends on the teams, if 2 low key teams reached the FA Cup final and only sold 25k tickets each, would there be a similar situation? Engineering work prioritised over fan attendance?