Independent report into Hobart's proposed new stadium has found the costs of the project have been significantly underestimated

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Does this mean there might be... "cost blowouts"... on an Australian building project??!!! how unlucky

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This is before the cost blowouts, and still excludes hundreds of millions related to the project (underground car park, scoreboards and replay screens, fitting out the food/drink stands which they are hoping will attract private funds, etc).
 

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This is before the cost blowouts, and still excludes hundreds of millions related to the project (underground car park, scoreboards and replay screens, fitting out the food/drink stands which they are hoping will attract private funds, etc).
Uhh no, the report clearly cites "Cost blowouts and unacknowledged costs" as the basis for the billion-dollar claim.

The guy tried to get another reviewer to back up his claim, and nobody else was willing to put it above $860m (see Appendix 5).

That's about 10% over budget, which is similar to every other recent major AFL stadium build including the widely misreported numbers for Perth.
 
Such a bizarre scenario with this stadium.

There isn't a person alive who thinks they can get it done for $800m. You won't find many people who think they can get it done under $1.2b. You think Qld would be refurbing a desolate outpost for the Olympics if you could build stadia under a billion?

When people are faced with this as a potential reason to reconsider it, they either get shitty with you, or they just don't think it's a good enough reason to not do it. (This is very much reflected in posts here on BF, in letters to editor down there et al)

It's wild politics. We have this basketcase state that couldn't build a ****ing ferry terminal big enough for their $1b worth of boats, that are now going to be second hand before they get to use them - but we have a community down there still giving their government almost free reign to do whatever they want and spend whatever they want to get the stadium done.
 
Such a bizarre scenario with this stadium.

There isn't a person alive who thinks they can get it done for $800m. You won't find many people who think they can get it done under $1.2b. You think Qld would be refurbing a desolate outpost for the Olympics if you could build stadia under a billion?

When people are faced with this as a potential reason to reconsider it, they either get shitty with you, or they just don't think it's a good enough reason to not do it. (This is very much reflected in posts here on BF, in letters to editor down there et al)

It's wild politics. We have this basketcase state that couldn't build a ****ing ferry terminal big enough for their $1b worth of boats, that are now going to be second hand before they get to use them - but we have a community down there still giving their government almost free reign to do whatever they want and spend whatever they want to get the stadium done.
It's bizarre that people can't accept this has moved way past the "negotiate with the AFL" stage.
 
Not really. If the AFL removed the rediculous roof stipulation, it resolves almost all challenges.

Sure but with respect, why would the AFL do that? It’s a pretty easy PR battle to win given the Tasmanian government already agreed to it.

Not sure too many non-tasmanians are going to give sympathy now that the deal that was agreed appears worse than first considered. I’m also not sure too many Tasmanian’s will be thrilled to lose the chance at an AFL team either.
 
The way I see it is that in a cold, dispassionate sense, the AFL has no business expanding into Tassie.

It won’t win new fans in the short or long term - they’re already footy mad and the population growth just isn’t big enough to add more people for what the cost will be.

This is an emotion-driven move aimed at being inclusive of a great footy state.

It will be hard. Setting up a new club (aside from the stadium) is expensive and hard to get a return on. And they absolutely will have retention and recruiting issues - young people are not moving to Tassie with any great eagerness. It’s a country outpost compared to the other clubs.

So given it’ll be a battle, the AFL want to make every last post a winner to give the club the best chance possible.

The stadium is a huge part of that. You want people to want to go there in the dead of winter. You want travelling supporters to go and have a great weekend and return next year to pump so more cash into the club. You want it dead simple to get to from the middle of town, with something to do before and/or after around it. You want to have night footy where the crowd isn’t completely exposed to subzero temps, sleet and rain.

The last thing you want is to put this club on the back foot from Day 1. Sending people on a trek to bloody Bellerive with an old, freezing stadium with nothing surrounding it. Because next time, when it’s a cold night and the couch is calling, they won’t come. Travelling supporters won’t return.

And the club will have more disadvantage.

Stadium experiences make a huge difference, as Adelaide and Perth have shown. A lot of major stadiums are now roofed and with a winter climate like Hobart’s, that’s a no brainer.

Basically, if the fed and state government want this then they need to pay up and do it properly. I don’t see that as totally unreasonable in this case.
 

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Sure but with respect, why would the AFL do that? It’s a pretty easy PR battle to win given the Tasmanian government already agreed to it.

Not sure too many non-tasmanians are going to give sympathy now that the deal that was agreed appears worse than first considered. I’m also not sure too many Tasmanian’s will be thrilled to lose the chance at an AFL team either.
Gil clearly preferred 18 teams, so made things difficult. Perhaps the new boss has a different position.

And most non-Tasmanian’s couldn’t care less either way, but the AFL could spin it like this:

In light of the 200k members, the AFL, clubs and Tasmania agree that 23k is too small. So the new stadium will be 30k. And by having no roof, it can be done on time and budget. This will be more affordable now, and more profitable in the future, and allow for mow travelling fans to experience Tasmania.
 
Not saying they will. Saying they should. They won’t.
Indeed they won't.

That's why it's bizarre for people to still be saying things like "Tas govt should simply not proceed with the stadium and seek to renegotiate the establishment of a Tasmanian AFL team".
 
The way I see it is that in a cold, dispassionate sense, the AFL has no business expanding into Tassie.

It won’t win new fans in the short or long term - they’re already footy mad and the population growth just isn’t big enough to add more people for what the cost will be.

This is an emotion-driven move aimed at being inclusive of a great footy state.

It will be hard. Setting up a new club (aside from the stadium) is expensive and hard to get a return on. And they absolutely will have retention and recruiting issues - young people are not moving to Tassie with any great eagerness. It’s a country outpost compared to the other clubs.

So given it’ll be a battle, the AFL want to make every last post a winner to give the club the best chance possible.

The stadium is a huge part of that. You want people to want to go there in the dead of winter. You want travelling supporters to go and have a great weekend and return next year to pump so more cash into the club. You want it dead simple to get to from the middle of town, with something to do before and/or after around it. You want to have night footy where the crowd isn’t completely exposed to subzero temps, sleet and rain.

The last thing you want is to put this club on the back foot from Day 1. Sending people on a trek to bloody Bellerive with an old, freezing stadium with nothing surrounding it. Because next time, when it’s a cold night and the couch is calling, they won’t come. Travelling supporters won’t return.

And the club will have more disadvantage.

Stadium experiences make a huge difference, as Adelaide and Perth have shown. A lot of major stadiums are now roofed and with a winter climate like Hobart’s, that’s a no brainer.

Basically, if the fed and state government want this then they need to pay up and do it properly. I don’t see that as totally unreasonable in this case.
Temperatures are about 2 degrees colder in Hobart compared to Melbourne in winter. Similar or less days of rain per month too. I've pretty much never thought about it being too cold to go to the G to watch the footy.
 
It's bizarre that people can't accept this has moved way past the "negotiate with the AFL" stage.

It never should have. And funnily enough it isn't too late.
 
Temperatures are about 2 degrees colder in Hobart compared to Melbourne in winter. Similar or less days of rain per month too. I've pretty much never thought about it being too cold to go to the G to watch the footy.
It’s about as close to Melbourne’s temperatures as Melbourne’s is to Sydney’s. It’s a noticeable difference.
 
And funnily enough it isn't too late.
That is funny, but let's be serious. It's far too late for negotiations.

The Tas govt have two options: 1) build the stadium, get a team; 2) don't build, no team.

It's pretty clear which option they're going with... ha ha.
 
Lol, the shits and giggles coming from this are priceless, except it is happening in one of the poorest states in the country. Elon Musk could learn a thing or two from the AFL, surprised Trump hasn't offered Gilligan the post of commandant of the Ministry of Truth! You spend $1 to get 66c back? LMFAO.

 
You know you're in the shit when Fox turns on you, oh that's right they sold the Foxtel golden egg. Well, it's play on then.

"...cost would be about $1380 for each Tasmanian"

Wonder if that includes the homeless, families on the poverty line, those with chronic health issues, etc.....

 
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Lol, the shits and giggles coming from this are priceless, except it is happening in one of the poorest states in the country. Elon Musk could learn a thing or two from the AFL, surprised Trump hasn't offered Gilligan the post of commandant of the Ministry of Truth! You spend $1 to get 66c back? LMFAO.


Plenty of cultural ventures lose money. It’s quite often a leap of faith and, quite simplistically, whether you “want it”.

I don’t think there’s much doubt that an AFL club will deliver non-financial benefits to Tasmania. It will deliver a form of inclusion for the oft-forgotten state. It will give the state a seat at what is, like it or not, one of the highest-profile tables in the country. It will give more people the motivation to visit the state where they never may have before - there are flow-on effects from that.

It will hand the state 100 authentic influencers (players) that it can leverage among young people on the national stage. That is worth something.

This all has value and the AFL knows that. It’s about whether the government wants all this. Of course they’ll want to do it as cheaply as possible to limit fallout. But not sure they can totallly dictate that when it’s only the AFL that can grant them a club.
 
Plenty of cultural ventures lose money. It’s quite often a leap of faith and, quite simplistically, whether you “want it”.

I don’t think there’s much doubt that an AFL club will deliver non-financial benefits to Tasmania. It will deliver a form of inclusion for the oft-forgotten state. It will give the state a seat at what is, like it or not, one of the highest-profile tables in the country. It will give more people the motivation to visit the state where they never may have before - there are flow-on effects from that.

It will hand the state 100 authentic influencers (players) that it can leverage among young people on the national stage. That is worth something.

This all has value and the AFL knows that. It’s about whether the government wants all this. Of course they’ll want to do it as cheaply as possible to limit fallout. But not sure they can totallly dictate that when it’s only the AFL that can grant them a club.

Absolutely agree, my point is rather we have been grossly misled as to the decision making and likely costs/benefits involved in this back-room operation. Our state is already 3 billion in debt and that's rising fast, with the lowest GDP in the nation.

I think that when a decision is so big that it will take literally generations to pay off it needs to be much more heavily, publicly scrutinized, and the AFL recalled to explain, also publicly, why their demands are necessary (I mean a roof ffs).

Anyway, I have no faith in this government to handle a major project like this as time and time again they have f'd up royally (like now paying $55,000 a week for the next few years to store a ferry in Scotland, because two government departments didn't talk to each other).

I personally would then like to see a state referendum on this so the whole population can make their opinions know. I'm happy for it to go ahead, even if the result is close but not if a large majority don't want their taxes spent this way.

Though I know that will never happen.

Not while Eric "the knife" Abetz is stadiums minister.


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Independent report into Hobart's proposed new stadium has found the costs of the project have been significantly underestimated

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