St James' Park
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It was first used by Newcastle United in 1891 after the unification of Newcastle East End and Newcastle West End, although football had been played there since 1880. The ground received only modest expansion until the early 1990s when businessman Sir John Hall invested heavily in the club. By 1995 the stadium had reached a capacity of 36,000 seats. However this was still not enough for the club's fan base, hence plans were drawn to move to a new stadium in nearby Leazes Park. These plans fell through due to political wranglings. Instead the club decided to expand the current St. James' Park by adding extra tiers to the Leazes Stand and the Milburn Stand. The upper tiers on the West and North sides of the ground were completed in July 2000, with seats and executive boxes also installed. Executive boxes in the East Stand were demolished and replaced by seating blocks from pitch level up to the existing rows, in a mirror image of the Milburn stand, increasing capacity to approximately 52,387. The cost of the new construction work was estimated at £42 million, significantly higher than the proposed Leazes Park stadium. Although the stadium appears severely lop-sided when viewed from the outside, the bottom tier of the four stands does create an integral rectangular bowl around the stadium, with the newer stands rising above this on three sides. The scope for further expansion is limited by a road facing the Gallowgate end and listed buildings behind the East Stand. There is also a multi-story car park. The car park includes a ramp into a St James' Park bar, which is sometimes used for competition nights where a car could be the prize. The club also purchased the land around and above the St. James' Metro station, with the eventual aim of building hotel and conference facilities. In 2005, a new bar was built beneath the upper tier of the Gallowgate end, named "Shearer's'" after Newcastle legend Alan Shearer. |
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