Bigger Is Better in Manchester
Norman Foster speaks in a short film about his firm's design of a proposed 100,000-seat stadium for Manchester United — a huge tent-like structure that would enclose “arguably the largest public space in the world.”
Manchster United's announcement this week of its plans for a new stadium was accompanied by architectural renderings and a short film, embedded below, in which Lord Foster boasts of it as “one of the most exciting projects in the world today.” More than a stadium for 100,000 fans, the project would create “a new sports-led neighborhood” and “mixed-use mini city.” Marked by a trio of 200-meter-tall tridents, the new stadium would be located next to Man United's existing Old Trafford stadium, which has “served us brilliantly for the past 115 years,” according to Sir Jim Ratcliffe, a co-owner of the team, but “has fallen behind the best arenas in world sport.” While the stadiums costs are reportedly £2bn, the team contends that the stadium and wider regeneration project “have the potential to deliver an additional £7.3bn per year to the UK economy.”