Bobs PHN interview on line now

[trinity]

Yep. Tell me if you were a Sheffield United (or Wednesday) supporter and were asked to swop to the other team - would you?

[Jordan R]

sorry, but what the hell has that got to do with it?? I am a Wednesday fan, I would never ever support United, I would support my hometown team (Donny Rovers). But the Steelers would move a couple of miles down the road, and I would like to think they would keep the Sheffield name. So again, what is swapping football teams got to do with the Steelers?

[Keith Sheppard]

Yep. Tell me if you were a Sheffield United (or Wednesday) supporter and were asked to swop to the other team - would you?

You're not being asked to change teams, it's your team that may be moving, (not far) to a new home. If you want to use a football analogy, Arsenal moved a similar distance that we may move from Highbury to the Emirates, Rotherham have moved to Sheffield in order to survive, Man City similarly have moved from Main Road to the City of Manchester Stadium.
What is the problem?

[trinity]

No problem - just my choice.

[Jordan R]

So are you basically saying that you will only support the Steelers if they play out of the Arena or Ice Sheffield?

[HockeyPlayer07]

Why are you choosing to not travel 3.4 miles?

[elliott hall]

In the interview, Bob said:

We have all the season ticket holders on a database now

A database of season ticket holders has existed throughout Bob's ownership.
He has received financial reports from that database.
He has received demographic reports from that database.
Some of those reports were written in direct response to his request.

[Navunik]

In the interview, Bob said:

We have all the season ticket holders on a database now

A database of season ticket holders has existed throughout Bob's ownership.
He has received financial reports from that database.
He has received demographic reports from that database.
Some of those reports were written in direct response to his request.

I think this was in reference to this years applications, some of which still needed processing?

[Hewett50]

Not to be a pessissimist but there are several things in here that worry me considerably and I would be grateful if someone could possibly provide answers to the following questions that I have:

1) What is the car parking at Magna like?
2) Does Magna have an ice plant that is capable of providing us with a decent sized and playable rink as well as providing all the other paraphenalia (a Zamboni for instance) and the required expertise to maintain this surface?
2a) If Magna does not currently have an ice plant that is capable of this, how expensive would one be to buy\hire the required equipment and staff required to maintain this - I assume this cost would be borne solely by the Steelers organisation (as I imagine it would be of little benefit to Magna to have such a facility otherwise), seeing as how we required the bank to ride in at the "11th hour and 59th minute" (Bob's words used in the Radio Sheffield Interview the other night) and this is (according to today's Star) only enough to make to the start of the season, how do the club anticipate meeting this cost whilst also meeting the costs incurred of the day to day running of the club during the season? I'm also assuming this ice would remain down for the duration of the season for the team to practice on and for advertising space on the ice surface to also be sold - this increasing the maintenance and running costs of the facility whilst bringing little (to no) additional revenue (through the likes of public skating).

And perhaps most importantly in my eyes

3) I was at Abbeydale for the Fans Forum. Bob said the relationship was getting better, as demonstrated by the high number of weekend dates we had been able to confirm - and maybe I'm a bit of a cynic and maybe because I've only seen this written down rather than heard him say that I'm reading more into it but - what have the league seen and shared during their liaisons with the Arena that has caused the position to deteriorate? If it was solely over the ownership issue, can we expect a joint statement from both the Arena and the Sheffield Steelers that the contract is signed and sealed in the next few days?

I know some people on here will accuse me of 'having an agenda' or whatever, but the truth of the matter is I really don't care who owns it, or who they employee behind the scenes, I just want to continue to have a hockey team I can go watch on a Saturday night rather than watch the 'reality' TV tripe that BBC and ITV pass off as 'entertainment'.

John

Does anone actually read a word I post on this forum??

[Hewett50]

Magna - why do they need an ice plant? Is it essential for a science museum?

Magna is a Science Adventure visitor attraction... not a museum, infact the powers that be get rather tetchy if you call it a museum.

Also we at Magna would quite like an Ice Plant... and the ideas have been thrown around for years to get one, so I'm told.

[HockeyPlayer07]

Are you allowed to tell us more ?

[Taz'n'Jim]

1) What is the car parking at Magna like?

I wondered the same and the Magna website says there are 500 free car parking spaces :)

Not sure if they would remain 'free' for steelers games though

[Hewett50]

I have been informed by my MD I can't go into detail of where the rink will be situated other than "in a large un-used area of the site" and that all the necessary site quiries have been answered by the correct people and we are basically in a round about way jsut waiting for the go ahead from the Steelers.

any other questions?

[HockeyPlayer07]

Any ideas on layout/capacity/timeline to completion?

Would MAGNA be running it, or would it be the Steelers (as the YES project was going to be) ?

[Hewett50]

Any ideas on layout/capacity/timeline to completion?

Would MAGNA be running it, or would it be the Steelers (as the YES project was going to be) ?

Not 100% sure on the running... originally it was suggested Steelers would be tennents but then that may have changed.

As for the other questions

Timeline - At one point required for the ice plant to be in for this Christmas... that however seems a push so IF the proposed move happened it would likely at a guess be for next season

Capacity - No where near confirmed but we do believe to have scope for 5,000

Layout - Not sure I understand what you mean on this one... as said before the rink would be situated in a currently unused and large area of the site with ease of access to the onsite FREE (currently) car parking and importantly for Magna, near the main entrance for the added possibility of secondary spend.