Building the Amex: February 17th 2010
February 17th 2010 was a good day for Brighton supporters who liked massive erections as the first pieces of the East Stand arch at the Amex Stadium were lifted into place.
The WeAreBrighton.com team couldn’t afford to miss it and so we headed to Falmer for the second time in 15 days to check out exactly what was going on at the construction site.
Our previous visit had been a little pointless if truth be told. North Stand Chat and early days Twitter had been full of Chinese whispers that the erection of the Amex Stadium East Stand arch would be taking place on February 2nd.
It wasn’t. Instead, we merely got to see the arch positioned neatly on what would go onto be the pitch, ready and waiting to be lifted into position by the massive crane that had been constructed on site. And so began a waiting game for when it would actually happen.
Four days after a 2-1 home defeat to eventual League One champions Norwich City, that day arrived. It was a gloriously sunny day – the first time we’d visited the site in nice conditions – which meant that we spent a good hour and a half wandering around and taking photos.
Obviously, the main purpose of the visit was to check out the erection. The arch had been split into three sections with each third being lifted into place in turn. First to go in was the South Stand part, which is what we were treated to on this particular visit.
This particular section was held in place by a massive structure of red metal while it awaited its two companions to be erected. Even with just one part of the East Stand arch in place, you began to understand the sheer size of the stadium – a world away from Withdean.
Good progress was being made on the South Stand with the concourse and terracing now nearly complete. Attention was now turning towards the largest part of the stadium, with concrete beginning to be poured into form the foundations of the West Stand.
We also took a look at proceedings from a path running alongside the railway line, with work going on to improve Falmer Station involving rickety old bridges all over the place that wouldn’t look out of place in the Crystal Maze.
This vantage point provided us with our first close up look of the north end of the East Stand. Although nothing of note had yet been done in terms of construction of the North Stand itself, you were afforded a much better view of the interior of the East Stand from down there.
