A leading expert has said that Australian Football League side Collingwood President Eddie McGuire's proposal to demolish Etihad Stadium "demonstrated an Eastern-suburbs centric approach which would make life harder for football fans from other parts of the city and Geelong," according to Larissa Nicholson of THE AGE. RMIT urban planning professor Michael Buxton questioned local politicians' "obsession" with the idea that all of a city's major sporting facilities should be located in the one precinct, saying that "it could create traffic problems and put tremendous strain on public transport." Former Premier John Cain also voiced concerns, saying that "public land should generally be sacrosanct and any changes to its use should be approached with maturity and caution." In a proposal Premier Daniel Andrews said that "he would look at closely," McGuire wants to bulldoze the 15-year-old Etihad Stadium, which sits right near Southern Cross Station on the western side of the city, and "replace it with a new 60,000 capacity ground" next to the Melbourne Cricket Ground. Buxton said that while McGuire's proposal "may have superficial appeal, the government should do detailed planning and traffic studies before making a decision on it." Buxton also said that he was "concerned about how much power big football clubs could wield over Victorian planning processes," citing Collingwood's use of the site of the old Olympic Park as its training grounds. He said that it "amounted to favourable treatment for a powerful club." Buxton: "Public interest should be central here, not the interests of a football club or a certain sporting code" (THE AGE, 3/9). In Sydney, Richard Hinds reported there are "good reasons why McGuire’s proposed stadium might never host a game -- most obviously the potential objection of Tennis Australia which runs the Australian Open." Victoria Stadium would be built on the current site of Hisense Arena, "the Open’s third biggest court." But as attempts to have the NSW Government "bring Sydney’s sporting stadiums into the 21st century reach stalemate due to political bickering and the myopia of local sports clubs, McGuire’s plan demonstrates why Melbourne’ venues are light-years ahead." Where Melbourne creates wonderful arenas, Sydney clubs "squabble about the petty inconvenience of having to abandon their current homes for a few years to build stadiums that, if done properly, would last for decades and vastly improve financial returns" (DAILY TELEGRAPH, 3/9).
