Personally, I can’t wait to get back into the pub, the grandstands, the concert halls etc. The pandemic of 1918 didn’t kill off mass entertainment, so I seriously doubt this little problem will.
Back to the comparison of the two sites, it is interesting to compare the populations of the two cities as of 2017:
Bristol Population
City and County: 463,400
Urban: 724,000
Metro: 1,006,600
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BristolCardiff Population:
City: 364,248
Urban: 479,000
Metro: 1,097,000
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CardiffThe key stat to focus on is the metro population. Cardiff is slightly ahead and will probably continue to outpace Bristol as Cardiff is set to see more inward migration.
I’ve been saying this for years, it’s like most other things, people need to get over thinking about Cardiff as a town and start thinking about it as a city at the centre of a much wider metro area.
Would people from the Valleys prefer to get on a train and travel to Filton rather than going to a gig in Cardiff? I doubt it! Think about coming out of a gig at 10:30 or 11:00 at night. Anyone here tried to get from Filton to Bristol’s centre at that time of night? It can be tricky enough getting from Bristol Parkway to the centre, I know as I’ve tried on numerous occasions as I lived in Bristol for 4 years!
Okay, so you drive (assuming they build a big enough car park). Anyone driven on those roads around Filton? They’re a nightmare! Driving in Bristol is an awful experience at the best of times, what’s it going to be like on those roads if 15,000 people have the idea of driving home?
I can see this site being worse than London’s O2. I remember trying to get to a gig back in 2009 when the Jubilee Line was down for some reason, I had to take a series of buses that meandered through London. It’s so stupid, the O2 is not even linked up properly with the DLR, which serves a huge area of east London, including Canary Wharf and the Isle of Dogs. You can’t even walk across the river at that location, as the tunnels are for cars and trains only!
I think Cardiff’s arena will be a huge success if it is designed properly and more capacity is added to the rail link (trams or extra trains).