Student seats limited in the new stadium

E. Claiborne Robins Stadium will bring Spider football to campus for the first time in the program's history, but the stadium's limited capacity will force student-ticketing protocol to change.

The new stadium's seating capacity is 8,700, but because of season-ticket holders, visiting team fans and others, only about 1,500 seats will be designated for students, said Jana Ross, the assistant director of athletic marketing and fan development.

Ross and Steve Bisese, the vice president for student development, have met with the Richmond College Student Government Association and Westhampton College Government Association to discuss some options for student seating. Based on those discussions, Ross said, a student section has been designated.

"We spoke with a lot of different student leaders on campus and decided that the best place to put the students is in the end-zone seating," Ross said. "It's closest to the field and in a mass in one big area, as opposed to having to spread [the students] around."

In the past, students could show their SpiderCards at UR Stadium on game day and be granted admission. That will not be the case next season. Ross and other athletic officials are trying to listen to student suggestions before they decide exactly how ticketing will be handled.

"It's going to be a little different in the aspect that students won't just be able to walk up and show their IDs on game day," Ross said. "There will be some sort of advance on tickets. We could do a lottery if we wanted. We could do first-come, first-serve based on a system we come up with. ... Some students thought a lottery was a good idea. Others didn't think it was."

To help ease the process, athletic officials are looking into purchasing software that would allow students to go online, create an account and then reserve and print tickets from their dorms or apartments. Students would then bring the tickets and their student IDs to the game for admission.

Ross said students would probably have to reserve their tickets by the Wednesday before the game so that any extra tickets could be offered to the general public.

Though some students have expressed disappointment in the possibility of a lottery system, Director of Athletics Jim Miller said he thought there would be enough student seating for most games, so it would not be overly problematic.

"In the 10 years I've been here, the largest crowd we've had was 1,100 until the Villanova game last year," Miller said.

There were 1,600 students at last season's game against Villanova University, which was on Homecoming Weekend. Miller said Robins Stadium's capacity had been subject to approval by the Richmond city council, and because there were only about 4,100 parking spaces on campus, 8,700 seats was the negotiated limit.

"The decision was really based on what we could get approved," Miller said. "It wasn't a strategy for what size stadium is best for our athletic program's potential, it was, 'What size stadium can we get approved?'"

Even though UR Stadium had a much greater seating capacity than Robins Stadium will, Miller said the feedback he had received had made it clear that having a stadium on campus was more important than having an ideal number of seats.

"When we first started this process we had a number of people ask why we wanted to move to a smaller stadium," Miller said. "People wanted 15,000 seats or 12,000 seats, but the key question was 'Do you want to be on campus?' One hundred percent of the people said, 'Yes.'"

Additionally, the stadium proposal was made before the Spiders won the 2008 FCS National Championship, and since that time the popularity of the program has increased significantly.

"Alumni ticket sales are a lot higher since [the National Championship]," Miller said. "We had about a 35 percent increase in season ticket sales last year, so we have more than 3,000 season tickets already sold [for next season] if people renew their seats."

Remaining season tickets go on sale June 1 and Ross said she expected many more fans will purchase them at that time.

Student interest also increased after the 2008 season, with the average student attendance rising to just more than 1,000 students per game last season, Ross said.

With the hype surrounding the new stadium and the fact that students can now walk to the games, Ross and Miller said they expected an increase in student attendance during the 2010 season.

"We would fully expect greater interest in student tickets with the on-campus stadium," Miller said. "We will look at it closely and see what the student demand is, and work with the university to respond to that demand."

Miller said he and others had looked into other college stadiums and found that, on average, schools tried to reserve seating for about 20 percent of the student body. At Robins Stadium, there will be seating for about 50 percent of Richmond's students, which Miller called "an unheard-of number."

Ross will continue to meet with student groups, such as the Rowdies, to hear more feedback from students about the ticketing options, with a goal of finalizing a student-ticketing plan by May. She admitted that the first season in Robins Stadium would be a learning experience for everyone involved.

"We're not going to be closed-minded," Ross said. "We know there are going to be problems that come up and we're going to look at them and adjust. We're going to learn a lot on game one, and I'm sure game two will be a lot different."

GAME DAY COMMITTEE FORMED

In addition to planning for student ticketing, Bisese is leading a Game Day Committee to make plans for pre-game activities in the parking lots and elsewhere on campus.

The committee has examined issues, such as special events on campus, tailgating areas and parking options on game day. Because the stadium will be on campus, Bisese said game days would impact almost all other university operations.

"We have to develop a scheduling policy," Bisese said. "The culture of the University of Richmond has to become that we have a more strict scheduling policy on game days, strictly based on logistics.

"For example, if Alpha Phi Omega wanted to have a meeting, they could, but they couldn't have a regional meeting on campus because if you bring cars, you have to restrict them."

Bisese also said the committee had tried to organize ideas about parking on game days. After hearing feedback from various student leaders, the committee designated a student area near the basketball courts in the Special Events parking lot next to Atlantic House for pre-game gatherings.

"We couldn't find a college or university that had a closer student area to the stadium than that, so we're excited," Bisese said. "We're still trying to decide whether the best thing to do would be to walk over there or if it should be a tailgating area with cars."

The committee plans more discussions with campus Greek Life leaders, who Bisese said were coming up with a plan for how the lodges would be handled on game days.

One downfall for students may be the need to move their cars from X-lot to the football practice field or W-lot near the Jepson Alumni Center so that X-lot could be used for general parking.

"That's the way it used to be for basketball for many, many years," Bisese said. "A lot of it is tied to the proposal that went through to the city and the county and the proximity of the guests to the stadium."

For any students who could not get tickets to home games, Bisese said, the university may simulcast video of the game in the Alice Haynes Room or another place on campus.

The dean's offices may also alter party registration procedures because of the stadium. Bisese said the committee was considering allowing students to register parties during the day on game days.

The Intramural Fields have also been mentioned as an option for extra parking during game days and Bisese acknowledged the possibility, but said he hoped it would not be needed.

"It's a very last resort with a promise by the university to as quickly as possible fix the damage," Bisese said.

Like Ross, Bisese and the Game Day Committee will continue to meet with student leaders during the spring to hear suggestions.

Contact staff writer Reilly Moore at reilly.moore@richmond.edu