Ok then, happy for you to do that if you want to back up what you're saying?
The ARCADIS International Construction Costs index for 2022 puts Manchester and Liverpool in 14th and 16th place respecitvely out of 100 cities (London being No.1). Amsterdam were in 50th place and Rome in 54th. This suggests otherwise but would welcome some other data you may have that proves costs are comparable.
It's a known fact that labour and material costs in the UK have risen steeply, particularly since Brexit. I was reading an article recently which indicated that between 2015 and 2022 the cost of materials like cement, timber and steel increased by 60% in the UK whilst labour has gone up by 30% over the same period. In the EU this increase is only 30% and 14% respectively.
I also can't see how you can have sufficient knowledge or detail for each of those projects to suggest that Bramley Moore costs are over inflated. It's just your opinion based on what you perceive to be more complex stadia without understanding the whole picture. As i've pointed out, we are paying a significant premium in terms of construction costs based on the sites location.
Did either of those stadiums ever make it to tender stage? I know BAM were involved with the Feyenoord City Project and the main reason it got canned was due to the increase in cost to circa £425m and their refusal to agree a fixed price due to the high risk nature of the project. I don't know enough about Roma's new stadium but i'll bet it didn't get much further than planning stage and the enabling works costs would likely be nowhere near those at Bramley Moore. It also wasn't in a marine environment.
As I recall, our original stadium cost was mooted at £300m, that then shot up to £500m. The increase likely following contractor input, development of the scheme in more detail and a better understand of the costs associated with the dock infill process and the subsequent impact on the structure. I expect similar would have happened with both Feyenoord and Roma's stadia had they progressed.
The point I was making was that the comparative costings were all from around the same time and more or less a similar stage in the process (mid to planning completion).... hence the reason for choosing them for a "broadbrush" comparison.
Construction indices should take all those material and labour cost increases into account, but again, I was generalising to those pre-covid indices and figures because that's when those costs were all first quoted. Where you are in the index rankings is be a bit like where Everton are in the league table... a few points either way could cover about 10 places ie half the league.... if I remember rightly, in pre-covid terms this was probably only a difference of 15-20% between both European countries and NW England. Correct me if I'm wrong. As you've said yourself, the Feyenoord scheme still only levelled out at just over £400m before being shelved only last year.... even taking into account post-Covid increases. That is still a massive disparity. The Roma one was less than Feyenoord and going through planning for years, so I think those costings were pretty solid.... their new one is also still less than ours, and is 10k larger.... but I agree, that is at preliminary stage, with new owner and Populous now onboard.
As regards "perception" of structural complexity.... the Feyenoord stadium was a triple-tier design with 7 floors of "back of house" construction (compared to a max of 4 at BMD), with more expensive curved corners, a whole corporate tier with many more boxes and a closing roof (An addition that Meis insisted would add £80-100m to BMD on its own). It also had over 11k more seats. Each of those alone represents a step up in structural complexity, volume and cost. Together, they represent a whole new level of stadium. The design probably did benefit from some economies due to structural repetition, but that alone would not explain the cost disparity.
The Roma one was also an over-lapping triple tier design over more floors and also with more structurally expensive curved stands and curved corners, with dedicated corporate tiers and many more boxes than BMD, if I remember rightly. So, all in all, I think the greater structural complexity of both designs is indisputable.
The additional costs for BMD due to location were outlined and included a long time ago. So they are not really an unknown....that marine factor also applies to the Feyenoord example which is land reclamation of a navigable waterway with no existing retaining structures. Depending who you believe, we have now grown into the £500m cost (because as you've said, material and labour costs have risen in the UK), or according to Moshiri, we have overshot by 50%.
Yes, there are potentially other unknowns in terms of quality of materials, fit out and any number of other potential ancillary works etc.... The roof could be stainless steel with titanium fixings for all I know. Whatever it is, they'd still need to be pretty substantial in value to fill those "initial" cost gaps.
