History
See also: History of Falkirk F.C.Work began on building the stadium in 2003 after Brockville Park, the club's town centre home since 1885, was sold and demolished.
The project of building the stadium was a partnership between Falkirk Football Club and Falkirk Council who set up the Falkirk Community Stadium Ltd which provided the funds to construct and run the stadium. Falkirk Council estimated £6.1 million pounds would be required for the first stage of the Community Stadium build and would contribute £3.1 million initially. The sale of Brockville Park amounted to £9 million pounds for the club, of which £2.8 million went towards the build, whilst £200,000 came from sportscotland.
The first stage of the stadium was completed in time for the 2004–05 football season and Falkirk moved in after spending the previous year ground-sharing with local rivals, Stenhousemuir at their Ochilview Park home.
Falkirk's first ever game at the stadium was a friendly in July 2004 against Dundee resulting in a 2–1 defeat. A month later the first league game was hosted in the stadium with visitors Hamilton Academical drawing 1–1.
In October 2004 construction work commenced for the building of a second stand to the north of the pitch. The stand has a capacity of 2,000. After completion, the £1.58m facility would bring the stadium's capacity to over the Scottish Premier League's 6,000 seating criteria meaning Falkirk would be allowed automatic promotion from the First Division. The stand received it's safety certificate in late March 2005, shortly before the SPL's deadline for a stadium which met the seating criteria. By May of the same year the north stand was fully completed.
Construction of the south stand began in December 2008 by contractors Ogilvie. A £2m pledge from Sandy Alexander, founder of Schuh and Falkirk supporter, helped fund the project. The south stand has a capacity of around 2,000 and is identical in appearance to the north stand of the stadium. It was officially opened in August 2009 in a friendly game against Royal Antwerp FC of Belgium. This brought the capacity of the stadium to around 8,000 people without the inclusion of the temporary east stand.
The joint venture that was set up between Falkirk F.C. and Falkirk Council, ended in 2009, just a few months before the opening of the south stand. The football club took full control of the facilities such as the pitch, seats, under-soil heating and floodlights, whilst the council retained most of the development rights for the site and manages and receives rent from businesses set up the stadium's main west stand.
Read more about this topic: Falkirk Stadium
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