County Ground Re-development

[ronnie21]

I don't get the car parking issues. There isn't a real need for the current car park at the ground, just that people are used to it. Plenty of parking in the town centre and public transport which works perfectly fine for a lot of other clubs.

Problem with that Johnny is that the club actually has no say over the car park - except on match days - it is owned and run by SBC.

[jonny72]

Problem with that Johnny is that the club actually has no say over the car park - except on match days - it is owned and run by SBC.

Not quite sure why you think there will be a problem with making changes to (or removing) the car park as part of the redevelopment, seeing as the council own the car park, the rest of the land the ground is on, are in charge of the planning process and local transport and so on.

[horlock07]

The key thing is though is the new lease with the council, if the council are not putting money into this then they should not retain 100% ownership of a redeveloped ground, hopefully an agreement will be reached whereby perhaps the council own 50% share but are unable to sell that 50% share unless the other parties are in agreement and vice versa.

It worth bearing in mind that in property development terms a 250 year lease is essentially freehold anyway as any yields for investors or later purchasers would be calculated on considerably shorter terms than that (to illustrate - think about it this way 250 years back from now is 1762 and how much the world has changed since then and no-one would have based investment decisions on that length of time).

I really cannot see them running a hotel themselves as it is a very specialised business, I would suggest it would be at best a JV with an operator, I think something similar is happening at the Reebok.

[ronnie21]

Not quite sure why you think there will be a problem with making changes to (or removing) the car park as part of the redevelopment, seeing as the council own the car park, the rest of the land the ground is on, are in charge of the planning process and local transport and so on.

In my opinion Jonny the council may not be quite so happy to give away their car park, the residents who use it locally after 6 pm would not be happy and at the end of the day it is a council asset they control.  Should they have the need to build on it it would turn into prime building land and I cannot see them releasing it.  The CG is also an asset but they technically have no control over it as long as we pay our rent!  Something we failed to do many times in the past and almost suffered for it!

[REDBUCK]

In my opinion Jonny the council may not be quite so happy to give away their car park, the residents who use it locally after 6 pm would not be happy and at the end of the day it is a council asset they control.  Should they have the need to build on it it would turn into prime building land and I cannot see them releasing it.  The CG is also an asset but they technically have no control over it as long as we pay our rent!  Something we failed to do many times in the past and almost suffered for it!

Can't see land next to a Football ground being that prime to be honest