Thetownend.com

Anyone know what the difference is to the originals and who is responsible for them?

Today’s Adver suggests that new plans are on the horizon yet Mark Devlin in the same article gives the impression there's a lot to be discussed and negotiated still.

ask pauld  :D

We (ie the Trust plus a couple of L&P and "unaligned" fans) have been looking at coming up with some alternative proposals in case (as now seems likely) the club's proposals fail (as the large element of housing renders them unacceptable). To that end, we've been talking to the various groups involved (council, residents, club etc) and trying to work out a framework that would satisfy everyone's needs and whether it would be possible to achieve what the club want (ie a stable non-football revenue stream) as well. And to date, it looks pretty positive - we believe that we're close to a viable framework that will work for all parties. But it's still early days and we don't have some kind of "secret plan" as the Adver seem to be implying - one of the reaons we've been able to make the progress we have is by being open with all parties and listening to what they want rather than cooking up secret plans. But it seems that's a bit too subtle for the Adver's need to jam it into a "New stadium plan soon" story - sadly, they seem more interested in creating a story than they are in genuinely getting the ground redevelopment progressed. It takes more than sticking a logo next to the story.

A crack group of commando's......or  a few fans including the king of the pessimists!

Not completed yet, hence the talk of much work still to do.  Basically they provide a set of proposals (a bit like a menu) for the club and Council to pick from and then build on,  Self funded development, although the club may have investors lined up to add a few bits on themselves and it should be acceptable to the residents due to the land usage.  Council would have no legal objections and would also benefit to varying degress depending on the involvement they require/would like.  The good thing is the Council, residents and football club all seem to have liked the concepts so far.  Probably be a few weeks before detail can start to be released.

Actually your original, pre-edit comment, "basically no housing" was a much better summary than my load of waffle. Perhaps add "no loss of open space" as well.

Wasnt sure how much detail I was allowed to go into to, so I kept it simple...then saw your waffle and thought...I guess we can waffle on about it then  :D and left you to it

A more useful summary:
1) We basically stick to the current footprint for the stadium, but build up and out to increase available floorspace (partly for stuff to fund the dev, partly for revenue generating facilities)
2) No loss of open/green space on wider CG site
3) Potential for a "leisure hub" on the site - ie multi-sports/leisure use
4) Council/community get spanking new leisure facilities (plus potentially some stuff for local businesses); club gets stable non-football revenue stream and modernised stadium; local residents don't lose open space but get current open space preserved and enhanced.
5) Everyone wins
6) There's a lot of discussion still to be had, a lot of detail to be negotiated, but early signs are encouraging

Very good, very good Gentlemen.

Not going into specifics can you reveal if the original estimated cost of £50 million for the stadium development would remain there or thereabouts the same and if this cost includes the cost of the financial bolt-ons?

Again, with the £25 million of investment the club originally had lined up, any idea as to what the original conditions of their investment was and in terms of slice of the cake what do they see in return?

The new plans would certainly cost alot less than 50million....alot less....

The plans would vary in cost depending on what is included by the parties involved.  The club may well add a few things on to what we propose (and there is room to do so) which they would have to fund themselves and the Council may wish to use the opportunity to include a large amount of leisure related facilities, which they could fund themselves (as they would have to do when losing the Oasis soon).

Basically the core ideas and add ons are self funded and a significant amount below £50m.

Cheers, what scale are we talking on the actual development of the stadium and stadium facilities (exec boxes etc) then?

£50 million seems to be the going rate for a full stadium re-development nowadays and it was never particularly  clear if the £50 million quoted in the original plans included the cost of the additional revenue making facilities (e.g. Hotel etc) attached to the project as well as the fundamental stadium.

I understand that you can’t go into details but without the housing can the club still raise the required funds and attract the same level of investment without gifting a far larger slice of the additional revenue pie away to a third party?

There are ways to keep development costs down.  A case for using some of what already exists?

Madjeski was quoted today as stating £1000 per new seat in a stadium and our research suggested anywhere between £800 and £2000.  That shows it doesn't have to be expensive.  Swansea's cost £25m for example.  I think the original club proposals included a huge cost for the hotel and conference centre, we've included a bit of this but basically left it up to them if they want to finance a large scale Hotel.  Our proposals/ideas suggest a way of developing what is essential at lowest cost.  We've basically allocated x sq m of space to be used to raise capital and/or ongoing funds.  It's up to the club and council which routes they take, but it provides a minimum and maximum level of finance being raised.

So far as we can tell, the £50m in the original plans was the total cost of the whole project (ie stadium, hotel, housing everything). So for starters if you take 600 houses out of the equation you cut down quite substantially on the build costs. But we're confident that there's room for the club to achieve their objectives in terms of the revenue-generating facilities (exec boxes, conferencing etc).

Without sounding to negative here, is there any danger of the 'new County Ground' being something along the lines of what Northampton town have? A smallish stadium which looks like it was made from Lego?

 At the moment we have a 14,500 capacity its rarely used so doesn't generate income....much more sense to have say a 10,000 capacity, then the Bank could be used for development.

why didnt we just have these plans in first place  :-))( good work Pauld

If it went down to 10,000 just to have 'a new stadium' i'd probably just say knock the whole lot down and don't bother rebuilding it. Absolute waste of time.

the capacity will be increased....not decreased  :roll:

Not saying it wouldn't, just looking at what Reg posted and saying what I feel on that.

I would rather build a ground around the current size. We CAN get bigger crowds than 10,000 when going well as proven a couple of years ago. It would be ridiculous to assume that we would never fill a slightly smaller stadium

 Surely if the idea is get income streams for other than match day....then having a space which is effectively dead makes no sense....it should be possible to build into it the possibility of expanding capacity should it be necessary, much the same way that Reading are going to 40,000, if they stay up next season

Well I agree, but having a capacity that low would be counter-productive. I think all teams who have built a new bigger stadium have gone on to get much higher average attendances and have achieved a degree of success -of course you could just argue that it's the success on the pitch not the stadium that draws in a crowd, though looking at Reading when they finished 2nd in 95 didn't always sell out and that was at shitty elm park, much lower than the madejski.

Think the evidence is a new ground generates some new fans, but they drop off if the product isn't good.....we wouldn't be getting a new ground as such though.

extra capacity doesnt mean dead space....means we would pack more people in for say a concert.....might attract better acts because its a bigger venue etc

 We have one concert a year....nobody uses the bank for it. Next.

currently we have one concert a year...currently nobody uses the bank for it.

 The only realistic way you could have more, than say another one, would be to build a concert hall into the ground...which I believe Coventry have done.

  Don't think there is the space at the CG site....without going outside the footprint.

I'm not a designer by any means but if you look at our Nationwide Stand you can see how much 'space' is wasted underneath it. Surely its possible to knock down The Town End, The Arkell's Stand and The Bank and build three new stands similar to The Nationwide but utilize the space underneath to accomodate such requirements the club wishes to generate non-matchday income. When we say the crrent footprint of the County Ground does that include the car park and all the little buildings down by the County Ground Hotel?

I presume it means only the ground and the car park. The buildings by the CGH would need seperate planning surely?

 The problem is likely to be coming up against all the minor planning regs...which dictate the access and egress of emergency vehicles etc.

 The Nwide stand being a classic example of how the local situation dictated a thin structure within the trees which locals fought for planting probably about 30 years ago.

  So the space under the NWide isn't really of much use fir anything substantial, but could be by using the strip of grass in Shrivenham Road..

 I think its entirely possible to tart up the CG on its present site, but can't see how too much in the way of significant income generators could be built in...unless its something like Rikki's Casino.

Bit of a shame you couldn't make any of the meetings we've had on the subject Reg as you're obviously bursting with ideas on it. FWIW, I'd say a 3-sided 10,000-seat stadium (apart from the fact that it pretty much dooms us to permanently being in the bottom two divisions in perpertuity) would not be acceptable to either the club or to what the council would like to do in terms of providing community sports/leisure facilities. You only get the chance to do something like this once in a generation, if that, it would be a shame to limit the opportunities for both the club and the town through lack of ambition.

What's the score with the recently mentioned rent increase mentioned at the recent cross party meeting?

There was talk of a rent increase to subsidise any land the Council potentially hand over.  It did look to be based upon the original plans with all of the proposed housing but is it likely to be something the Council will push for under the new blueprint?

I’d have hoped that free rent like other clubs have negotiated with local authorities could possibly have been on the cards but it looks highly unlikely.  The only possibility I can see is if the club and council develop joint community facilities on site and then come to some arrangement.

   As things stand at the moment, sustaining the club in the lower two divisions looks like an ambition the current board wont be able to deliver.

  We need to be realistic.....if the aim is for income generators on the CG footprint in order to sustain some level of pro football something will have to go.

  Some sort of apartment blocks where the Stratton Bank used to be, overlooking the pitch and Extension....could be quite lucrative.

That's the problem in a nutshell with the "10,000 is all we'll need" approach. You may well be right that 10,000 is likely to be ample for the next few seasons and it may well be realistic to say we'll be farting about in the lower divisions for as much as the next four/five years. But, if you limit the capacity to 10,000, then that's all you're aiming for, for the next 25-30 years. You're saying to any future ambitious up-and-coming manager, or bright young prospect looking for a solid side to carve out the next step on his career (or impress in a one-year loan deal) "Don't bother looking at us - we're a small-town club with no ambition. Go to Walsall [insert own preferred choice of unglamorous potential rival here] instead".

If you're doing a stadium redevelopment, you don't get the chance to do it very often so what you do and how you do it is important. And if you allow your ambition to be limited by short-term pessimism, you'll likely fulfill your own prophecy - build a 10,000 seater and I'd pretty much guarantee we will just bumble around the lower leagues in perpetuity. But I don't think most of the fans want that, the council doesn't want that and the club don't want that.

I understand the point you're making Reg, but I think you've allowed the current gloomy situation (by which I mean not just this season but for at least the last 5 years) to cloud the potential of what we could achieve as a town and as a club. And, if we were to go down the "Northampton-stylee nice little ground" route, to kill that potential for a generation.

I appreciate what you're saying....but I think folk underestimate the depth of the crisis in which we find ourself.

 If the fans wanted more than a 10, 000 capacity ground then they'd turn up in the numbers to justify it....the notion that SBC want anything other than the demise of pro football in the Town and a lucrative development site is laughable.  As is the likelihood of the present incumbents of the Board room being able to deliver a bright shiny new future.....the immediate future will be about securing firstly league status and then some sort of pro football inthe Town

 We've had numerous opportunities in the last 30-40 years to create the type of club we'd all love to see...its this failure which has brought us to the current situation.

 Call me thick, but its my understanding that its roughly 1K a seat for new build...so a 10,000 capacity is going to cost 10 mill.....how os this to be paid for without some substantial othe rbuilding and where is it going if not inside the existing ground in some way.

Sorry Reg but I'm going to have to disagree. If we build a new ground more people will come anyway. How many more I don't know but there will be new faces at the start. We need to hold on to these by impressing them ON the pitch and OFF. If we can do that there is no reason why 15,000 would be too big. Plus we need the extra capacity for big games which may not be regular but would provide much appreciate extra revenue. It would be such a shame to only get 10,000 in for a big cup game or a derby or whatever when we could easily have more.

Clubs that build new stadiums do increase attendances but it’s very short term unless there’s something to bother worth turning up to watch the tourists quickly head home.

You have to invest equally in the side as you do in the facilities to view them.  The playing side is so hacked back to the bone marrow at the moment unless there is speculative spending then we’ll continually cycle through seasons like this one.

Reg, the impression given is that development would be possible on the car park area and the green area towards the Magic Roundabout, subject to all the normal planning rules etc.  Most of the ideas relate to buildings that hug the current footprint, that's how it funds the £1.5k a seat (average, £1k quoted by Madjeski I think is a more basic cost, can be as much as £2.5k)

Who is this prick?

  DV ? A respected poster on this site.

You know i meant you smart arse, you talk complete shit, how do you think clubs like Hull got their new stadium? Look at them now! They were in a worse financial position than what we find ourselves in. Now they are heading in the right direction. why? because of their stadium.

10,000? you having a laugh.

Weren't Hull getting 10K+ after it was annonced they may go bust. This was way before the new stadium. Because their fans gave a damn.

Now we have fans that give a damn. But how many? I'd guess around 5000 and deminishing.

A new stadium is crucial for non-match day revenue, but a new stadium = diddly squat on gates anything after the immeadiate short term if things go badly on the pitch.

I worked for Kingston around the time Hull's stadium was finished off Dunc and it's completely different to ourselves.

Hull basically got their stadium because Hull's council are rather minted especially when you compare them to SBC.  Plus on top of that they then got their own PLC to sponsor the whole package for a wedge of cash.

The price of land is pennies in the area as well and it's of combined use rugby, community and football which made it easier to get council funding.

They got a very, very sweet deal that's never going to happen in our circumstances but there's definitely some hope for us and a Stadium redevelopment.  

The proof though is going to be how the club manage to fund the development and still keep investors happy with a limited development and still come out of it at the end of the day with enough off the pitch revenue generators to make it worthwhile.

another good example is Swansea. the council there forked out 27 mill on the liberty stadium! be nice if SBC did that rather than wasting 16 million pounds on a stupid flyover at commonhead  :-))(

Which might be a strong argument except the Highways Agency are paying for the flyover at Commonhead, not the council. Fact is Swansea, Darlo, Hull and other developments where councils have chipped in, they've been able to do so because there was demonstrable benefit to the local community, not just to the club. Which is what we've been trying to work towards and we seem to be making progress.

 If you think I talk complete shit, why not try and pick up on particular points and address them.....the Hull analogy doesn't work, becasue of the oddity of the KC situation, which only arose because of their geographical isolation.

 I see our situation more akin to the likes of Palace and Bolton in the 80's, who when about to go bust, sold off an end to a supermarket.  Thus generating the funds to continue, both relatively successfully.

 I'd be interested to know how you think  20 mill for a 20,000 stadium can be generated from development only on the current CG footprint.