Rage Online

Oh good, I do like a bit of planning, and at last the starting gun has officially been fired.

This is what he's on about ...

http://www.oxfordmail.co.uk/news/128704 ... _car_park/

But no mention of the implications of having a bigger stadium but less car parking...OK I am assuming a bigger stadium also means more crowds.

If only that were an April Fool story.

There will be a new train station in the Science Park run by Chiltern Railways. At the moment this is planned for 2020 (ish) but can be brought forward. Expect also to see a new parade of shops in the overflow car park being touted.

And those corners need not all be for housing, as there is potential there for some of them facing the pitch to become executive/corporate boxes.

And by the way, this idea trumpeted as ‘news’ by the OM has been in the planning for about 10 years now. It just happens to be the first time it’s become half-official.

My view is that Kassam will not want to spend several mill developing the 4th stand and that this story is more about forcing the hand of Eales.

I completely agree and hope we are right

Forcing Eales to do what?

The ‘hope value’ of that land is rocketing if buying the ground is what you mean.

Water eaton for me. Houses for all Grenoble road. If not I can't see kassam letting us profit from any developments around the stadium and will probably only sell the 3/4 stands once everything else has been done with little chance of external revenues to OUFC.

All a long shot I appreciate but a fresh start elsewhere is probably best for the club of possible

Eales to CDC planning officer : Hello, I’d like to build a stadium please at Water Eaton for Oxford United.

CDC planning officer : Why, you’ve already got one?

Eales : Ian Hudspeth told us we could build one there.

CDC planning officer : You’re 5 days too late to pull that joke. Now what is it you really want?

Snake wrote:Forcing Eales to do what?

The ‘hope value’ of that land is rocketing if buying the ground is what you mean.

Forcing Eales to decide the location of the future of OUFC by either buying the stadium, or committing to a move to Water Eaton.

Let's look at the reality.

Kassam cannot get rid of OUFC for at least 11 years, if not ever, without paying a heavy cash price to do so. A position that I understand he may be willing to do.

OUFC cannot get rid of the KasStad without a new stadium to go to.

OCC are desperate for the land for housing.

The KasStad was built with a planning requirement to have 2,000 car parking spaces.

Building a 4th stand and putting housing on the overflow, would remove maybe half of the existing spaces with nowhere to replace them. Science park will never allow use of their car parks and other land in the area is already earmarked for housing.

Building a new stand costs in the region of 4 to 5 mill nowadays. That would be a huge chunk of the profits for Kassam to lose out of any development. Almost certainly too much given the risk factors

Building in the corners costs a shed load more and would require not only complicated, costly and time consuming PP, but would also require the council to overturn the sporting covenant that says the land may only be used for sports activities. The covenant does not (from memory) allow mixed use.

In order to sate OCC housing, much of any development would need to be social housing, which would severely restrict the potential profits of any development.

OCC would have to come up with new ideas about how to accommodate the movement of potentially 15,000+ supporters without major investment in the road network, which would also make any development unworkable.

A new station at Littlemore might well provide some of that capacity, but nowhere near all of it and as everyone knows, the vast majority of supporters travel to games by car as a choice.

Given all the above, and much more besides, development of the land that presently serves the stadium, whilst OUFC are in situ, is highly unlikely on grounds of planning, inconvenience, time and cost.

I have no doubt that the land will be developed, but the issue will be if it is Kassam who buys out OUFC, with OUFC moving to Water Eaton, or OUFC buys the stadium and land from Kassam to develop, providing funding for a new stadium at Water Eaton.

As Snake rightly says, the land value is increasing significantly by the day, and development of Minchery with OUFC out of the picture would be hugely profitable for the landowner, so I can't see Kassam being all that willing to sell. Which leaves the option of buying OUFC out of their contract and planning rights, to facilitate a move to Water Eaton, which I think would be eased through by a very willing group of councils, eager to build houses and make money from their land.

What gets me is if Water Eaton really was a runner then why nothing in the CDC local plan about it? It’s been knocking about for years in its formulation, with tons of input from consultees, yet no one has said a dickie bird about it in terms of trying to get a stadium in there. Too late now as the consultation window is closed and the horse has bolted. That’s another reason why I think the club are not serious about WE.

As for some of the excellent points raised by GY, then planning conditions can be changed, and I can’t think of any other club with 2,000 free car park spaces. Can’t argue with a figure of £4-5m on a new stand as it’s hard to find the details. Might be more, might be less. I'd guess it could be done more cheaply though and we know that the foundations are already in place. It would also need no fitting out underneath into something posh, as the East Stand already has space but no demand for it. Tons of detail here though - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ground_dev ... gue_system

As with the PP, the sporting covenant could be changed if agreed by all parties.

All in all, I think we’d all agree that this is complex and neither option is going to happen in a hurry, but to my mind there are fewer obstacles at Minchery Farm to overcome.

GodalmingYellow wrote:Building in the corners costs a shed load more and would require not only complicated, costly and time consuming PP, but would also require the council to overturn the sporting covenant that says the land may only be used for sports activities. The covenant does not (from memory) allow mixed use.

Does not the fact that there is a conference centre business running on the site mean that it already is under mixed use?

Snake wrote:I can’t think of any other club with 2,000 free car park spaces.

The whole idea of people driving to big events like football matches in their little separate cars is pretty silly. There's a railway nearby, the bus service is terrible, there could be a park and ride. No problem with reducing parking if alternatives are properly developed.

A-Ro wrote:

GodalmingYellow wrote:Building in the corners costs a shed load more and would require not only complicated, costly and time consuming PP, but would also require the council to overturn the sporting covenant that says the land may only be used for sports activities. The covenant does not (from memory) allow mixed use.

Does not the fact that there is a conference centre business running on the site mean that it already is under mixed use?

Not sure on that one A-Ro. Possibly PP was originally granted on the basis that the conference centre was a business side of the football club. Residential flats belonging to a company which no longer has anything to do with the football club might be viewed differently. I am just speculating.