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£400 Million Stadium Given Green Light
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Liverpool FC'S new £400 Million stadium has been unanimously approved by Liverpool City Council planning committee after a five-hour meeting, in Oakmere Confrence Centre in Cherry Lane Walton.
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17:00GMT Nov 6th 2007 by Ste Leftley, Newanfield.co.uk
It has been a long time coming but today we can confirm that the council has set the ball rolling on our new stadium.
Rick Parry, Todd Schultz, Paul Hyett, and Andrea Titterington representing Liverpool HKS and Tulley Associates were all in attendance at todays Public Commitee Meeting.
The Commitee was made up of
MIKE BURCHALL, MARK LOUGHRAN, DAVE IRVING, DANNY CLARE AND DEBBIE ASHTON
In his speech, Paul Hyett, chairman of HKS Architects in charge of the stadium project, said: "You don't often get one like this to deal with. Most people never get to work on one like this.
"It's a fantastic job to be involved with, a fantastic city and fantastic club." He also confirmed like we thought that the corners would not be used to fill in the ground in the future this would be at the scoreboard end.
A spokesman for Liverpool FC said work on the new stadium could begin almost immediately and was expected to be finished by August 2011.
Construction of the new ground means the Stanley Park area will benefit from £14m of Government funding.
Chief executive Rick Parry told Liverpoolfc.tv: "This is very good news and we're obviously very happy. We got unanimous approval from the planning committee which is very gratifying.
"Building work will now begin in the spring. I don't want to be any more specific than that.
"This gives us the ability to build a structure, and that structure would be capable of taking significantly more than 60,000.
"There will be a follow up application for whatever we decide the capacity could be."
Parry claimed that while the opening will now be 12 months later than originally thought, the end product would be worth the wait.
He added: "We will be very proud of what we have. Whether it will be the best depends on what other clubs do in the future, but we're certainly setting our sights high.
"We want a great team and a great stadium. The message for the fans is it will give us the revenues to make sure we continue to compete on the pitch. That's the whole purpose of the exercise.
"It's not about building monuments, it's making sure we're competitive."
Parry also revealed how he'd spoken to co-chairman Tom Hicks and George Gillett straight after this afternoon's decision was made.
"We've obviously let them know and it's fair to say they are very pleased. We haven't had time for lengthy discussions yet because this is hot from the press.
"People are excited by this. All the credit is down to Tom and George. It was their initiative - they decided to stop and draw breath on these plans."
The club now has to wait four months for any legal challenges or intervention from the secretary of state.
There was various objections from a number of people who took to the stand for 5 minutes these people included;
Local councillor Steve Radford called it a "monstrous sized development" that should not have been passed.
He said: "I believe the officers of the council have acted as agents of the club, not agents of the people."
Florence Girsten, Nell Williams, Lily Montgommery, Frank Green, and Pam Leadbetter of the Liverpool Branch of CPRE and others spoke out in protest at the stadium's location.
Hicks, who spoke last week when he was attending a global sports industry forum in London ahead of the NFL game between the New York Giants and the Miami Dolphins, admitted the projected cost had risen to “at least £400m.”
But he added: “I'm so excited about the new stadium because we'll be able to go do things for the fans we’ve never been able to do for them.”
The stadium will have a capacity of 60,000 – 15,000 more than Anfield – when it opens but that could increase to 75,000 in the future.
Hicks said: “Our fans are wonderful and over time we’ll be able to give them the amenities, comfort and ease of getting tickets they’ve never had before.”
He said neither he nor Gillett had any intention of cashing in on any future revenues at Anfield.
“People get involved in sport mainly because they have a passion rather than for the money,” he said. “There are far better investments I could make than buying a football team.”
More to come
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