New or Used: The Stadium Thread

And just for kicks

here's the article:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/...log/2012/may/31/liverpool-new-anfield-stadium

Liverpool's new Anfield stadium is tale of lost years and lost homes

Talk of surrounding demolition points to expansion rather than an entirely new place in Stanley Park for Liverpool
Liverpool's hardening plan not to build their interminably mooted new stadium on Stanley Park but instead to expand Anfield in a fashion eerily similar to a scrapped plan from 1999 might be darkly funny, were it not a tale of lost years, hope and money. Anfield has become a monument not only to Premier League football and a grand club's ambition to keep up with its rivals but also, sadly, to spectacular inequality. Outside the walls of the ground in which footballers play for multimillionaires' salaries, for a club owned principally by John W Henry, a billionaire in Boston, people are living amid dereliction and decline approaching the country's grimmest.
Liverpool city council still says the new stadium on Stanley Park is its preferred option, even while it presents plans for house demolitions behind the main stand, and on the corner opposite the main stand and Kop, which will enable the expansion of Anfield. Liverpool have declined to comment on those demolition plans being revealed or to respond to criticism from residents that they failed to communicate openly. But Henry has made it abundantly clear he wants to scrap the new stadium plan and take the cheaper option of expanding Anfield.
The proposed clearances of three rows of terraced houses on Lothair and Alroy Roads behind the main stand were revealed by Liverpool city council to the Rockfield Residents Association at a meeting attended by Ian Ayre, Liverpool's managing director, on 15 May. The council's assistant director for regeneration, Mark Kitts, told the Guardian that the demolitions would make the number of houses more "sustainable" and allow for refurbishment. Kitts said Liverpool have confirmed, in discussions with the council, that these demolitions would meet the club's requirements.
"We have been working with the club very closely," Kitts said, "and they have said this will accommodate their needs if they stay at Anfield and refurbish the current stadium."
Liverpool's main physical difficulty expanding Anfield is not in enlarging the footprint, because their plan is understood to involve adding an extra tier, plus corporate facilities, to the Anfield Road and main stands. Building high, however, would block neighbouring residents' "right to light". Kitts, discussing the planned demolitions, told the Guardian: "My understanding is that this will solve the right to light issues."
Ros Groves, chair of the local Salisbury Residents Association, says her members who own their own homes are worried they will not be paid enough, if their houses are demolished, to buy a house outright elsewhere. Kitts confirmed homeowners will be paid the market rate plus 10% "loss of home payment" but said the council is "very sympathetic" and he hoped this would be enough.
Groves criticised Liverpool for not openly telling the residents what the club are now planning. Last week Ayre said Liverpool would "need to convince" residents if the club were to stay at Anfield, and said: "We're having some great dialogue with them."
Groves, whose association represents residents in the Baltic Street area planned for clearance nearer the Kop, said she "hit the roof" when she read that. "I cannot see how it can be called 'great dialogue' when Ian Ayre has been to one meeting with one residents group," Groves said. "Everybody can see which way this is going now. We just want Liverpool football club to be open with us."
Ann O'Byrne, the council's cabinet member for housing, said its priority is to "regenerate the area" for residents and she confirmed that Liverpool had said they could "work with" these demolition plans.
Building a brand new stadium was always not just about the football club but about trying to improve physically a sunken area and to generate a working economy. It was the conclusion reached after a painful process sparked by uproar when those original 1999 plans were exposed, involving an expanded Anfield, a commercial area for the club in the same corner proposed to be cleared now and the demolition of 1,800 homes about which no resident had been consulted.
After that a detailed community structure was established to ensure full consultation with the residents. The proposed new 60,000-seat stadiumon Stanley Park emerged from that, approaching 10 years ago. Liverpool came to the conclusion they could build better facilities, including enough corporate dining to make money in Manchester United proportions, if the club moved from Anfield, its hemmed-in home since 1892. The site of the current ground was then going to be developed into "Anfield Plaza", with shops, restaurants and office space, to attract visitors and, it was hoped, generate jobs for local people.
Liverpool, then 51% owned by the Littlewoods Pools family scion, David Moores, and run by the chief executive, Rick Parry, were anxious, however, about borrowing the money to build it. Parry believed that, even if rich men taking over were not actually going to provide the money needed, they would at least stand behind borrowing it, and it is still remarkable to reflect that Liverpool was sold only to finance the new stadium. The result was the Tom Hicks and George Gillett takeover. They paid £174m for the club, Moores receiving £89m for his shares; they described it as a "multi-generational commitment" by their families but had borrowed the money from Royal Bank of Scotland for only 12 months. They promised a spade in the ground within 60 days to build the new stadium but then said global financial conditions meant they could not borrow the money required.
When RBS in effect installed Martin Broughton as the Liverpool chairman in April 2010 to sell the club, he said explicitly that he would seek new owners who would build that new stadium: "We want to do the right thing for Liverpool and a new stadium is doing the right thing," he said. "It will add long-term value to the club and, if we are looking for a new owner, that is something they will have to accept."
However, after Henry and his Fenway Sports Group emerged victorious from the bitter October 2010 court battle to buy Liverpool, Henry said from the beginning he did not want to build it. The economics of spending around £300m effectively to fund 15,000 new seats(although there would also be commercial areas in a new stadium) did not make financial sense, Henry said. Liverpool maintain they still have the new stadium option open but the demolition plans strongly point to Anfield being expanded instead.
In the club's accounts for 2010-11 £49m was written off relating to the new stadium, adding to £10m previously in 2010, making £59m seemingly wasted. The council, under these plans, would take care of the right-to-light issues and negotiate with residents, possibly backed by compulsory purchase orders if any stubbornly refuse to go. That is also a source of unhappiness among some, who believe Liverpool should negotiatie upfront themselves. Liverpool declined to comment, saying: "The private discussions and plans that Liverpool Football Club has or may have with residents or other stakeholders are, in our opinion, exactly that: 'private'."
Kitts said he is expecting the club to make an announcement by the end of June. It would be a great surprise if that heralds a new stadium, to be built on Stanley Park.