Wimbledon Stadium: Some Important News

[The White Knight 9,039]

Well said TWK! Without Gustix's contribution on this thread, the situation of Wimbledon Stadium has gone cold. Gustix is so knowledgeable on Wimbledon Stadium affairs, as he has had many years involvement with Wimbledon Speedway, along with Parsloes too and others. Gustix, where are you? we need your input!

 

I quite agree Ray. :approve:

 

The Thread has definitely tailed off a bit since his disappearance. I do hope that he isn't ill. :unsure:

[stratton 1,491]

Gustix is great value on this forum,enjoy his debate very much love his knowledge on the Older riders great fun.

[Ray Stadia 1,071]

As Gustix appears to have gone 'awol', does anybody else have any latest news on Wimbledon Stadium please?

[salty 2,202]

As Gustix appears to have gone 'awol', does anybody else have any latest news on Wimbledon Stadium please?

Much as Gustix has to offer, I would venture that "Arthur Cross" is the most informative poster when it comes to Wimbledon Stadium.

 

No news as such - the planning decision is due in April.

However, the Greyhound world are planning this show of support later this month...

http://www.racingpost.com/news/greyhounds/wimbledon-show-of-passion-confirmed-as-2pm-february-17-at-city-hall/1599872/top/

[arthur cross 492]

As "salty" rightly says, no significant news in the last few days and Merton Council's report into the recent 2-day planning hearing is due around April.

 

But some other key dates to note are the local council elections on 22nd May and the final of the Greyhound Derby on 31st May.

 

As Merton's a London borough, all the council seats are contested in one go every 4 years (unlike most of the rest of England where a third of the local council seats are contested each year on a 3-year rotation) ... in the couple of wards nearest Wimbledon Stadium, any candidate's bound to be asked for his/her preference for the site but as the stadium's tucked into the northern edge of the borough, many of Merton's wards are at least a couple of miles from the site and therefore hardly affected by any traffic implications or changing use of the site.

 

In those more distant wards, there may well be more AFC Wimbledon supporters than regular greyhound spectators (the Racing Post article linked by "salty" above readily admits the greyhound crowd is probably drawn from a wider catchment area than the potential football crowd) and while Merton Council is supposed to be collectively impartial, there's nothing to stop individual candidates (including current councillors seeking re-election) favouring one side or the other while canvassing for votes based on what they think will appeal most in their ward.

 

The last big sporting influence I remember on a London local election was the Vote For The Valley group of Charlton Athletic supporters in 1990 when their football team was renting Selhurst Park (and later Upton Park) while their own ground remained derelict ... a Valley candidate, standing against a Greenwich councillor stubbornly opposing any efforts to revive Charlton's ground, won a famous victory at the polls that certainly helped the club's return to its true home and the subsequent revamping of it into today's 27,000 all-seater stadium.

 

It showed how a specific local sporting matter close to the heart of enough residents could trample over the usual party-politics ... however, for all the enthusiasm of the We Want Wimbledon campaign and the Show of Passion in a fortnight's time, I don't think the future use of Wimbledon Stadium is ever going to have as big an electoral impact as that 1990 Charlton vote.

 

(By the way, the local elections are usually on the opening Thursday of May but this year have been delayed so that they're held on the same day as the European Parliament elections, thus making sure two traditionally low-turnout elections require only one day's closure of schools and village halls for polling stations and one shift of ballot-counters for the results.)

 

Meanwhile, as it's an even-numbered year and therefore an international football tournament year (World Cup this time in 2014, next Euros in 2016, etc.), the four weeks it takes to work through the six rounds of the Greyhound Derby are in May this year, leading up to the final on the 31st (whereas the 2013 Derby was staged in its traditional odd-year four-week span last June) ... the logic is that while June's the perfect time for drawing the biggest crowds on warm evenings well before the start of the school holidays, any likely benefit from that better weather gets demolished by the counter-attraction of watching the football at home or down the pub, hence the Derby's run in May in even-numbered years.

 

But it's only once every 20 years that the 5-year-term of the European Parliament clashes with (and slightly delays) the 4-year-term of London Borough local elections ... when it does, it's in an even-numbered year so it's a May-running of the Greyhound Derby.

 

All of which has created a very rare instance here in 2014 of the local elections and the Derby final being only 9 days' apart, just when the future of Wimbledon Stadium is at a critical stage only a few weeks after the scheduled announcement of Merton's recent planning hearings.

 

While the efforts of everyone in the We Want Wimbledon campaign are wonderfully enthusiastic, anything they do still isn't getting round the on-going saga of Galliard struggling to repay Nama the Irish multi-millions ... meanwhile, for Nama's judgement of how much further pressure to apply, it must be useful for them to be able to wait only 9 more days after the council elections to get by far the current stadium's biggest event of the year out of the way as well.

 

The potential greyhound-racing revamper Paschal Taggart admitted on his recent appearance on Racing Post Greyhound-TV that he seriously fears this May's Derby will be the last to be run at Wimbledon ... if even he's that worried, it wouldn't surprise me at all if Nama get really stroppy in June or July after this quick sequence of planning-report, local elections and Derby final.

 

In the last couple of years, the Greyhound Racing Association have willingly transferred most of Wimbledon's other big annual races elsewhere, notably moving the Oaks (the bitches-only classic run every December) to fellow-GRA track Belle Vue while letting the Grand National go to Sittingbourne (a non-GRA venue) to form a double-bill with their Kent Derby.

 

Once Wimbledon's staged the Derby Final on 31st May, its only remaining big events would seem to be the late-summer Puppy Derby (that seemed unlikely to be held last year until a generous local sponsor emerged) and the Springbok (the country's major novice hurdle) whose 2014-edition is in a few weeks' time and so wouldn't be on the calendar again until Feb/March 2015 giving ample time for it to be moved.

 

As usual, thanks for reading this ... I wish I could provide more positive news beyond the enthusiasm of the We Want Wimbledon campaigners but there's relentless gloom for the dogs (and therefore, probably speedway as well) everywhere else in this story at the moment.

 

PS ... am I the only one wondering whether the greyhound community could have chosen a better title than "Show of Passion" for their upcoming day at City Hall given they want to attract the support of a Mayor of London for whom "Show of Passion" probably means something entirely different judging by the reputation of his private life !!

[salty 2,202]

Yet again, an extremely well written and informative post from Arthur. I'm afriad I would have to concur with his pessimism regarding the future of dogs at Plough Lane - and as we have mentioned before - the only hope for Speedway (if any) is that Paschal Taggart wins the day.

[michaelcroucher 30]

I agree well written Arthur. You are truly great with what’s going on etc.

 

As most of you are aware when I write on this forum about Wimbledon I like to be optimistic. I can see that without greyhound racing that Speedway may not return but when was the last race of Speedway at Wimbledon. The dogs have been there quite a while and Speedway hasn’t, so to say that without Greyhounds there be no speedway I think this is wrong. With greyhounds we don’t have speedway so why should fans get all excited to read if greyhounds stay then speedway has a chance.

 

I have always thought with greyhounds being there then speedway will never return. I hope that Merton council don’t allow planning permission for houses then that way speedway has a slim chance of returning. If a sporting venue does return to the area then this is where fans need to be active. You never know what other people are thinking. Lets face it if AFC goes in a and its just football then the person who runs AFC might say lets give speedway a looking and plan a stadium around football and speedway. We never know what other people are thinking. I know it may never happen but being positive has some hope. I find in this country we moan a lot but really don’t do much about it. If Wimbledon is to return then we have to fight for it and not just 1 or 2 years. This might even take 3 years but by giving up and I’m not saying people are giving up we do stand a little chance. I know that people will say well we will have to wait to see what is going on in April or May with the site which I agree but we must not give up.

[cityrebel 2,960]

As a lifelong wimbledon fan i think the stadium has little chance of surviving as a greyhound or speedway venue. Both sports are in decline and who in their right mind would invest millions of pounds in building a new stadium for about a 1000 people. For this reason I fear that swindon will soon join oxford and reading as a former speedway venue. There is no money in speedway anymore, you only have to look at the strength of the elite league to realise that.

[The White Knight 9,039]

As a lifelong wimbledon fan i think the stadium has little chance of surviving as a greyhound or speedway venue. Both sports are in decline and who in their right mind would invest millions of pounds in building a new stadium for about a 1000 people. For this reason I fear that swindon will soon join oxford and reading as a former speedway venue. There is no money in speedway anymore, you only have to look at the strength of the elite league to realise that.

 

I very much hope you are wrong - but - I fear you may be right. :sad:

[arthur cross 492]

Michael, I appreciate you saying my posts are "truly great about what's going on" and that you like to be as optimistic as possible ... but in this case will you please respect my view that, in reality, you're being hopelessly optimistic with regard to the future of the Wimbledon Stadium site as well as still dreadfully struggling to grasp the current situation there (especially the financial side).

 

You say "I hope that Merton Council don't allow planning permission for houses" but no-one has yet offered any other sort of realistic way to raise the multi-millions that keep appearing to be needed (and increasingly urgently) by the current owners of the site, Galliard, to pay off the Irish banks wanting their overdue loans back from a decade ago.

 

Merton Council have made it clear that a crowd-attracting sporting venue must feature in any redevelopment of the site ... but, like everyone else who's studied this saga realistically, they regard house-building on part of the site as the only way to payback fairly quickly at least a hefty chunk of the multi-millions.

 

As long as the Irish debt agency Nama remain supportive of Galliard's plans rather than any other option, then Galliard's solution of 600 homes plus a football stadium for AFC Wimbledon remains the clear favourite.

 

If Nama finally lose all patience with Galliard (thus forcing Galliard to flog the site to another bidder as their only remaining way to pay back any of the Irish debt), the only other option fully planned out is Paschal Taggart's solution of a 21st-century revamping of greyhound racing but even his project includes 400-to-450 houses ... and a big part of his reputation within that sport is based on his revamping of Dublin's Shelbourne Park that involved turning the land beyond the first/second bends and the first-half of the back-straight into smart apartments.

 

No exact figures have emerged about how many millions Nama still require from Galliard but we do know £50-million was the purchase-price around a decade ago when the Greyhound Racing Association operations last changed ownership on the open market ... given several recent ways Nama have seemed to raise their pressure on Galliard, £10-million would seem to me to be the minimum fair estimate of what's still owed and I wouldn't be surprised if it was over £20-million.

 

It isn't speedway's fault that such a big debt continues to hang over the existing use of the site ... but even an Elite League club operating there wouldn't reach a turnover of £1-million a year and therefore speedway offers a tiny fraction of the overall solution to anyone trying to resolve the current multi-million debt (never mind then sorting out any noise-level issues in the future).

 

There is absolutely no point hoping AFC Wimbledon might like to plan a stadium around football and speedway ... because it won't be AFC Wimbledon's decision about how that new stadium takes shape !!

 

AFC Wimbledon will simply be Galliard's tenants in a rectangular-field stadium that's part of Galliard's overall sport/housing plan and that shape is vital because it requires a smaller area of the site to be used for the sporting playing area (plus the spectator facilities) and therefore leaves a bigger area of the site to be used for extra housing that will help pay off more of the multi-millions (and, longer-term, generate extra council tax revenue) ... all AFC Wimbledon are doing in this is taking lucky advantage of being the ideal team to fit into a new stadium that lets Galliard tick Merton Council's box for keeping a sporting community-use within the redeveloped site.

 

There are only 2 ways speedway can co-exist with a football/rugby pitch ... either, speedway temporarily lays its track within the rectangular confines of the pitch (limiting the size of the track to Cardiff's 285-metres for the British-GP or a similar length at Copenhagen's Parken for the Danish-GP) or it has a permanent track around the pitch with the bends of the track curving past the football corner-flags.

 

The huge cost of laying and removing a temporary track can only be justified for occasional meetings (usually just once-a-year) in any stadium already big enough to host international events ... AFC Wimbledon's new home wouldn't be anywhere near that big and any Wimbledon speedway promoter would want to keeping relaying the track plenty of times a year so the costs of linking up like this are utterly impossible.

 

Meanwhile, a permanent speedway track around AFC Wimbledon's pitch forces a bigger floor area for the stadium (notably wasting two big empty semi-circles in between the speedway bends and the football goalmouths) and thus reducing the area of the site still available for housing ... that's why the Taggart plan has at least 150 fewer houses than the Galliard plan because the greyhound track also needs the oval shape that uses up more sporting floor space.

 

Hence any request by speedway to join in with Galliard's football option would be laughed at by Galliard unless speedway's paying several million pounds up front to compensate for the reduced number of new houses caused by speedway's inclusion ... that's why speedway's better (but still tiny) hope is to find a way of being included with the greyhounds because the greyhound-revamping will then be footing the bill for the extra sporting floor space it also needs (although also including enough new houses to give speedway a noise-level nightmare).

 

As usual, thanks for reading all of this ... and as I've mentioned before, anyone speculating on "what happens next" with this site must understand that, first of all, just Nama and Galliard must finally resolve between themselves "what happens with the multi-millions still owed now",

 

And Michael, I hope we can find a way for your enthusiasm and optimism about speedway in general to match up with speedway's realistic place within the Wimbledon Stadium saga.

Edited February 5, 2014 by arthur cross

[BangerBoy 47]

I know this thread has been going for some time now but is the simple fact that unless the stadium is replaced as it is ie no homes as part of any scheme that with any form of housing then any type of motor sport will be killed off due to noise levels.

 

 

[arthur cross 492]

I know this thread has been going for some time now but is the simple fact that unless the stadium is replaced as it is ie no homes as part of any scheme that with any form of housing then any type of motor sport will be killed off due to noise levels.

 

 

 

A very fair assessment of how heavily the odds are stacked against speedway, stocks or bangers ... they've all been dumped into this gloomy situation because the main use of the stadium has been entrenched for so long in debts so heavy that significant house-building (with its obvious bad side-effect for any motorsport) appears by far the most likely way of repaying those debts.

 

Certainly the motorsports (even collectively) don't have enough financial clout to really help resolve those debts in return for a better chance of having a future on the site.

 

My own contributions to this thread are much more a way of explaining the depth of the stadium's problems to speedway fans likely to be unfamiliar with the greyhound racing, football or local politics ... I don't have a wonderfully radlcal answer to help return speedway to Wimbledon and, sadly but realistically, nor does anyone else either.

Edited February 5, 2014 by arthur cross

[The White Knight 9,039]

Certainly it seems that the return of Speedway to Wimbledon is going to be VERY unlikely - but - never give up hope.

[Guest]

Have the new silencers introduced a couple of years ago made a significant difference to the decibel readings?

[michaelcroucher 30]

I totally understand where Arthur is coming from, and yes I do think that speedway doesn’t have a chance at Wimbledon but you never know who reads these forums. It might not be now but somewhere down the line you never know.