Along with all the football grounds in Swing London town.
Both Tottenham and West Ham are looking to re-locate their grounds pretty soon, The Guardian has two interesting pieces about their options and the logistics of them all, along with a fair bit of economic mumbo jumbo. I found it interesting, you should too :p
Tottenham Olympic Stadium bid has economic certainty at its core
Despite a vocal campaign against moving to Stratford, Tottenham believe most supporters can see the economic sense
Tottenham Hotspur's late bid to take control of the Olympic Stadium in Stratford was not taken seriously at first by fans, politicians or the Olympic community. It is now.
Originally dismissed as a stalking horse to improve their chances of getting planning permission for a new stadium at White Hart Lane and put pressure on those - Transport for London, English Heritage and Haringey council - making what the club saw as onerous demands, plan B has become plan A. If Spurs are granted preferred bidder status when the Olympic Park Legacy Company makes its decision on 28 January, they must hand over a sizeable bond to underline that fact.
The seriousness of their intent became clear in October when Tim Leiweke, the president of the US sports and entertainment company AEG, flew to London and tossed a hand grenade into the debate. Revealing that the plan was to demolish the existing stadium, remove the track and rebuild the ground as a purpose-built football stadium lit the touchpaper on a fiery debate that will not end with the OPLC's decision.
This week's salvo from David Keirle, the head of the firm of architects drawing up Spurs' plans for a new stadium that they claim will be the best in Europe, raised the stakes further. It was a high-risk strategy. On the one hand it risked fixing in the public imagination that their pitch involved tearing down a stadium built using £496m of taxpayers' money just a few months after it hosts the Games. On the other it enabled Spurs to make a pitch directly to their fans and plant doubts in the minds of their West Ham counterparts. Just as there is unrest among some Spurs fans about moving east, so there are a growing number of West Ham fans questioning whether Stratford would really be a better option.
Most of all it was aimed at raising doubts about West Ham's ability to make the economics work. The argument about knocking down the stadium is more subtle than it first appears. In many ways the real surprise is that there was not more outrage in 2005 at the fact that around half a billion pounds is being spent on building a temporary structure. Then, the default plan was to reduce it from 80,000 to 25,000 seats after the Games. Given that it will cost around £1m a year to maintain, Spurs say it is better to simply knock it down and build a state-of-the-art football stadium that can support itself for decades.
The Spurs pitch is based on economic certainty. Trust us, it is saying to the government, the legacy company and the mayor, and we will not come back with a begging bowl in years to come.
They point to a strong supporter base and a growing global brand as evidence that they can be relied upon to deliver the return that will be promised to the OPLC under the terms of the lease agreement. They can point across the Thames to AEG's success in turning the abject Millennium Dome into the hugely successful O2 and their ability to programme a calendar of sports and entertainment events that will keep the site busy for 365 days a year. In October, AEG Europe president David Campbell pushed those buttons: "We went into a big white elephant and made it work for the government and work for us. We hope we can do the same here."
More difficult will be winning over Seb Coe and the athletics lobby. Spurs are adamant that the two sports cannot coexist and claim their plans offer a better legacy for athletics in any case. But UK Athletics, and an ever-growing list of athletes, are convinced the offer to refurbish Crystal Palace and establish a "legacy fund" for the sport is nothing more than window dressing.
Ed Warner, the UK Athletics chairman, believes the inspirational effect of giving British athletes the goal of competing on the same track where the 2012 Games took place cannot be measured in pounds and pence. The International Olympic Committee said yesterday it would prefer the track to stay but would not intervene.
Coe's insistence that the athletics legacy must be delivered on the Park is partly personal - he made the promise in Singapore and deeply believes it could reinvigorate the sport in the UK - and partly political given his ambitions in global sports politics beyond the Games. But Coe does not perhaps have the leverage he once did.
For the club there are 200 million other good reasons for the move. It estimates building the 60,000-capacity football stadium and renovating Crystal Palace will cost £250m, and they could potentially recoup a considerable sum of that by selling the naming rights for the ground. By contrast, the plan to rebuild White Hart Lane has been costed at nearer £450m.
The club reason that, with fans travelling an average of 40 miles to White Hart Lane and a high proportion coming from Hertfordshire and Essex, the benefits to the club and supporters of the new location will outweigh their historical attachment to N17. They believe they can argue that the design of the new stadium, fusing a traditional "English" football atmosphere with comfort and innovation, shows they put supporters first.
Although there is a vocal campaign against the move, the club believe the majority of fans would follow them east. With the looming introduction of Uefa's Financial Fair Play rules that will force clubs to maximise revenues to compete and the lure of a new stadium, they believe supporters will ultimately follow their heads rather than their hearts.
For Daniel Levy, the Spurs majority shareholder who has shrewdly plotted their course to the Champions League despite the limitations of White Hart Lane, there might be another motivation.
Those opposing the Tottenham plan are convinced there must be more to it than meets the eye. If Levy has got an eye on a sale - whether to AEG, the Qataris or some other suitor - then winning the race to occupy a purpose built stadium in a very well connected part of London that will soon have the eyes of the world on it will increase the value of his asset exponentially.
sauce
West Ham Olympic Stadium bid puts political gain over financial pain
West Ham's bid to take over the 2012 Olympic Stadium makes political sense but the spectre of relegation casts a shadow
Around three miles separate West Ham United's current home, the Boleyn Ground, and the Olympic Stadium in Stratford that the club's owners believe would help to move them into a different league. The unfortunate thing for David Sullivan and David Gold, and their vice-chairman, Karren Brady, the driving force behind the plan, is that the decision on the future of the stadium will be made when the club is in danger of dropping out of the Premier League.
While the Olympic Park Legacy Company board will not allow the current predicament of Avram Grant's team to influence the long-term future of the Olympic Park and surrounding area, Spurs will make the case that their rivals represent a risky bet.
Spurs will argue that West Ham will struggle to fill a 60,000-capacity stadium and will thus leave fans rattling around in an unatmospheric bowl. West Ham will counter that the design of the Olympic Stadium is unusually intimate and that they will spend up to £100m to turn it into a state of the art facility that they will fill with new generations of fans, pulled in by attractive ticket prices.
The club's legacy credentials are impressive and tick many boxes that Spurs do not. West Ham have the wholehearted backing of Newham Council and of UK Athletics. Their vision of a continental-style multi-sport facility is as seductive as Tottenham's football-only vision. They will attempt to paint Spurs' attempts to offer community programmes and a legacy for athletics at Crystal Palace as last-minute and ill-thought-through sweeteners.
West Ham's motives are not dissimilar to those driving Spurs. They see an opportunity to expand their fanbase to the north and east, acquire a new site with excellent transport links and boost revenue. Their plans are well thought through but open to attack. Spurs and AEG will question whether a council facing cuts and a club that could be in the Championship are best placed to make the most of the OPLC's plans for the Park.
It is understood that during the period of negotiation that will lead to "best and final" bids by 21 January, West Ham have been back and forth to the OPLC to underline their financial security. It is believed that Newham will borrow around £80m to fund the conversion of the stadium, with a further £35m available from within the existing Olympic budget to all bidders.
West Ham will return around £40m to the Council once Upton Park is sold and they will service the rest of the debt on an ongoing basis. They will emphasise that all their costings are based on Championship figures and give minimum guarantees on the amount of revenue that will be returned to the OPLC. That final figure will be key.
Some form of mechanism is likely be put in place to stop any new owners of the club reneging on the agreements.
However, where they once looked like the only game in town, West Ham now risk being blindsided. There is a danger that their increasingly vocal interjections in the debate will backfire. The individuals who will make the decision will have to balance the merits of two imperfect bids. Each has what the other lacks.
But they would far rather be here - with two viable bids battling it out at the last - than left with a 25,000-seat athletics stadium with no anchor tenant or business plan, as was the fallback position two years ago when the OPLC was formed and vowed to look again at the vexed stadium question. Tottenham offer long-term economic certainty in return for short-term political embarrassment. West Ham feel like a more natural fit for the stadium and tick the legacy boxes and they should be the natural favourites. But their bid comes with a degree of risk attached. And if there is one thing that the current economic and political climate mitigates against, it is risk.
sauce
Interesting stuff! (well, for me anyway, but I have like OCD when it comes to location-location-location of London and the home counties in the same way that I have OCD when it comes to having to know exactly why a film got what rating, LOL). I think that, for every football, there is an element of needing to have your ground somewhere remotely near the club, otherwise, you know, there's grounds for the team legitamately renaming themselves Stratford Hotspurs or something. But, as a Chelsea fan (our ground is in Fulham), I totally get that not every team lucks out like Arsenal can has the means or the free land space to build their new ground so close to the old one. But my main qualm with West Ham occupying the Olympic Stadium is not to do with location; more, the embarrassment of having a relegation threatened club having such a luxurious ground. Though, at the same time, I don't think Spuds should be allowed to move their either; there's signs outside it pointing people to Bow ffs! That's nowhere near Haringey in the context of LDN! But I just chat B/S because we all know I fret over the prospect of Stamford Bridge getting bumped down even further in the pecking order of "London teams with most capacity" ;)
What say you??!
Tottenham Olympic Stadium bid has economic certainty at its core
Despite a vocal campaign against moving to Stratford, Tottenham believe most supporters can see the economic sense
Tottenham Hotspur's late bid to take control of the Olympic Stadium in Stratford was not taken seriously at first by fans, politicians or the Olympic community. It is now.
Originally dismissed as a stalking horse to improve their chances of getting planning permission for a new stadium at White Hart Lane and put pressure on those - Transport for London, English Heritage and Haringey council - making what the club saw as onerous demands, plan B has become plan A. If Spurs are granted preferred bidder status when the Olympic Park Legacy Company makes its decision on 28 January, they must hand over a sizeable bond to underline that fact.
The seriousness of their intent became clear in October when Tim Leiweke, the president of the US sports and entertainment company AEG, flew to London and tossed a hand grenade into the debate. Revealing that the plan was to demolish the existing stadium, remove the track and rebuild the ground as a purpose-built football stadium lit the touchpaper on a fiery debate that will not end with the OPLC's decision.
This week's salvo from David Keirle, the head of the firm of architects drawing up Spurs' plans for a new stadium that they claim will be the best in Europe, raised the stakes further. It was a high-risk strategy. On the one hand it risked fixing in the public imagination that their pitch involved tearing down a stadium built using £496m of taxpayers' money just a few months after it hosts the Games. On the other it enabled Spurs to make a pitch directly to their fans and plant doubts in the minds of their West Ham counterparts. Just as there is unrest among some Spurs fans about moving east, so there are a growing number of West Ham fans questioning whether Stratford would really be a better option.
Most of all it was aimed at raising doubts about West Ham's ability to make the economics work. The argument about knocking down the stadium is more subtle than it first appears. In many ways the real surprise is that there was not more outrage in 2005 at the fact that around half a billion pounds is being spent on building a temporary structure. Then, the default plan was to reduce it from 80,000 to 25,000 seats after the Games. Given that it will cost around £1m a year to maintain, Spurs say it is better to simply knock it down and build a state-of-the-art football stadium that can support itself for decades.
The Spurs pitch is based on economic certainty. Trust us, it is saying to the government, the legacy company and the mayor, and we will not come back with a begging bowl in years to come.
They point to a strong supporter base and a growing global brand as evidence that they can be relied upon to deliver the return that will be promised to the OPLC under the terms of the lease agreement. They can point across the Thames to AEG's success in turning the abject Millennium Dome into the hugely successful O2 and their ability to programme a calendar of sports and entertainment events that will keep the site busy for 365 days a year. In October, AEG Europe president David Campbell pushed those buttons: "We went into a big white elephant and made it work for the government and work for us. We hope we can do the same here."
More difficult will be winning over Seb Coe and the athletics lobby. Spurs are adamant that the two sports cannot coexist and claim their plans offer a better legacy for athletics in any case. But UK Athletics, and an ever-growing list of athletes, are convinced the offer to refurbish Crystal Palace and establish a "legacy fund" for the sport is nothing more than window dressing.
Ed Warner, the UK Athletics chairman, believes the inspirational effect of giving British athletes the goal of competing on the same track where the 2012 Games took place cannot be measured in pounds and pence. The International Olympic Committee said yesterday it would prefer the track to stay but would not intervene.
Coe's insistence that the athletics legacy must be delivered on the Park is partly personal - he made the promise in Singapore and deeply believes it could reinvigorate the sport in the UK - and partly political given his ambitions in global sports politics beyond the Games. But Coe does not perhaps have the leverage he once did.
For the club there are 200 million other good reasons for the move. It estimates building the 60,000-capacity football stadium and renovating Crystal Palace will cost £250m, and they could potentially recoup a considerable sum of that by selling the naming rights for the ground. By contrast, the plan to rebuild White Hart Lane has been costed at nearer £450m.
The club reason that, with fans travelling an average of 40 miles to White Hart Lane and a high proportion coming from Hertfordshire and Essex, the benefits to the club and supporters of the new location will outweigh their historical attachment to N17. They believe they can argue that the design of the new stadium, fusing a traditional "English" football atmosphere with comfort and innovation, shows they put supporters first.
Although there is a vocal campaign against the move, the club believe the majority of fans would follow them east. With the looming introduction of Uefa's Financial Fair Play rules that will force clubs to maximise revenues to compete and the lure of a new stadium, they believe supporters will ultimately follow their heads rather than their hearts.
For Daniel Levy, the Spurs majority shareholder who has shrewdly plotted their course to the Champions League despite the limitations of White Hart Lane, there might be another motivation.
Those opposing the Tottenham plan are convinced there must be more to it than meets the eye. If Levy has got an eye on a sale - whether to AEG, the Qataris or some other suitor - then winning the race to occupy a purpose built stadium in a very well connected part of London that will soon have the eyes of the world on it will increase the value of his asset exponentially.
sauce
West Ham Olympic Stadium bid puts political gain over financial pain
West Ham's bid to take over the 2012 Olympic Stadium makes political sense but the spectre of relegation casts a shadow
Around three miles separate West Ham United's current home, the Boleyn Ground, and the Olympic Stadium in Stratford that the club's owners believe would help to move them into a different league. The unfortunate thing for David Sullivan and David Gold, and their vice-chairman, Karren Brady, the driving force behind the plan, is that the decision on the future of the stadium will be made when the club is in danger of dropping out of the Premier League.
While the Olympic Park Legacy Company board will not allow the current predicament of Avram Grant's team to influence the long-term future of the Olympic Park and surrounding area, Spurs will make the case that their rivals represent a risky bet.
Spurs will argue that West Ham will struggle to fill a 60,000-capacity stadium and will thus leave fans rattling around in an unatmospheric bowl. West Ham will counter that the design of the Olympic Stadium is unusually intimate and that they will spend up to £100m to turn it into a state of the art facility that they will fill with new generations of fans, pulled in by attractive ticket prices.
The club's legacy credentials are impressive and tick many boxes that Spurs do not. West Ham have the wholehearted backing of Newham Council and of UK Athletics. Their vision of a continental-style multi-sport facility is as seductive as Tottenham's football-only vision. They will attempt to paint Spurs' attempts to offer community programmes and a legacy for athletics at Crystal Palace as last-minute and ill-thought-through sweeteners.
West Ham's motives are not dissimilar to those driving Spurs. They see an opportunity to expand their fanbase to the north and east, acquire a new site with excellent transport links and boost revenue. Their plans are well thought through but open to attack. Spurs and AEG will question whether a council facing cuts and a club that could be in the Championship are best placed to make the most of the OPLC's plans for the Park.
It is understood that during the period of negotiation that will lead to "best and final" bids by 21 January, West Ham have been back and forth to the OPLC to underline their financial security. It is believed that Newham will borrow around £80m to fund the conversion of the stadium, with a further £35m available from within the existing Olympic budget to all bidders.
West Ham will return around £40m to the Council once Upton Park is sold and they will service the rest of the debt on an ongoing basis. They will emphasise that all their costings are based on Championship figures and give minimum guarantees on the amount of revenue that will be returned to the OPLC. That final figure will be key.
Some form of mechanism is likely be put in place to stop any new owners of the club reneging on the agreements.
However, where they once looked like the only game in town, West Ham now risk being blindsided. There is a danger that their increasingly vocal interjections in the debate will backfire. The individuals who will make the decision will have to balance the merits of two imperfect bids. Each has what the other lacks.
But they would far rather be here - with two viable bids battling it out at the last - than left with a 25,000-seat athletics stadium with no anchor tenant or business plan, as was the fallback position two years ago when the OPLC was formed and vowed to look again at the vexed stadium question. Tottenham offer long-term economic certainty in return for short-term political embarrassment. West Ham feel like a more natural fit for the stadium and tick the legacy boxes and they should be the natural favourites. But their bid comes with a degree of risk attached. And if there is one thing that the current economic and political climate mitigates against, it is risk.
sauce
Interesting stuff! (well, for me anyway, but I have like OCD when it comes to location-location-location of London and the home counties in the same way that I have OCD when it comes to having to know exactly why a film got what rating, LOL). I think that, for every football, there is an element of needing to have your ground somewhere remotely near the club, otherwise, you know, there's grounds for the team legitamately renaming themselves Stratford Hotspurs or something. But, as a Chelsea fan (our ground is in Fulham), I totally get that not every team lucks out like Arsenal can has the means or the free land space to build their new ground so close to the old one. But my main qualm with West Ham occupying the Olympic Stadium is not to do with location; more, the embarrassment of having a relegation threatened club having such a luxurious ground. Though, at the same time, I don't think Spuds should be allowed to move their either; there's signs outside it pointing people to Bow ffs! That's nowhere near Haringey in the context of LDN! But I just chat B/S because we all know I fret over the prospect of Stamford Bridge getting bumped down even further in the pecking order of "London teams with most capacity" ;)
What say you??!