Falmer - would be setting a precedent?

[Lush]

Been worrying a bit about this lately.

Let's just say you're ANOTHER football club and you get yourself into a shit load of debt.

You decide the only way out is to sell your nice centrally located ground for housing/business/retail park and you have your eye on a nice bit of countryside that currently doesn't have planning permission and is therefore very cheap.

Assuming we get Falmer, could you point to our experience and say that therefore you can build where you like as it is in "the national interest" etc etc.

Can someone put my mind at rest?

 

[Dick Knights Mumm]

You can't sell now without another ground in mind. And if you have a ground then there is an alernative - so it is not in the Mational Interest.

Bit of a Catch-22.


So relax .................

 

[Lush]

But you could have another place - albeit in the countryside - in mind?

And they could argue that if they DIDN'T sell their existing ground they'd go bust and losing a league club wouldn't be in the national interest (just as we are).

*worry worry *

 

[Lammy]

You should have to have planning permission and funding for a new ground before you sell your old ground. Or at least that is how is SHOULD be.

 

[The Large One]

Being a Football League club would always have certain claim to National Interest. However, it is always a gamble to sell your ground and move somewhere else, just because the land there is cheap. It does not follow that you can write off you debts. In fact, all you are doing is re-organising them.

Besides, 'being in the National Interest' is not the only criteria set aside for these decisions. Transport, environment, social, financial impact considerations have to be taken into account - among many other things. It just so happens that the Falmer application ticks all these boxes. Another club's Project X may not.

 

[Dick Knights Mumm]

The sun is out. It is only 8 days to the first friendly. Summer holidays are almost here. The papers are full of recommended books to take with you. Big Brother has weeks to run. You have forgotten about Englands abject performances (did Greece use their own matresses I wonder). Forget about Falmer. It is like a boiling kettle. It won't boil if you are watching.

 

[fatbadger]

Hopefully, Prescott's team will see Falmer as a precedent. All future football ground plans should contain Falmer's sustainable transport plan.

 

[Superphil]

I beleive our situation is unique, a scheming crook took on the club to exploit it, I think clubs are more wary now in general

A precedent, no, but I think it will open peoples eyes as to how to build a stadium the right way, with consideration to environment, transport, etc.

WE WANT FALMER

 

[teaboy]

with regards to the 'alternative' - would we be considering building at Falmer if we still had the Goldstone?

 

[BensGrandad]

It is the view of an Ex Manager (dont ask me to name him becauser I will not for his sake) of ours that all this money for Falmer is a waste as the CLUB do not want Falmer but are hoping the pressure put on JP will make him suggest to Brighton Council and virtually tell them to let us build a stadium at WATERHALL. Could he be serious or just having a joke?

 

[Lord Bracknell]

I wouldn't wish a Public Inquiry on any other football club (at least not an Inquiry like the one we've had to go through).

But precedent is an important feature of planning practice and law.

Our Inquiry was NOT about finding a site for a Stadium for the Albion. It was about whether this particular development was acceptable in a nationally designated AONB. In other words, did it meet the national policy requirement that major developments in an AONB must meet the following criteria?

1. That the development was in the national interest;

2. That no other suitable site was available;

3. That the development would bring significant economic and social benefits;

4. That the environmental impact of the development can be mitigated.

The Inquiry looked at a number of planning precedents that have already been set. The only relevant FOOTBALL precedent was the Wycombe Wanderers stadium (although the facts of that case were rather different from those that apply to the Albion).

 

[Scoffers]

It is the view of an Ex Manager (dont ask me to name him becauser I will not for his sake) of ours that all this money for Falmer is a waste as the CLUB do not want Falmer but are hoping the pressure put on JP will make him suggest to Brighton Council and virtually tell them to let us build a stadium at WATERHALL. Could he be serious or just having a joke?

Has to be a joke, why would you spend x millions on the application hoping it would 'possibly' lead to another site, doesn't add up to me

 

[Uncle Buck]

It is the view of an Ex Manager (dont ask me to name him becauser I will not for his sake) of ours that all this money for Falmer is a waste as the CLUB do not want Falmer but are hoping the pressure put on JP will make him suggest to Brighton Council and virtually tell them to let us build a stadium at WATERHALL. Could he be serious or just having a joke?

Well that would be Barry Lloyd then. Can he actually see beyond his fag smoke?

 

[BensGrandad]

Maybe a joke but how much has this application personally cost DK or MP?

 

[Dave the OAP]

Also Bens Grandad, I take it Greg will be financing the waterhall venture then?

You really are a shit stirrer. In fact. you make FG seems positively positive.

Whats next then? barry coming back to manage is he?

 

[BensGrandad]

It wasn't Barry LLoyd and I will not answer to any other managers names irrespective of whether you guess rightly or not

 

[Gazwag]

I beleive our situation is unique, a scheming crook took on the club to exploit it, I think clubs are more wary now in general

A Wrexham fan might argue that point

 

[Lord Bracknell]

It is the view of an Ex Manager (dont ask me to name him becauser I will not for his sake) of ours that all this money for Falmer is a waste as the CLUB do not want Falmer but are hoping the pressure put on JP will make him suggest to Brighton Council and virtually tell them to let us build a stadium at WATERHALL. Could he be serious or just having a joke?

He might believe that, but it is NOT a serious option.

Even if Brighton & Hove City Council wanted to allow a stadium at Waterhall, they wouldn't be allowed to let us have one.

For a start, by the time any application was prepared, the City Council won't be the Planning Authority for Waterhall. Planning powers will transfer to the new South Downs National Park Authority.

Secondly, a stadium at Waterhall is ruled out by the Local Plan.

Thirdly, it would attract objections from far more people than have objected to Falmer and the government would be bound to call it in for a long Public Inquiry.

Fourthly, the Club doesn't want to spend a further £3 million or so on the cost of failing to get a stadium at Waterhall.

 

[Uncle Buck]

It wasn't Barry LLoyd and I will not answer to any other managers names irrespective of whether you guess rightly or not

Like all people that post toss like you have, if you cannot name your sources, then please just keep it to yourself.

You really are tiresome at times. It is one thing to slag players off (guilty before people like Turkey start piping up), but this is more important than anything and we need to pull together. If Falmer does go tits up, what we do not need is people like you coming on here and saying told you so, what we will need is people pulling together again and working out what we do next, but I doubt you want this. You seem to be the sort of person that wants this to go wrong, just so you can be proved correct about Knight and Perry. If that is so, please go away and talk to your imaginary in a dark padded room.

And breath.....

 

[Dick Knights Mumm]

It wasn't Barry LLoyd and I will not answer to any other managers names irrespective of whether you guess rightly or not

Pat Saward.