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Villa Park redevelopment


Phumfeinz

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New stand is absolutely 100% something the owners want. It's critical for the growth of the club. I don't think Purslow's departure will cool the enthusiasm for it whatsoever. The only risk is if Purslow was involved heavily in connections with the council / neighbours etc., navigating any issues there could be a little trickier now. But I have no idea about that.

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42 minutes ago, jayEm said:

New stand is absolutely 100% something the owners want. It's critical for the growth of the club. I don't think Purslow's departure will cool the enthusiasm for it whatsoever. The only risk is if Purslow was involved heavily in connections with the council / neighbours etc., navigating any issues there could be a little trickier now. But I have no idea about that.

maybe he had subordinates, that was well versed with it all.

I would think this was all thought through.

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5 hours ago, Wainy316 said:

Nah, he's done all the leg work.  Maybe having it all set in stone has contributed to his departure

Yep, purslow wouldn't be anywhere near the day to day on this, the club will have appointed a project manager to look after it for them (and I'm sure someone here knows who it is?)

They'll do reporting to someone at the club but that's about it, the level of interest from the end user changes with every project

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Interesting, this may be a key to why we haven't heard a start date for the project yet. Hopefully the funding for the upgrade to the station will be approved shortly so we can get cracking on the project.

Villa Park holds key to £117m city cash boost as railway station plea intensifies

Leader of Birmingham City Council John Cotton spoke with Aston Villa chiefs last week to discuss stadium development plans

Aston Villa will find out in September if their home, Villa Park, will host the UEFA European Championships in 2028. And should the UK and Ireland’s bid be successful, leader of Birmingham City Council John Cotton believes it will boost the local economy by £117 million.

Villa Park is one of ten stadiums which are part of the UK and Ireland’s bid to host the tournament. Others include Wembley, Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, St James’ Park in Newcastle and Hampden Park in Glasgow.

It’s understood Villa are awaiting funding from the West Midlands Combined Authority which, in 2021, funded the £30m redevelopment of Perry Barr railway station ahead of the Commonwealth Games.

Speaking at Birmingham City Council’s full meeting on Tuesday (June 13), councillor Lee Marsham (Nechells, Lab) put pressure on Mayor of the West Midlands, Andy Street, to stump up the millions needed to upgrade Witton Station in line with Villa’s grand plans to improve their stadium in the months and years to come.

In response, Cllr Cotton said: “Now, clearly we want visitors to have the best possible experience so improvements to Witton Station are important, not just for this tournament but for the local community and for Villa fans who are travelling for games in the future.

 

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I hope we start next season with a home game, and end with an away game. It gives us the opportunity to start tearing down the stands earlier, and perhaps some available seats for the start of next season in the new stand. 

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I might be wrong, but I'm pretty sure that our planning permission was granted without any additional stipulations, and that whilst the upgrade to the station is important to the wider planning of the area around Villa Park, we can go ahead and build the North Stand without it.

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I'm sure I saw something along the lines of it being delayed because of inflation being so high this year. Building materials, machinery, workforce etc costing way more than was expected so waiting for the expected drop in inflation before making a start.

Not sure where I saw that, might have been on here somewhere.

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1 hour ago, blobbyrob said:

I'm sure I saw something along the lines of it being delayed because of inflation being so high this year. Building materials, machinery, workforce etc costing way more than was expected so waiting for the expected drop in inflation before making a start.

A drop in inflation won't make anything cheaper. It will just mean things won't be increasing in price as fast. Seems odd to wait if that's the case, it saves you money getting a tender out and confirmed now because in a year or two the cost would be even higher.

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2 hours ago, villa89 said:

A drop in inflation won't make anything cheaper. It will just mean things won't be increasing in price as fast. Seems odd to wait if that's the case, it saves you money getting a tender out and confirmed now because in a year or two the cost would be even higher.

Inflation is not driven by building materials costs. Supply and demand affects materials significantly. Power costs affect materials production significantly. 

If power costs drop to something more normal in the next 12 months and there is a downturn in construction projects (which seems to be happening) the build cost probably will fall a lot from where it would be if it started today 

Edited by sidcow
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12 hours ago, blobbyrob said:

I'm sure I saw something along the lines of it being delayed because of inflation being so high this year. Building materials, machinery, workforce etc costing way more than was expected so waiting for the expected drop in inflation before making a start.

Not sure where I saw that, might have been on here somewhere.

Nah they'll have contingencies in for that, every danger that the tender returns came in higher than the cost plan but that's because cost plans are generally a load of bollocks (I could go in to a lot of boring detail here...) but it won't be because of inflation

Assuming the project will probably be a design and build fixed price lump sum if they were that concerned over inflation they would just put inflation clauses in the contract, they wouldn't delay it

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13 hours ago, OutByEaster? said:

I might be wrong, but I'm pretty sure that our planning permission was granted without any additional stipulations, and that whilst the upgrade to the station is important to the wider planning of the area around Villa Park, we can go ahead and build the North Stand without it.

Yes I think we could easily go ahead and just start to build the new stand. I do think the club are very aware of the transport issue getting worse as a result. Therefore I reckon we are just holding fire on announcing a start date to keep the pressure on the council to agree to stump up funding on their part for the station which will ease match day traffic and improve the links into the area. That is why we saw the article I posted yesterday where Cllr Lee Marsham and Cllr John Cotton are highlighting the financial benefits of the outlay to the wider area if we win the bid for the Euros. A clear message of £30m outlay now could bring over £100m to the local economy in the near future.

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Anyone  know if there’s a chance that they could tweak the design to add an extra couple of thousand seats or would that need a whole new planning application. Could they raise the roof a few metres or tweak the flanks? The new Anfield Road stand is a similar design and will seat circa 16k… 

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I am beginning to think they have over complicated this by planning on incorporating new dressing rooms, moving the tunnel etc. This has no doubt made the stand a more complex project and will also involve a lot of reconfiguration of the Trinity- our newest stand.

I would ne inclined to just get a new stand up and then figure out the Witton Lane.

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