Belle Vues National Speedway Stadium

[Guest]

HAVE posted elsewhere that the builders have been appointed by the council and they are pursuing planning permission which should be no more than a formality although it still has to go through the right channels and takes time.

 

The builders are a very large international company for whom this £6 million project should be a breeze.

 

It does indeed when compared to the cost of Arsenal's Emirates Stadium which was £390 million.

Can the stadium use the title Belle Vue while the stadium next door also carries that title?

[Shale Shaker]

HAVE posted elsewhere that the builders have been appointed by the council and they are pursuing planning permission which should be no more than a formality although it still has to go through the right channels and takes time.

 

The builders are a very large international company for whom this £6 million project should be a breeze.

 

So why is this information not posted on the offical site or Facebook page?

[The White Knight]

HAVE posted elsewhere that the builders have been appointed by the council and they are pursuing planning permission which should be no more than a formality although it still has to go through the right channels and takes time.

 

The builders are a very large international company for whom this £6 million project should be a breeze.

 

Thank you for that update Philip. Is there any reason that you know of why Belle Vue are not giving folk regular updates?

 

This is an historic Event for both Belle Vue and for British Speedway - I would have thought that it would be in the interests both the Belle Vue Promoters and the BSPA to encourage enthusiasm among Speedway's Supporters. We do not have a lot to Celebrate these days - the building of a brand new British Speedway Stadium would really give folk a sense of optimism for the future.

[pandorum]

HAVE posted elsewhere that the builders have been appointed by the council and they are pursuing planning permission which should be no more than a formality although it still has to go through the right channels and takes time.

 

The builders are a very large international company for whom this £6 million project should be a breeze.

I have worked for some of the biggest civil/building companies in the world and have seen many a project a lot bigger than this tin shed come and go so what you said Phil means nothing really.

No planning permission means no project. No sane company would waste a lot of time on something that has not gotten planning permission yet.

 

 

 

So why is this information not posted on the offical site or Facebook page?

Good question

Edited July 24, 2013 by pandorum

[Vincent Blachshadow]

HAVE posted elsewhere that the builders have been appointed by the council and they are pursuing planning permission which should be no more than a formality although it still has to go through the right channels and takes time.

 

The builders are a very large international company for whom this £6 million project should be a breeze.

Are these builders appointed for the entire project or just for the speedway stadium part of it?

[Halifaxtiger]

HAVE posted elsewhere that the builders have been appointed by the council and they are pursuing planning permission which should be no more than a formality although it still has to go through the right channels and takes time.

 

The builders are a very large international company for whom this £6 million project should be a breeze.

 

While I think Pandorum is wrong and that this will be built I can very much understand his pessimism.

 

It seems bizarre to me that the council has appointed the builders but are waiting for planning permission............from the council.

 

While I recognise that the circumstances are different, it seemed to take 5 minutes for Tony Mole to get planning permission at Odsal.

[The White Knight]

While I think Pandorum is wrong and that this will be built I can very much understand his pessimism.

 

It seems bizarre to me that the council has appointed the builders but are waiting for planning permission............from the council.

 

While I recognise that the circumstances are different, it seemed to take 5 minutes for Tony Mole to get planning permission at Odsal.

 

Actually - that is a very good point HT.

Edited July 24, 2013 by The White Knight

[pandorum]

While I think Pandorum is wrong and that this will be built I can very much understand his pessimism.

 

It seems bizarre to me that the council has appointed the builders but are waiting for planning permission............from the council.

 

While I recognise that the circumstances are different, it seemed to take 5 minutes for Tony Mole to get planning permission at Odsal.

 

That is not surprising Tiger. Most councils have a list of preffered companies for building projects as small as this.

A tendering process for such a tiny project would be expensive so councils simply assign projects to their preffered list.

It probably consisted of someone going around the preffered list and asking who fancied it.

 

Or maybe the massive firm bought somebody lunch and said 'we will do this for you'.

Sometimes companies would do such a tiny project at a loss to allow them to get something bigger.

The profit margin for a massive company on something so trivial as building a shed and a oval surrounded with some landscaping is tiny to non existent so it is probably the above scenario.

 

Big firms refer to jobs like this as hospital jobs and use them to keep machines and men working whilst waiting for larger more important projects.

Edited July 24, 2013 by pandorum

[Shale Shaker]

Planning permission never takes as long as this, even when the most inept councils are involved.

 

And yet we are told that planning permission is "no more than a formality" - so really it should have been granted much quicker than the norm.

 

I can't help feeling something is amiss, sadly.

[arthur cross]

As I understand it, Manchester City Council has agreed to lend the speedway club (maybe to be more precise, its operational team at the new stadium) the bulk of the money needed to build the stadium ... this money, probably about 90-percent of the total bill, is then to be repaid back by the speedway folk on the terms of a 60-year-loan.

 

But that still leaves a few percent to be directly funded by Belle Vue, maybe about £500,000 ... is drumming that money together proving to be a stumbling point ?

 

You can have the best building company in the world primed up and ready to build the stadium but there's no way such a company will consider starting such a project until all the finance is clearly in place, especially since the 2008 credit crunch that led to various multi-million pound projects being left unfinished.

 

Some other significant questions ...

 

1) Is there even a date fixed yet for the planning permission hearing ? ... so that any building company has some idea when they're going to get the go-ahead and can therefore start advising their contractors or special equipment to be available soon after that go-ahead date.

 

2) Given it's already late-July with no planning permission granted yet, it would be remarkable if the whole stadium was ready for the start of next season in 8 months' time (Redcar's much simpler design took about 6 months to complete and only got its safety certificate a few hours before its opening night in April 2006) so is there an initial contingency plan to just build the track and some basic spectator areas in the limited time that's going to be available ? ... the stadium wouldn't then be fully finished until the 2015 season but this would at least give it some use in 2014.

 

I've already said on this forum that while I welcome the creation of a national speedway stadium (especially one that's going to be next door to a long-established home of speedway in as big a city as Manchester), I wouldn't let the current ham-fisted Belle Vue regime anywhere near the running of it ... given the on-going delay even securing what's supposed to be rubber-stamped planning permission, I don't expect any meeting to be staged at this new site in 2014 and I wouldn't be surprised if it isn't ready until well into the 2015 season.

[John Leslie]

Are these builders appointed for the entire project or just for the speedway stadium part of it?

Believe they're building the whole sports village.

 

They built the 6,000 seater London Olympic velodrome, so a 6,000 capacity speedway stadium with 2,500 seats should be within their capabilities http://www.isgplc.com/projects/

[Grand Central]

I think an awful lot of the pessimism expressed here looks warranted.

And am surprised that words spoken quite some time ago are still being taken as gospel now.

When so much time has passed with no concrete action hasvingtaken place.

 

And the fact that this particular promotion entrusted with the operation is not even regarded that well WITHIN Speedway.

Doesn't give one much cause for optimism for their performance on this much larger stage.

And over 60 years.

 

I mean, sorry, but would you want YOUR local council, spending your council tax on this loan deal.

Really.

Edited July 24, 2013 by Grand Central

[John Leslie]

When so much time has passed with no concrete action having taken place.

No concrete action? Just 3 months ago the council executive (the highest authority in the city) formally approved the plans. Within the last month or so they have awarded the tender to build the village to ISG. Doesn't sound like no action to me.

I mean, sorry, but would you want YOUR local council, spending your council tax on this loan deal.

Really.

Just as well that not one bean is coming from council tax then!

[Grand Central]

 

No concrete action? Just 3 months ago the council executive (the highest authority in the city) formally approved the plans. Within the last month or so they have awarded the tender to build the village to ISG. Doesn't sound like no action to me.

 

Just as well that not one bean is coming from council tax then!

 

That's OK on all grounds then.

My mind is now at rest.

[pandorum]

Believe they're building the whole sports village.

 

They built the 6,000 seater London Olympic velodrome, so a 6,000 capacity speedway stadium with 2,500 seats should be within their capabilities http://www.isgplc.com/projects/

 

Massive they are NOT Phil. ISG are a medium sized company who have less than 50 million in projects for this year ranking #17 in this years contractor list.

Can't say I have heard of them but that is no surprise as companies are constantly being amalgamated, taken over or just dissapear.

But again this is meaningless. All companies have filing cabinets with contracts in the pipeline.

Many of which will never even reach the stage where a contractor even visits the site.

 

Any reasonably sized building/civil company could cope with such a small contract.

The prep work minimal, steelwork will likely as not fill one wagon, the concrete involved trivial.

The rest is simply labour and sub contracts.

If it wasn't finished in 6 months the whole crew would deserve the sack.

 

 

No concrete action? Just 3 months ago the council executive (the highest authority in the city) formally approved the plans. Within the last month or so they have awarded the tender to build the village to ISG. Doesn't sound like no action to me.

Happens all the time mate. Means absolutely nothing. I have worked for firms that have won tenders for jobs that simply dissapear and are never heard of again.

Was there an actual tendering process for this?

Seems odd, as it costs money to prepare a tender, that something not only as small but with a poor track record would warrant one. Obviously not impossible but just sounds off to me when councils nowadays prefer to keep a list of preffered contractors and award jobs rather than tendering.

Edited July 24, 2013 by pandorum

[John Leslie]

Massive they are NOT. ISG are a medium sized company who have less than 50 million in projects for this year ranking #17 in this years contractor list.

I don't recall using the word massive. That's a relative term. They do however seem to have a £1.3bn turnover, and have built the London Olympics Velodrome where we swept the board in Olympic gold. If they're the 17th biggest building contractor in the country then I'd be pretty convinced they can knock up a pretty decent speedway stadium inside 6 months and maybe we can move on to British Speedway picking up some gold medals in future

[Vincent Blachshadow]

Believe they're building the whole sports village.

So we know that something is going up now, but not necessarily what's included. Edited July 24, 2013 by Vincent Blackshadow

[PHILIPRISING]

I think an awful lot of the pessimism expressed here looks warranted.

And am surprised that words spoken quite some time ago are still being taken as gospel now.

When so much time has passed with no concrete action hasvingtaken place.

 

And the fact that this particular promotion entrusted with the operation is not even regarded that well WITHIN Speedway.

Doesn't give one much cause for optimism for their performance on this much larger stage.

And over 60 years.

 

I mean, sorry, but would you want YOUR local council, spending your council tax on this loan deal.

Really.

 

THE money used of the whole project has not come from council tax but is in effect from Manchester City Football Club which is why it was deemed acceptable to spend it on a Sports Village

[Shale Shaker]

^{If the project is all going ahead, and coming along swimmingly, it would make a great idea for a feature in the Speedway Star, don't you think?}

Edited July 24, 2013 by Shale Shaker

[pandorum]

I don't recall using the word massive. That's a relative term. They do however seem to have a £1.3bn turnover, and have built the London Olympics Velodrome where we swept the board in Olympic gold. If they're the 17th biggest building contractor in the country then I'd be pretty convinced they can knock up a pretty decent speedway stadium inside 6 months and maybe we can move on to British Speedway picking up some gold medals in future

Wasn't making that comment at you, apologies, my bad, it was what Philip described them as.

You did miss out the word Phil in my quote in your post though.

 

And I wasn't saying that they could not do the job. I have worked for small local firms who could knock that up easily.

 

But to addreess one point you made. The size of the company is not directly proportionate to the standard of the job they do. A large firm might send their poorest labour to a job this small whereas a smaller firm might consider this a more important flagship job and send their better men there.

I have worked for massive firms that did a lousy job and small firms that did an excellent job.

In days gone by some of the biggest civil/building firms in the country had reputations as lousy builders but had the finance to get the work over firms who could not compete with them.

Edited July 24, 2013 by pandorum