Wimbledon Stadium: Some Important News

[racers and royals]

If from the above post you are saying Romford is successful and Wimbledon isn't, as a dog venue, why should that be? Is it because 'Essex man' is more of a dog fan than 'South West London man'? Or is the Romford venue, better run/promoted and offers more palatial surroundings?

The main reason i would suggest is because Corals own Romford-facilities are good,prize money is decent,whereas Wimbledon is being run down by the GRA, and prize money is pathetic.

[arthur cross]

Not an expert on greyhound racing by any means, but I can tell you that the crowds at Romford (which along with Plough Lane and Crayford is one of only three remaining tracks in Greater London) are absolutely enormous - well they are on Friday & Saturday nights.

Incredibly there are weekly meetings on FOUR evenings: the two just mentioned plus Mondays & Wednesdays. Amazing - you name another sport which is staged at the same stadium FOUR evenings (and indeed two lunchtimes too...) every week?!

 

It's only that busy thanks to the money Romford (and many other greyhound tracks) receive from BAGS (the Bookmakers Afternoon Greyhound Service that supplies live greyhound racing into betting shops).

 

Romford has 3 BAGS slots - Saturday lunchtime, Monday nights and Thursday afternoons - it certainly wouldn't stage the daytime action without getting several thousand pounds of BAGS-money per meeting and it's debatable whether it would run Monday nights without the BAGS-money.

 

Overall, it probably receives well over £1million a year in BAGS-money (just over £6,000 three times a week would total a million quid per year and, as far as I know, the BAGS-money per meeting is slightly above that figure) ... compare that sort of money for one track with the entire Elite League being guaranteed a total of only £900,000 per year to share between its 10 clubs from the Sky-deal that's just ended ... there are currently 17 dog tracks on the BAGS schedule covering between 41 and 47 meetings per week with only 8 other dogs tracks (including Wimbledon but see a few paragraphs further down) operating within the official Greyhound Board of Great Britain rules but without a BAGS-income.

 

If you're wondering how dog racing generates that much money from betting shops for its tracks, it works out that each shop up and down the country is paying about £1 for each dog meeting it's showing ... most of the meetings have between 11 and 14 races so that's well under 10p per shop per dog race ... hence, tiny amounts of money from each of 8,000 betting shops become hefty payouts for 17 dogs tracks !!

 

(Newcastle bring in even more BAGS-money because they've 4 slots a week - Tuesday nights, Wednesday lunchtimes, Thursday nights and Saturday afternoons - in fact, their last Saturday afternoon race for the betting shops is at 6.16 and then at 7.39, it's the start of their Saturday evenings for their local punters as well as the Racing Post's greyhound tv-channel.)

 

The vast majority of BAGS races are relatively low-grade affairs involving runners supplied by each track's contracted trainers ... Romford's Wednesday nights and Saturday nights are of the same standard but attract enough of a crowd (especially Saturdays) to be profitable while their main meeting each week is the Friday-night "open" meeting (in other words, open to all trainers anywhere in the country).

 

Clearly, any dog track looks to make plenty of money from its crowd betting on the races or enjoying its bars and restaurants so the admission price for most greyhound fans isn't as big a chunk of their total spending as it would be for most speedway fans ... but the sobering thought for speedway fans is that the BAGS-money also helps to keep down the admission price for the local punters so Romford lets them in free of charge for the daytime-cards, £4 on Monday/Wednesday nights, £7 on Friday/Saturday nights ... it means families can afford to go along even if only one of the parents is seriously into the betting on the races.

 

- - - - - - - - -

 

Meanwhile Ray Stadia wondered how the greater number of meetings at Romford compared to Wimbledon reflected the standards of those two tracks ... several years ago, Wimbledon did have at least one BAGS meeting a week but as it's one of the tracks owned by the Greyhound Racing Association, the GRA chose to re-allocate any of Wimbledon's BAGS-action elsewhere among its venues (Belle Vue and the Birmingham duo of Hall Green and Perry Barr as well as the now-closed Oxford) ... the GRA's reasoning was that it was too costly to open up Wimbledon's much bigger stadium for BAGS-meetings attended by only a handful of spectators when the overheads would be much cheaper at their other tracks for the same BAGS-money coming in.

 

Generally in greyhound racing in the last decade (as with many pubs and restaurants and other leisure businesses), they've had to face up to the changing demands of the public who are now far less likely to go out on Mon/Tue/Wed nights because they're saving their leisure money for the spell that might start on Thursday night but really kicks in between Friday teatime and Sunday mid-evening.

Edited October 21, 2013 by arthur cross

[Ray Stadia]

It's only that busy thanks to the money Romford (and many other greyhound tracks) receive from BAGS (the Bookmakers Afternoon Greyhound Service that supplies live greyhound racing into betting shops).

 

Romford has 3 BAGS slots - Saturday lunchtime, Monday nights and Thursday afternoons - it certainly wouldn't stage the daytime action without getting several thousand pounds of BAGS-money per meeting and it's debatable whether it would run Monday nights without the BAGS-money.

 

Overall, it probably receives well over £1million a year in BAGS-money (just over £6,000 three times a week would total a million quid per year and, as far as I know, the BAGS-money per meeting is slightly above that figure) ... compare that sort of money for one track with the entire Elite League being guaranteed a total of only £900,000 per year to share between its 10 clubs from the Sky-deal that's just ended ... there are currently 17 dog tracks on the BAGS schedule covering between 41 and 47 meetings per week.

 

If you're wondering how dog racing generates that much money from betting shops for its tracks, it works out that each shop up and down the country is paying about £1 for each dog meeting it's showing ... most of the meetings have between 11 and 14 races so that's well under 10p per shop per dog race ... hence, tiny amounts of money from each of 8,000 betting shops become hefty payouts for 17 dogs tracks !!

 

(Newcastle bring in even more BAGS-money because they've 4 slots a week - Tuesday nights, Wednesday lunchtimes, Thursday nights and Saturday afternoons - in fact, their last Saturday afternoon race for the betting shops is at 6.16 and then at 7.39, it's the start of their Saturday evenings for their local punters as well as the Racing Post's greyhound tv-channel.)

 

The vast majority of BAGS races are relatively low-grade affairs involving runners supplied by each track's contracted trainers ... Romford's Wednesday nights and Saturday nights are of the same standard but attract enough of a crowd (especially Saturdays) to be profitable while their main meeting each week is the Friday-night "open" meeting (in other words, open to all trainers anywhere in the country).

 

Clearly, any dog track looks to make plenty of money from its crowd betting on the races or enjoying its bars and restaurants so the admission price for most greyhound fans isn't as big a chunk of their total spending as it would be for most speedway fans ... but the sobering thought for speedway fans is that the BAGS-money also helps to keep down the admission price for the local punters so Romford lets them in free of charge for the daytime-cards, £4 on Monday/Wednesday nights, £7 on Friday/Saturday nights ... it means families can afford to go along even if only one of the parents is seriously into the betting on the races.

 

- - - - - - - - -

 

Meanwhile Ray Stadia wondered how the greater number of meetings at Romford compared to Wimbledon reflected the standards of those two tracks ... several years ago, Wimbledon did have at least one BAGS meeting a week but as it's one of the tracks owned by the Greyhound Racing Association, the GRA chose to re-allocate any of Wimbledon's BAGS-action elsewhere among its venues (Belle Vue and the Birmingham duo of Hall Green and Perry Barr as well as the now-closed Oxford) ... the GRA's reasoning was that it was too costly to open up Wimbledon's much bigger stadium for BAGS-meetings attended by only a handful of spectators when the overheads would be much cheaper at their other tracks for the same BAGS-money coming in.

 

Generally in greyhound racing in the last decade (as with many pubs and restaurants and other leisure businesses), they've had to face up to the changing demands of the public who are now far less likely to go out on Mon/Tue/Wed nights because they're saving their leisure money for the spell that might start on Thursday night but really kicks in between Friday teatime and Sunday mid-evening.

Therefore, BAGS subsidises the entry fee. Parlsoes suggested that Saturday night was rammed and the entry fee, as per above, is £7. Does this mean and an old chestnut I know, that if speedway were to lower the entry price, the terraces would be more healthy? Probably with rider demands on what they want, I doubt whether £7 per meeting could be achieved. I wonder what children are charged? I would imagine they enter for free.

[arthur cross]

Therefore, BAGS subsidises the entry fee. Parlsoes suggested that Saturday night was rammed and the entry fee, as per above, is £7. Does this mean and an old chestnut I know, that if speedway were to lower the entry price, the terraces would be more healthy? Probably with rider demands on what they want, I doubt whether £7 per meeting could be achieved. I wonder what children are charged? I would imagine they enter for free.

 

Given the title of this thread, Parsloes, Ray and myself are all probably going a bit off-topic here except that much of the theory behind Romford's pricing policy and revenue streams could be applied to Wimbledon (they certainly would be if Paschal Taggart builds a new Wimbledon dog track on the existing site).

 

But to answer Ray's latest enquiry ... Romford just put the one category of admission charges (including racecard) that I quoted earlier on their website ... the key thing is they're charging just £7 for the initial admission and then letting their customers choose how much they want to gamble or eat/drink as the night develops depending on each customer's budget.

 

(The racecard is simply a page for each race summarizing the last few appearances of each runner ... there's rarely any reading material beyond that basic form guide so it would be the equivalent of a 50p or £1 speedway scorecard rather than a £2 or £3 programme).

 

In marketing terms, they're not charging as much for the "primary spend" (getting into the venue) because they're better able to profit from the "secondary spend" once you're inside that venue (in their case, the betting, food & drink).

 

And that's usually speedway's massive problem when it tries lower admission charges (or does a free meeting like Lakeside's night a few years ago) because apart from programmes and any sort of raffle draw, any increase in "secondary spending" from the bigger cut-price crowd is probably going to the stadium landlord's profits rather than helping the speedway club.

 

The betting-tote at Romford creams off just under 30% of the total amount bet on each race before the dividends for winning bets are calculated ... so if it's a 12-race card and you bet £2 per race and you have an average night success-wise, the tote will keep about £7 of your money (roughly 30% of your £24 total stakes) and give you back the rest as your various winnings as the night goes along ... of course, depending on your luck/judgment, you might win enough to cover your admission charge or you might lose all £24 you've bet.

 

But assuming you have an average night with your bets, it's cost you £14 (£7 admission and £7 lost on your bets) to get into a busy entertainment venue, be given a basic guide to what's going on and then enjoy the buzz of having a bet every 15-minutes or so ... for a newcomer spending £14, is that a better introduction than spending roughly the same amount to see a few exciting heats of speedway within a 15-heat match ?

 

Maybe the best way of illustrating how well the dog tracks capture "secondary spend" compared to speedway is what's known throughout greyhound racing as "6-pack vouchers" for their crowd ... Romford's current example is that if you book ahead as a group of at least 6 people, you each pay £6/Friday or £9/Saturday on top of the basic £7-admission and then you each get vouchers for a basic snack bar meal, your first two drinks and your first £1 on the tote.

 

What you're paying for those vouchers is good value in its own right (especially on Fridays) but from the track's point of view, any newcomers soon learn their way round the stadium while using those vouchers, ready to spend more money on drinks or bets once they've used the vouchers.

 

In that respect, dog racing is way ahead of speedway in helping its newcomers to get involved.

Edited October 21, 2013 by arthur cross

[mickthemuppet]

If Greyhound Racing is so far ahead of Speedway as you say , why are there only 25 greyhound tracks left in this country. When Greyhound Racing and Speedway were at it's peak in the 1940-50's there were over 120 licenced tracks in this country and over 30 in London. alone. Back in the good old days the tote only took out 5% of the take so it was quite possiblr to win. Now it is 30% which is probably higher than any other sports betting. So how can Dog Racing be ahead of Speedway when Speedway now has more tracks than Greyhound racing. In addition to the licensed track there were over a hundred unlicensed tracks as well. This total is now down to nine

[arthur cross]

If Greyhound Racing is so far ahead of Speedway as you say , why are there only 25 greyhound tracks left in this country. When Greyhound Racing and Speedway were at it's peak in the 1940-50's there were over 120 licenced tracks in this country and over 30 in London. alone. Back in the good old days the tote only took out 5% of the take so it was quite possiblr to win. Now it is 30% which is probably higher than any other sports betting. So how can Dog Racing be ahead of Speedway when Speedway now has more tracks than Greyhound racing. In addition to the licensed track there were over a hundred unlicensed tracks as well. This total is now down to nine

 

The number of tracks operating in each sport really isn't a big factor in what I've been trying to explain ... instead, by answering the enquiries from Parsloes & Ray, I've been explaining aspects where greyhound racing is way ahead of speedway, namely in its ability to bring in money from its tv-coverage in betting-shops and its better user-friendly approach to newcomers.

 

The general changes in our leisure spending has been a huge challenge for the dogs tracks as well as for speedway clubs ... that's why so many dog tracks and speedway clubs have closed just like many pubs, social clubs, cinemas, bingo halls, etc have shut as well.

 

It's also worth noting that in the heydays you've mentioned, there were a lot more greyhound tracks but many of them hosted just a couple of meetings each week that were normally 8-race cards or 10-races at the most, partly because grass tracks were still a normal surface (others were sanded-bends but grass-straights) and they couldn't cope with more frequent use ... today, all the dog tracks are fully sand-based which enables 12 or 13 races to be the usual nightly programme and why several venues like Romford can cope with staging between 60 and 80 races a week, an unthinkable number in those heydays.

 

Most of the dog tracks that have survived are looking after themselves financially far better than most of the surviving speedway clubs ... very few of the dog tracks are being propped up by long-standing family owners or generous local sponsors whereas that's how probably the majority of speedway tracks are just about staying afloat ... instead, the dog tracks have developed a balance that involves daytime or midweek-evening income from betting shops alongside Friday/Saturday night income from local spectators ... I'd sum it up by saying speedway's sunk even further financially than the greyhounds and if you were using profitability instead of mere survival as your measure for who's bigger, the dogs would be way ahead.

 

This thread was started within the debate of whether speedway has any chance of being staged at whatever new sporting venue emerges on the site of the current Wimbledon Greyhound Stadium where one of this country's most famous speedway clubs, the Wimbledon Dons, used to race.

 

Judging by the comments of the We Want Wimbledon greyhound campaigners leading up to last month's gathering at Merton Council, they've made allowances for the number of squash courts in the current site's fitness club to still feature in their preferred plans for a shiny new dog track ... but they made no mention of speedway whatsoever despite the long but increasingly distant history of the Wimbledon Dons.

 

Also (as Parsloes mentioned), there are still 3 dog tracks in Greater London at Wimbledon, Romford and Crayford ... you have to go within touching distance of the M25, never mind any London boundary, to find speedway's nearest track to the capital at Lakeside and while Rye House is only a few miles beyond the M25, dog racing can say exactly the same about Harlow.

Edited October 21, 2013 by arthur cross

[mickthemuppet]

The number of tracks operating in each sport really isn't a big factor in what I've been trying to explain ... instead, by answering the enquiries from Parsloes & Ray, I've been explaining aspects where greyhound racing is way ahead of speedway, namely in its ability to bring in money from its tv-coverage in betting-shops and its better user-friendly approach to newcomers.

 

The general changes in our leisure spending has been a huge challenge for the dogs tracks as well as for speedway clubs ... that's why so many dog tracks and speedway clubs have closed just like many pubs, social clubs, cinemas, bingo halls, etc have shut as well.

 

It's also worth noting that in the heydays you've mentioned, there were a lot more greyhound tracks but many of them hosted just a couple of meetings each week that were normally 8-race cards or 10-races at the most, partly because grass tracks were still a normal surface (others were sanded-bends but grass-straights) and they couldn't cope with more frequent use ... today, all the dog tracks are fully sand-based which enables 12 or 13 races to be the usual nightly programme and why several venues like Romford can cope with staging between 60 and 80 races a week, an unthinkable number in those heydays.

 

Most of the dog tracks that have survived are looking after themselves financially far better than most of the surviving speedway clubs ... very few of the dog tracks are being propped up by long-standing family owners or generous local sponsors whereas that's how probably the majority of speedway tracks are just about staying afloat ... instead, the dog tracks have developed a balance that involves daytime or midweek-evening income from betting shops alongside Friday/Saturday night income from local spectators ... I'd sum it up by saying speedway's sunk even further financially than the greyhounds and if you were using profitability instead of mere survival as your measure for who's bigger, the dogs would be way ahead.

 

This thread was started within the debate of whether speedway has any chance of being staged at whatever new sporting venue emerges on the site of the current Wimbledon Greyhound Stadium where one of this country's most famous speedway clubs, the Wimbledon Dons, used to race.

 

Judging by the comments of the We Want Wimbledon greyhound campaigners leading up to last month's gathering at Merton Council, they've made allowances for the number of squash courts in the current site's fitness club to still feature in their preferred plans for a shiny new dog track ... but they made no mention of speedway whatsoever despite the long but increasingly distant history of the Wimbledon Dons.

 

Also (as Parsloes mentioned), there are still 3 dog tracks in Greater London at Wimbledon, Romford and Crayford ... you have to go within touching distance of the M25, never mind any London boundary, to find speedway's nearest track to the capital at Lakeside and while Rye House is only a few miles beyond the M25, dog racing can say exactly the same about Harlow.

It's a shame that you do not take into consideration that it costs about 10 times as much money to put on a Speedway Meeting than in does a greyhound meeting so their loss is even worse. East Anglia roughly has one greyhound tracks left at Yarmouth. and from memory gone are Raleigh,Southend,Clacton,Ipswich,Bury St Edmunds,Norwich Boundary,Norwich city,Cambridge,Swaffam . So with even with 10% of Speedway expenses they still closed.So there is more Speedway tracks in East Anglia than Greyhounds if not in London

Most of the bigger tracks ran three meetings a week but you also have to remember that all greyhound stadiums ran trials where there were more races that there than an actual meeting.so they were used a lot more than you say. I think you will find that gradually sand replaced the grass as to reduce the injury to the dogs not because of the wear and tear which was very little on a track surface.THe main problem with grass was if it froze but even sanded tracks have the problem as well although not so bad.

Because the tracks take so much money out of the totes (30%) people will see they will be lucky to win in 1 meeting in 10 and and will stop going eventually You will find at least another six tracks will close in the next 5 years. Take its from me Greyhound Racing is in a more perilious state than Speedway.. The bookmakers levy has gone down from £12.5million to $8.5 million.

Edited October 21, 2013 by mickthemuppet

[Parsloes 1928 nearly]

Some very interesting contributions especialy from arthur cross. My point was merely observation really, that Romford Dogs is packed out for Friday & Saturday nights - sure BAGS is financially important to the Corals operation but those are real live punters attending the place those nights! And sure, the crowds did considerably increase when the 'Stow closed.

I do think too that people in the Romford area like a night out. I sadly never saw Speedway at the old Brooklands (closed just before I got into the sport) but by all accounts they got huge crowds there too.

[racers and royals]

From the racing post website posted yesterday

 

THE potential sale of Hall Green and Belle Vue has moved a step closer with a request from sale agent CBRE for formal written offers for the GRA-owned tracks to be submitted by Monday.

The asking price for Hall Green is for offers in excess of £2.3m, while at Belle Vue it is £2.4m.

However, Sheffield-based A&S Leisure Group, whose MD John Gilburn was once general manager at Belle Vue and has made little attempt to disguise aspirations to one day purchase the Manchester stadium, will not be among the suitors.

[Elephantman]

Unfortunately at the best of times we British are parochial; when it comes to sport quite tribal.

 

The obvious solution is for all sports that have an interest in this site getting together and as this is at the design stage designing a true multi use Community Stadium. If West Ham F.C. can retrofit retractable seating to the Olympic Stadium then it shouldn't take a rocket scientist to work out how to do this over a speedway track/dog track or whatever in a new build.

 

However it does require the people with an interest to also have the money; it is clear that the plan for Wimbledon AFC is to flog off some of the land for housing to pay for the stadium; more sport less room for housing. Perhaps that what they mean by community stadium; people live there!

[Sir Sidney]

Based on the very first post on this subject as below Ian Perkin is in contact with Paschal Taggart's representatives, so someone is representing speedway's interest. I doubt any one has both the interest and the financial resources to put forward an alternative speedway focussed proposal and so our best bet is probably that the greyhound proposals are the preferred option. As so often with speedway, we are in the hands of others

 

'Wimbledon Club Chairman when the track closed in 2005, Ian Perkin has had communications with Paschal's legal counsel and if the bid is successful she has indicated that Paschal would be interested in discussing with the previous promotion whether there might be a suitable opportunity for allowing Speedway racing to take place in the new stadium.'

[racers and royals]

Racing Post article today

By Jim Cremin 3:38PM 11 JAN 2014

 

 

IRELAND’S National Asset Management Agency (Nama) has stunned greyhound supporters by backing the plans put forward by Galliard and appearing to rubbish the alternative Paschal Taggart-led vision for a new world-class greyhound stadium.

 

Mark Pollard, senior asset manager at Nama, in a December 11 letter to Planning Inspector Robert Yuile released under disclosure rules to interested parties, describes “speculative third party approaches”.

 

“All such approaches are given due consideration,” he writes, “but in this case are not being progressed. None of these ‘alternatives’ are from as strong and experienced a home builder in Galliard Homes nor offer the deliverability of the sporting facilities.”

 

He added: “Nama hold the loan advanced to the stadium owners GRA (Galliard),” and says the Galliard proposal is “viable, deliverable and most beneficial to the area through its regeneration with primarily sport and residential uses. The proposal does not require any third party land holding or co-operation and can thus be implemented in the short term.”

 

Such support from Nama is potentially seriously damaging with the planning inquiry due to open on Wednesday week at Merton Town Hall in Morden.

 

Indeed, Diane McLean, the greyhound owner and barrister leading the We Want Wimbledon campaign, on Friday expressed her astonishment at the letter and says she has immediately written to Pollard, sending copies of her response to Irish government ministers and other interested parties.

 

McLean questions whether it is appropriate for a governmental institution such as Nama to lobby another country’s governmental body in charge of an independent review, and highlights Taggart’s track record and the ferocious opposition from residents to a football stadium.

 

She points to the support from the Mayor of London for greyhounds and the excellent performance of the existing greyhound operation despite it being so “run down”, and stresses that funding is in place for the new stadium, stating: “Unlike a 20,000 capacity football stadium, [it] will require minimal changes to planning. I am therefore very puzzled as to why Nama has not given any due consideration to these plans. This must surely be contrary to the best interests of the Irish taxpayer?”

 

She underlines that Taggart’s plans have been on record with Merton Council and the Mayor’s office since last February unlike the “speculative” plans of AFC Wimbledon and Galliard Homes, which only came to fruition last month.

 

McLean went on: “Perhaps of equal significance is the fact that an Irish governmental department, set up for the benefit of the Irish taxpayer, should wish to be party to extinguishing a valuable, and cultural, part of the Irish economy.

 

“The Irish greyhound industry is worth €500m to the national economy of Ireland and supports approximately 10,300 full-time and part-time jobs. Furthermore, the industry generates a gross wage bill of €207m per annum and the tax contribution from this employment is estimated at €21m.

 

“The Irish greyhound industry has a very high reputation internationally and has an acknowledged pre-eminence for greyhound breeding. Has Nama not considered the long-term economic effect to Ireland should it be party to closing the last remaining greyhound stadium in London?”

 

McLean added on Friday: “Paschal has always seen this as being about the future of the Irish and British greyhound industry, and it beggars belief that an official Irish department could take such potentially destructive action.

 

“On the other hand, we have been buoyed by the decision of Oxford City Council on Wednesday to turn down the Galliard scheme there, and the hard work going on there, with real Parliamentary and local support, is something we can replicate for Wimbledon.

 

“I call on Nama to reconsider their position. We are happy to meet with Mr Pollard and other officials there, and for all greyhound fans not to lose the faith. We can and will win this battle.”

[salty]

Thanks for posting R & R.

Not massively surprising that NAMA are keen on the Galliard plan as it probably gets them their money quicker.

[Parsloes 1928 nearly]

Am utterly puzzled - what on earth has the National Asset Management Agency of Ireland got to do with a housing development proposal in south-west London...?!

[Triple.H.]

It is they more or less that RCP borrowed the money off for the purchase of the GRA and stadia.

[arthur cross]

Am utterly puzzled - what on earth has the National Asset Management Agency of Ireland got to do with a housing development proposal in south-west London...?!

Because Nama are acting on behalf of various Irish banks still owned millions from the current use of the site !!

 

As I've mentioned before on this thread (especially posts 149 & 163 back in August/September) when explaining mostly-greyhound-based stories about the future of Wimbledon Stadium, the original purchase of the Greyhound Racing Association by Risk Capital over a decade ago (with Galliard Homes lurking in the background from an early stage, if not day one) was significantly funded by multi-million-pound loans from Irish banks who were still several years away from suffering an even bigger 2008 crash than their British counterparts.

 

Within the GRA tracks, the property/redevelopment value of the Wimbledon site is much greater than Hall Green or Belle Vue (or the currently-closed Oxford) ... they can't sell the Perry Barr site as that's tied up in a special deal they have with Birmingham City Council so the only redevelopment money they've raised in recent years is a relatively small amount from the closure of what was always their scrubbiest remaining track at Portsmouth (there was also the closure of Catford in November 2003 but the GRA sold that to English Partnerships in 2004 before a 9-year stalemate that didn't result in the go-ahead for a housing estate until last May).

 

As has also been mentioned earlier in this thread, Nama were behind the invitation a couple of months ago for any individual bids for either Hall Green or Belle Vue although nothing seemed to emerge from what always appeared a rather optimistic invite.

 

That 2008 crash, along with Risk/Galliard's failure to make any proper progress in repaying those loans, has led to those Irish banks having to rely on Nama's clout as their only realistic short/medium-term way of getting the bulk of their money back ... it's long been clear that any profit Wimbledon greyhounds make from their well-attended meetings every Friday and Saturday night is really only covering the interest-payments on those loans rather than making a worthwhile dent in repaying them (the same applies to any profits from the other GRA tracks).

 

With no new development at Wimbledon yet underway, the dragging out of the present scenario (with the real home straight facilities mothballed and the original back straight now the only side open to the public and therefore being the current home straight) has effectively led to Nama being regarded as the owner of the Wimbledon Stadium site (and it's been acknowledged as such by Risk/Galliard in several Racing Post reports in recent months).

 

That's why Nama have an almighty say in what happens next because nothing can happen to the site (football stadium, new dog track, luxury flats or any other type of development) until they can assure those Irish banks that the redeveloper will cover enough of Risk/Galliard's existing multi-million-pound debt.

 

Merton Council have made it clear they prefer a sports/leisure-based development of the site but their influence (especially regarding planning rules & consent) really doesn't come into play until the current private owners want to go ahead with any redevelopment ... and that redevlopment can't go ahead until either Nama report back successfully to those Irish banks or, even worse, Nama and those Irish banks come to the reluctant conclusion of settling for just the small proceeds they'd get from some sort of bankruptcy action against the GRA & Risk/Galliard (such a draconian outcome could be disastrous for the Belle Vue Aces if it was to happen before the building of the long-awaited National Speedway Stadium).

 

By the looks of this latest article, Nama feel their best (or more probably, least bad) option is to support the redevelopment plan of a company they're already dealing with rather than rely on being better satisfied by any new incoming developer.

 

Diane McLean speaks passionately on behalf of those wanting to keep greyhounds running at Wimbledon but beyond being the leader of a noisy campaign, she has no clout whatsoever compared to Risk/Galliard, Merton Council or Nama.

 

Perhaps very significantly a few weeks ago, both she and Paschal Taggart were the invited guests of honour at the Greyhound Writers' Association annual Christmas lunch, after which Mr Taggart was quoted as admitting it's "Wimbledon or nothing" for his ambitions of bringing his Irish experience of revamping greyhound racing to this country ... the overwhelming impression was that his enthusiasm for Wimbledon is beginning to slide and if that's the case, there's almost no hope of the dogs beating a football/housing redevelopment on that site because his reputation, determination and contacts are crucial to the whole greyhound project.

Edited January 11, 2014 by arthur cross

[salty]

Very true, Gustix. The headline of the article on the website is "WWW fury as Nama supports Galliard" which doesn't help either, though there is a pic of Wimbledon Stadium with caption "Wimbledon planning inquiry opens on January 22 at Merton Town Hall".

 

Parsloes - I'm amazed you didn't know of NAMA's involvement. The wonderful venture capitalists at RCP with the "visionary" Luke Johnson at the helm only got their hands on GRA by loaning the money from Irish banks.

 

Arthur Cross - informative as ever - Thank You.

Edited January 11, 2014 by salty

[arthur cross]

What a poor intro to the article by the witer. It in't until the fifth and sixth paragraphs that we get the clues that it's Wimbledon Stadium.

The Racing Post's greyhound section, probably correctly in terms of its regular readership, has long since regarded the future of Wimbledon Stadium, wrapped up in the soap opera of Galliard, Nama and the We Want Wimbledon campaign, to be its biggest behind-the-scenes story by a wide margin and therefore covers any new developments in the story assuming its readers are well clued up about the key people/groups.

 

Jim Cremin's article in today's paper may well have been hastily written before last night's print deadline depending on when the Nama letter and Diane McLean's reaction came to light yesterday ... while I can understand your criticism of the way the article's written when you've only seen the article itself, the actual presentation on page 83 of today's paper makes it very clear the story's about Wimbledon with a correctly-captioned picture of the track at the top, the headline mentioning WWW, Nama & Galliard in the middle and then Jim Cremin's article underneath.

Edited January 11, 2014 by arthur cross

[Parsloes 1928 nearly]

What a poor intro to the article by the witer. It in't until the fifth and sixth paragraphs that we get the clues that it's Wimbledon Stadium.

Well yes, but one assumes the headline (not included here) did refer to Wimbledon Stadium..? If not the article would indeed be very confusing!

Edited January 12, 2014 by Parsloes 1928 nearly

[iris123]

For sure,one would normally assume that there was something that indicated the article was about Wimbledon Stadium.Typical nit-picking.....

 

Quite ironic given a previous Wimbledon speedway promoters links to speedway in Dublin that now we have letters to the Irish government being sent to ask them to step in and save the Greyhound(and maybe speedway)stadium plans!!!Doesn't look good though