Ground development and the Rugger lot

[Red and White Zider]

they dont seem to have any spending power and have lost circa £18m in the last 2 seasons... so im hopefull but not really expectant!!

hopefully they get relegated and we get promotion and we we be back amongst them!..

i reckon you lot will do ok .. no great shakes in league 1 this time as all the teams that came down are skint... and with Saints and Brighton out of the way it looks a tight league

you and a fair few others should def have a shout of play offs

can see udders and Sheff we up nr the top ... and teams like yourselves, charlton, b'mouth, palace and preston fighting it out...

Ive sussed you out my old drinking friend!

 

[Oldsmobile-88]

We looked into sharing as part of our consultation re: stadium a couple of years back - main stumbling block would be the cost of "buy in" at the ground - several million, I believe.

Indeed...The only way a ground share would work,is if both parties got on the ground floor together.
..
After the Grecians lost the freehold to SJP it was game over for any pipe dreams of a joint stadium....(Exeter Arena was mooted at one time)

 

[Willy Nilly]

can see udders and Sheff we up nr the top ... and teams like yourselves, charlton, b'mouth, palace and preston fighting it out...

I'm not sure Palace will make the League One play-offs!!

 

[NHSgas]

I'm not sure Palace will make the League One play-offs!!

well spotted meant preston then didnt delete the palace bit lol

 

[Antony Moxey]

who owns sandy park? rugger lot? council? private?
Football club invited? ignored? or did Exeter City FC decline to be involved?

All very similar to our situation at the gas in the past (and possibly future)

Sandy Park is wholly owned by the Chiefs, and was financed through the sale of the old County Ground in St Thomas for, I think, £10-12M.

As part of the Drivers Jonas report, they looked at redeveloping SJP, sharing with the Chiefs or going to a new ground altogether. The Chiefs wanted - for an equal partnership - £11M from us to go in with them, plus, of course, from then on we'd have to stump up half the development costs they're shelling out to raise their capacity to 20k.

The cost of moving to a new ground was a not dissimilar figure - upwards of £10M I think - plus there was finding a suitable site in the first place, so that one fell by the wayside leaving us with redeveloping SJP.

I think too that in the DJ report this was the least preferred option as there weren't the expansion opportunities at the SJP as there are at SP and AN Other ground, however I think the board and fans thought f*ck it, we're staying anyway.

And I agree with that - the bit of the DJ report that we were allowed to see seemed to me to be very half arsed with figures and conclusions contradicting themselves throughout. But anyway, that's a by the by. If we want in the with Chiefs it'll cost us £11M, if we do it ourselves it looks like we'll be getting £7M-worth for 'free'.

 

[Pete Martin (CTID)]

Mr. Moxey is pretty well spot on with his assessment.

The County Ground was sold to Bellway Homes for circa. £12million. The Chiefs were fortunate that they sold it when they did as the economy was still fairly buoyant at that time.

As Moxers rightly says the Chiefs wanted at least £11 to "buy in" and then a half share of the cost of any future expansion plans (at a time, back then, when their capacity was around 7,800). Once they got past about 12,000 we would have effectively been financing their expansion plans, not our own.

To give a flavour of the comparisons, I believe the Drivers Jonas report suggested a figure of around £7 million to develop an entirely new stadium with a capacity of just 5,000 near Exeter Arena - and that was nearly 5 years ago.

We also gain massively by being virtually in the centre of the city with rail, bus, foot and cycle travel to the ground all very straightforward and plenty of car parking within walking distance.

Like Moxers, I still think we made the right decision.