Stoneham - What Actually Happened?

[AwaySaint1]

The answer to the original question is simple.

 

My brother was on EBC at the time and attended the meetings,the original plans seemed to be going through ok,BUT then RL added new plans that would of included his brother building shops/retail and small industrial units on the site.

 

RL would not budge unless his family had enough fingers in the pie(Webbs etc).

[um pahars]

For all its faults, the reverse takeover enabled the rights issue that helped get the ball rolling on the stadium. It might not be right for us now, but SMS wouldn't exist without it.

 

I have to say that's a rather large, and IMHO, an incorrect assumption.

 

The main reason why we finally secured the funding for a new stadium, along with a number of other clubs who weren't listed, was due to the inlfux of cash into the game, mainly from SKY (also, it cannot be denied that for a short period, football clubs achieved favoured status in the financial world!!!!).

 

The rights issue itself contributed something like 8% of the total costs and was not pivotal in ensuring the project went ahead.

 

What was pivotal was the ability to borrow money (up to 25million) from institutions, which also did not rest on the listed status of the Club, something confirmed to me recently by David Jones (FD).

 

The main factor was the sharp increase of money brought into the game by television broadcasters and all the consequential effects such a sea change in broadcasting rights brought about.

[bungle]

Am I the only one who is delighted that Lowe ****ed it up (allegedly) and we have a stadium in the city centre? OK we could be debt free with Stoneham but **** me who really wants a soulless out of town ground like Reading? Do you remember the buses to get back from the Madjeski this season? I know St Mary's is a far from perfect identikit stadium but give me its location rather than the outskirts of the city every time!

 

Hale Rupert! :cool:

 

I agree entirely. Who cares what did or didn't happen, we have a city centre stadium rather than something in the middle of nowhere.

[ecuk268]

Many years ago (I think) the club was offered the land where Toys R Us is built for a new ground.

 

Saints shot themselves in the foot here. Just after the FA Cup win in 1976, he club were looking to build a ground and the Council offered them the old Power Station site (Toys R Us) AND help with the finance to build it.

 

However, the Council saw it as a community stadium with joint ownership. Saints turned it down saying that they wanted complete control.

 

I don't think that Lowe should take all the blame for the Stoneham failure. The site was ideal with the links to the motorway, railway and airport. It also included a leisure centre, football pitches, tennis courts etc for community use. apart from the usual group of nimbys the whole thing was very political with the 3 councils involved. If Southampton had been Tory controlled things might have been different, but with HCC you had councillors from faraway places like Aldershot, Hartley Whitney etc voting.

 

What was never really spelt out at the beginning was how it was going to be financed. All that Lowe did was to look at it with his financial eye and realise that it needed some form of retail development to fund it. Eastleigh objected to all this and the whole thing fell apart.

[South City Si]

I agree that Stoneham would have been a worse choice than SMS.

 

It also highlights for me the importance of any investment into the club must be followed by the purchasing of the land around SMS, i.e. the waterfront, for development which could offer opportunities for the club as a whole.

This would be be good for the city and not just for the club.

[Dicko]

Who cares?

 

We would have been like Reading, a 25000 seater stadium in the middle of nowhere

Give me SMS every day of the week

[lordswoodsaints]

didnt they start the ball rolling in 76?,i believe the preferred site was the 'toys r us/west quay' site or the lido/pirellis site for us old boys:-).

then i believe there was talk of turning the dell around,swallowing up the church and the flats on the corner of archers road.the stoneham proposal was always going to be a difficult one as it incorporated some green belt land that the eastleigh residents saw as a boundry which seperated their independance from southampton.

[John Smith]

I don;t know the ins and outs, and I'm sure there was blame on each part. However, I don't think we would have ever seen a Saints stadium in Eastleigh, and IMO, nor should we. Southampton is where the stadium should be. Should we pay homage to Lowe for acquiring SMS? No, don;t be silly. He never 'found' it, he was given it, he just said yes. Fair play, he could've said no and The Dell sold and we have no ground to play in, but he didn;t.

 

Let's put stoneham to rest, was never going to happen, never did happen, never will. Let's also put to rest this 'Lowe gave us SMS', he didn;t, the council did.

 

Not blaming Lowe for anything, and also not giving him any credit for anything. IMO, anyone who was chairman at Saints at this time, would've said yes to the site, if they were in the same situation.

[eelpie]

I don;t know the ins and outs, and I'm sure there was blame on each part. However, I don't think we would have ever seen a Saints stadium in Eastleigh, and IMO, nor should we. Southampton is where the stadium should be. Should we pay homage to Lowe for acquiring SMS? No, don;t be silly. He never 'found' it, he was given it, he just said yes. Fair play, he could've said no and The Dell sold and we have no ground to play in, but he didn;t.

 

Let's put stoneham to rest, was never going to happen, never did happen, never will. Let's also put to rest this 'Lowe gave us SMS', he didn;t, the council did.

 

Not blaming Lowe for anything, and also not giving him any credit for anything. IMO, anyone who was chairman at Saints at this time, would've said yes to the site, if they were in the same situation.

 

What I don't understand is why, if shops etc were the stumbling block at Stoneham, Lowe did not incorporate similar for St Mary's. The Madjeski's hotel does not take up more of a 'footprint' than St Mary's, for example, and provides useful revenue for Reading FC.

[JohnnyFartPants]

Saw this on 606 (don't laugh..) - what actually caused the Stoneham Plan to fall through?

 

I remember that the usual NIMBY's paraded themselves to try to block it - the post on 606 (below) makes some big accusations against RL though, saying that the planners just got fed up of him.

 

If true, it does make a mockery of the 'We Built it, You fill it' claim...if Stoneham would have been built (and with the Retail Units financing the Payments on the Stadium) we could have been in a totally different financial position to now.

 

Instead we have the £20M over our heads. Hardly the evidence of good business acumen.

 

Come on guys...what happened? I know that as the post was on 606 it may be as realistic as the Skates' Championship hopes but it is worthy of discussion.

 

 

---

 

 

Channon wide to Golac who crosses to Osgood and bang into the top corner. (U11922071)

posted 23 Hours Ago

 

Absolutely incorrect, you clearly don't know the history of why we are where we are.

 

1. The Stoneham site was near the M27 and included proposed retail and leisure outlets and facilities.

 

2. Those outlets pay rent which covers the ground mortgage payments.

 

3. Lowe angered the planners to the point they threw the whole proposal out for good.

 

4. Lowe had already agreed the old ground sale and time was pressing.

 

5. Lowe was saved from total humiliation when Southampton City Council came up with a plot in a run down industrial area right next to the gas storage units.

 

 

We are where we are through his arrogance and incompetence and cannot support our stadium costs without selling everything.

 

Lowe has never acknowledged the Council saved his bacon and our stadium is nothing special at all.

 

Still, all the many Uefa games we have staged has been really handy!

 

Go and see Derby's ground to see what might have been, cinema's, shops, pubs, hotels, restaurants a plenty.

 

The stadium is nothing to what the right man could have achieved.

 

 

-----

 

People could always compare different clubs and stadiums to others but for you to use Derby as an example is just too good not to reply to. At the end of the day I go to the stadium to watch football and not to shop, watch a film or stay in a hotel. Further to that, if I did wish to do any of those things I would much rather watch a match in St Marys type of stadium and then use the local shops, cinemas and hotels in the region - long established and in better areas than go to that souless dump in the middle of an Industrial Business Park that is Pride Park. The "add-ons" that have been built into the stadium plans take away from the stadium and the location of the whole place does so to a greater amount. I would be careful what you wish for, unless you are new wave chav culture, obviously.

[Trumush]

Saints shot themselves in the foot here. Just after the FA Cup win in 1976, he club were looking to build a ground and the Council offered them the old Power Station site (Toys R Us) AND help with the finance to build it.

 

However, the Council saw it as a community stadium with joint ownership. Saints turned it down saying that they wanted complete control.

 

I don't think that Lowe should take all the blame for the Stoneham failure. The site was ideal with the links to the motorway, railway and airport. It also included a leisure centre, football pitches, tennis courts etc for community use. apart from the usual group of nimbys the whole thing was very political with the 3 councils involved. If Southampton had been Tory controlled things might have been different, but with HCC you had councillors from faraway places like Aldershot, Hartley Whitney etc voting.

 

What was never really spelt out at the beginning was how it was going to be financed. All that Lowe did was to look at it with his financial eye and realise that it needed some form of retail development to fund it. Eastleigh objected to all this and the whole thing fell apart.

As one of the most vociferous opponents to the project was the Tory councillor for Bassett, Mr Alec Samuels I dont think having a Tory controlled council would have helped much.

[La BoIS Saint]

I'm happy that the stadium in in Southampton rather than Eastleigh. I hate out of town grounds.

[Channon's Sideburns]

People could always compare different clubs and stadiums to others but for you to use Derby as an example is just too good not to reply to. At the end of the day I go to the stadium to watch football and not to shop, watch a film or stay in a hotel. Further to that, if I did wish to do any of those things I would much rather watch a match in St Marys type of stadium and then use the local shops, cinemas and hotels in the region - long established and in better areas than go to that souless dump in the middle of an Industrial Business Park that is Pride Park. The "add-ons" that have been built into the stadium plans take away from the stadium and the location of the whole place does so to a greater amount. I would be careful what you wish for, unless you are new wave chav culture, obviously.

 

JFP.

 

I have pointed out on other responses above, quite clearly...

 

I WAS NOT THE PERSON WHO MENTIONED DERBY AS AN EXAMPLE - IT WAS PASTED FROM THE THREAD ON 606 BY A POSTER 'Golac etc'.

 

Unfortunately others didn't get the gist of that and basically started mudslinging.

 

I'm not going to repeat it again, it's getting very tiresome now.

 

Not your fault.

 

BTW I've two small daughters, and I hope 1000% that Chavs cease to exist by the time my girls are in their teens.

 

Chavs are the boil on the arse of society. End of.

[JohnnyFartPants]

JFP.

 

I have pointed out on other responses above, quite clearly...

 

I WAS NOT THE PERSON WHO MENTIONED DERBY AS AN EXAMPLE - IT WAS PASTED FROM THE THREAD ON 606 BY A POSTER 'Golac etc'.

 

Unfortunately others didn't get the gist of that and basically started mudslinging.

 

I'm not going to repeat it again, it's getting very tiresome now.

 

Not your fault.

 

BTW I've two small daughters, and I hope 1000% that Chavs cease to exist by the time my girls are in their teens.

 

Chavs are the boil on the arse of society. End of.

 

Soz, thought they were your words. As for chavs and having off spring, I echo your sentiments.

[ericofarabia]

Just as well we didn't get the Stoneham site ... poor old Skatesmuff wouldn't have any where to train LOL

 

And lets not forget St Mary's is our spiritual home .. we're going back to our roots man

[Channon's Sideburns]

Soz, thought they were your words. As for chavs and having off spring, I echo your sentiments.

 

No probs, appreciate your reply.

 

I started the thread with good intentions, just wanting to widen my knowledge of the Stoneham issue.

 

I thought that it was a valid point to raise as the post on 606 was alleging that Rupert ballsed up the application.

 

As it turns out it looks like there were 8-10 people who collectively did that, so that's fine by me. Unfortunately there are some on here at present (yourself excluded) who just want an argument.

 

Regardless of anyone's views on the running of the club, we are all red and white.

 

At least you'd think so!!

[Saint_clark]

No probs, appreciate your reply.

 

I started the thread with good intentions, just wanting to widen my knowledge of the Stoneham issue.

 

I thought that it was a valid point to raise as the post on 606 was alleging that Rupert ballsed up the application.

 

As it turns out it looks like there were 8-10 people who collectively did that, so that's fine by me. Unfortunately there are some on here at present (yourself excluded) who just want an argument.

 

Regardless of anyone's views on the running of the club, we are all red and white.

 

At least you'd think so!!

 

Agreed, and I think it's sad that what is a very interesting debate has been brought down by certain people.

[Scummer]

Yes this is accurate - Lowe was the man who came in and altered the plans to include more retail which gave Eastleigh BC the opening to object. It became political as well with the Tories in Hampshire CC (which included Mike Han**** from Portsmouth) basically point scoring over their Labour counterparts in Southampton CC.

 

Small point, but Mike Hanc ock is a Liberal, not a Conservative.

[St_Tel49]

Saw this on 606 (don't laugh..) - what actually caused the Stoneham Plan to fall through?

 

I remember that the usual NIMBY's paraded themselves to try to block it - the post on 606 (below) makes some big accusations against RL though, saying that the planners just got fed up of him.

 

If true, it does make a mockery of the 'We Built it, You fill it' claim...if Stoneham would have been built (and with the Retail Units financing the Payments on the Stadium) we could have been in a totally different financial position to now.

 

Instead we have the £20M over our heads. Hardly the evidence of good business acumen.

 

Come on guys...what happened? I know that as the post was on 606 it may be as realistic as the Skates' Championship hopes but it is worthy of discussion.

 

 

---

 

 

Channon wide to Golac who crosses to Osgood and bang into the top corner. (U11922071)

posted 23 Hours Ago

 

Absolutely incorrect, you clearly don't know the history of why we are where we are.

 

1. The Stoneham site was near the M27 and included proposed retail and leisure outlets and facilities.

 

2. Those outlets pay rent which covers the ground mortgage payments.

 

3. Lowe angered the planners to the point they threw the whole proposal out for good.

 

4. Lowe had already agreed the old ground sale and time was pressing.

 

5. Lowe was saved from total humiliation when Southampton City Council came up with a plot in a run down industrial area right next to the gas storage units.

 

 

We are where we are through his arrogance and incompetence and cannot support our stadium costs without selling everything.

 

Lowe has never acknowledged the Council saved his bacon and our stadium is nothing special at all.

 

Still, all the many Uefa games we have staged has been really handy!

 

Go and see Derby's ground to see what might have been, cinema's, shops, pubs, hotels, restaurants a plenty.

 

The stadium is nothing to what the right man could have achieved.

 

 

-----

EBC refused to sanction the shops, cinema, hotel etc so they would never have been built anyway - so we would have a 25000 seater stadium rather than a 32000 seater and still had to fund it without the surrounding retail area. So the "facts" in the post are simply wrong except that Lowe did p i s s off EBC because he insisted on the necessity of the retail development as well as the stadium.

[Junction 9]

I'm just glad they built it where it is instead of Stoneham.

[Kadeem Hardison]

There is karma in the NIMBYs denying our stadium at Stoneham on the grounds of disruption to the neighbourhood once every couple of weeks: the council then decided to make it a permanent site for travellers to pitch their caravans, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

[saintwarwick]

There is karma in the NIMBYs denying our stadium at Stoneham on the grounds of disruption to the neighbourhood once every couple of weeks: the council then decided to make it a permanent site for travellers to pitch their caravans, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

 

That'll learn the NIMBY's.

[saintwarwick]

Saints shot themselves in the foot here. Just after the FA Cup win in 1976, he club were looking to build a ground and the Council offered them the old Power Station site (Toys R Us) AND help with the finance to build it.

 

However, the Council saw it as a community stadium with joint ownership. Saints turned it down saying that they wanted complete control.

 

I don't think that Lowe should take all the blame for the Stoneham failure. The site was ideal with the links to the motorway, railway and airport. It also included a leisure centre, football pitches, tennis courts etc for community use. apart from the usual group of nimbys the whole thing was very political with the 3 councils involved. If Southampton had been Tory controlled things might have been different, but with HCC you had councillors from faraway places like Aldershot, Hartley Whitney etc voting.

 

What was never really spelt out at the beginning was how it was going to be financed. All that Lowe did was to look at it with his financial eye and realise that it needed some form of retail development to fund it. Eastleigh objected to all this and the whole thing fell apart.

 

That's very much how I read into it. One thing about the Toys R Us site, after talks about the site as a possible venue for a new stadium didn't the council then start drilling for hot water to power the town? Seem to recall seeing/reading something about it.

[spyinthesky]

I always thought that Stoneham would have been ideal due to proximity to Motorway/Rail and Air Links.

 

Also would have been an iconic site viewable by millions of travellers a year.

 

However, despite earlier reservations, St Mary's probably deals with traffic issues better than Stoneham would have done.

 

Would have been interesting to see how the shape of Soton City Centre would have developed if the original plans for a new stadium on the Pirelli site had progressed. No West Quay Shopping, for example

[CB Fry]

No probs, appreciate your reply.

 

I started the thread with good intentions, just wanting to widen my knowledge of the Stoneham issue.

 

I thought that it was a valid point to raise as the post on 606 was alleging that Rupert ballsed up the application.

 

As it turns out it looks like there were 8-10 people who collectively did that, so that's fine by me. Unfortunately there are some on here at present (yourself excluded) who just want an argument.

 

Regardless of anyone's views on the running of the club, we are all red and white.

 

At least you'd think so!!

 

 

Nice attempt at taking the moral high ground, but it doesn't wash.

 

Two days ago you started a pointless thread (that was rightly ripped to shreds) bleating about how we have never again matched the highs of beating Man Utd 6-3. An assertion that was not only total rubbish (we've had plenty of highs since then) but was started by you purely to wind people up - I think you just "wanted an argument" myself.

 

 

And then you followed it on with this lot of nonsense dredging up Stoneham a project missed by absolutely no-one except for a few desperados who just seem addicted to having a go at Lowe for absolutely anything even if it involves them lamenting the fact we didn't get a 25,000 stadium in the middle of nowhere surrounded by branches of Subway and Frankie and Benny's. And linked it to a posting on 606 which any fule kno is full of utter rubbish, all the time.

 

So two threads in two days serving no purpose except to wind people up and start arguments.

 

Every Saints fan breathing air (except about two wind up merchants on here) wants Lowe gone, and Lowe gone tomorrow.

 

There are plenty of sticks to beat him with - if you want I'll give you twenty of the top of my head to you get started. Just let me know and i'll reel them off.

 

 

But whinging about an isolated result in a **** poor season in 1997 and grizzling about not getting a stadium noone really wanted anyway, again more than ten years ago really is pointless.

 

You know you started both threads as a wind up, not least because you said the other day that Lowe support in the fanbase was 50:50 so you think you need to convince people Lowe needs to go by going on about stuff that happen a decade ago. 50:50!

 

Good luck finding that 50% pro Lowe fanbase.:smt044

 

We're united. We want Lowe out. Stop flogging dead horses.

[DaveyR]

Nice attempt at taking the moral high ground, but it doesn't wash.

 

Two days ago you started a pointless thread (that was rightly ripped to shreds) bleating about how we have never again matched the highs of beating Man Utd 6-3. An assertion that was not only total rubbish (we've had plenty of highs since then) but was started by you purely to wind people up - I think you just "wanted an argument" myself.

 

 

And then you followed it on with this lot of nonsense dredging up Stoneham a project missed by absolutely no-one except for a few desperados who just seem addicted to having a go at Lowe for absolutely anything even if it involves them lamenting the fact we didn't get a 25,000 stadium in the middle of nowhere surrounded by branches of Subway and Frankie and Benny's. And linked it to a posting on 606 which any fule kno is full of utter rubbish, all the time.

 

So two threads in two days serving no purpose except to wind people up and start arguments.

 

Every Saints fan breathing air (except about two wind up merchants on here) wants Lowe gone, and Lowe gone tomorrow.

 

There are plenty of sticks to beat him with - if you want I'll give you twenty of the top of my head to you get started. Just let me know and i'll reel them off.

 

 

But whinging about an isolated result in a **** poor season in 1997 and grizzling about not getting a stadium noone really wanted anyway, again more than ten years ago really is pointless.

 

You know you started both threads as a wind up, not least because you said the other day that Lowe support in the fanbase was 50:50 so you think you need to convince people Lowe needs to go by going on about stuff that happen a decade ago. 50:50!

 

Good luck finding that 50% pro Lowe fanbase.:smt044

 

We're united. We want Lowe out. Stop flogging dead horses.

 

I used to read your posts with interest but you are turning into a right sanctimonious tit lately!

[JohnnyFartPants]

 

Every Saints fan breathing air (except about two wind up merchants on here) wants Lowe gone, and Lowe gone tomorrow.

 

 

The point you make is a stupid one and doesn't allow for "Saints fans" to have a brain. Yes, most might wish him gone and it his place they may want some money bags overseas consortium put in place. To add to this they may also want a credit card that has no limit and a bathroom they can play baseball in but then reality sets in. Then the question asked is "who out of the current shareholders do we want at the helm", and this is where your argument falls down. Sure, some may well still want him gone, but it isn't by any means a large majority. Crouch and Wilde have their own black mark days too.