Yes I had a gander at this this morning, that illustration of the hotel etc has changed a bit from the one we saw last year.
Very much a huge (absolutely massive actually) hotel stuck onto a cricket ground whereas in the original it looked like a redeveloped stand with a hotel inside.
....or maybe a cricket ground stuck onto a hotel!
It's definitely increased in size!
I don’t hate it…wouldn’t it be worth increasing the stadium capacity a bit at the same time though?
At least it looks a lot better than the monstrosities they built at Old Trafford…
Lengthy feature about this on ITV Central yesterday. After the adverts forward to 10 mins in case anyone missed it;
Regarding the windfall that has come Warwickshire's way as a result of The Hundred sell-off, George Dobell says on-line in The Cricketer:
"Warwickshire's situation is actually quite simple: they have planning permission for further ground development and this money will alleviate the need for costly loans at commercial rates. The latest development plans will see a hotel built in the area currently occupied by The Priory stand.
This will include extra seating, raising the ground capacity a little, as well as more hospitality options. With Birmingham City Council - who are effectively bankrupt - pulling out of a loan agreement for it, there has been some lending agreed with the West Midlands Combined Authority.
The combination of that and this windfall will allow Warwickshire to build without needing to be overly reliant upon commercial borrowing rates. The club have paid off around £5m of debt on their previous development (at the pavilion end of the ground) over the last couple of years. Their long-term borrowing arrangement with Birmingham City Council, which has featured low interest rates and payment holidays, is not affected."
Thanks Gerry. Maybe I'm a moaner but I find this a bit depressing. A county cricket club gets a windfall and the first thing it thinks of doing with the money is build a hotel. I mean if that's all they're going to do with money, then they have £15m coming as a share of the ECB's sale of a 49% stake in the Hundred franchises, plus a gift of a 51% stake in the Warwickshire franchise, valued at £40m. If Warwickshire sold the 51% stake they would get 80%, so £32m, giving £47m in total. There's about 4,000 members so if they split that across us, £11,750 a member. I'd rather they do that than build a hotel which isn't worth building if they have to finance it at commercial rates.
The hotel, should, provide a long term and sustainable income stream to help fund the club. As well as the higher yeild per ticket from improved hospitality sales, and of course, boosting the conference business which functions all year.
In The Cricketer review of how counties intend to spend the money, 15 out of the other 17 counties mention ground development in one form or other, six mention debt clearance or reduction and two mention increasing (non-playing) staff. The only ones not to mention ground development are Essex, who are not sure what they want to do with the money, and Worcestershire who are currently reviewing their possible options to move away from Worcester.
I was looking at a picture of the ground today. I bet there’s some in those new flats which were built and has a view of the ground who must be gutted a hotel will now block their view.
BosworthBear wrote:
I was looking at a picture of the ground today. I bet there’s some in those new flats which were built and has a view of the ground who must be gutted a hotel will now block their view.
Surely none of the people who bought them expected to keep that view for long? The club has been planning to redevelop that side of the ground for a while.