Developers eye stadium green light (From Dorset Echo)

Developers eye stadium green light

9:00am Saturday 23rd February 2013 in Sport By Adam Summers

ANDREW Livingston is confident the possible relocation of Weymouth FC can have a positive outcome for all parties.

The finance director at Morgan Sindall Investments Ltd has been holding talks with the Terras and is very keen to help deliver a proposal that will not only benefit his employer’s profit margins but also the club and the community.

Livingston told Echosport: “We want a good outcome for the football club but we are also a company that wants to make money – that is how the business works really.

“The big thing for us is having planning permission on the Bob Lucas Stadium site which will then give us the green light to go ahead and deliver a stadium that meets the club’s requirements.

“That is the hope and talks are on-going to try and get to that stage.”

Morgan Sindall is in partnership with Wessex Delivery Partnership which holds an option to acquire the Bob Lucas Stadium in exchange for providing a new stadium within five miles of the current ground; to be at a build cost of £7million plus grants; and to be built to Football League standard.

WDP can exercise that option up to 15 years from the date of the agreement in 2008, and recently the company submitted a second set of plans to build up to 200 residences on the current site at Radipole Lane, and move the club to Lodmoor – a proposal that has already received objections from the Terras.

Weymouth FC officials are hoping to hold further talks with Livingston early next month.