'Missed opportunities' over 2012's Olympic stadium?
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Caborn admits that the 2012 board "missed an opportunity" in not striking a deal because it was determined to provide an athletics legacy, one of the key pledges of 2012 chairman Lord Coe during the bid.
Officials from the are currently trying to find a tenant for the stadium and West Ham are still interested in a move there. But rebuilding the arena for top-class football now could cost up to £100 million.
Caborn says West Ham were ready to help change the design of the stadium before it was even built. They made their offer in January 2007, ten months before the design was unveiled.
"West Ham made a very strong offer backed by the Newham Mayor. It was between April 2006 and January 2007," Caborn said. "They wanted to get into negotiations and they did and there was money on the table. They wanted also to honour the athletics legacy.
"Many of us were concerned that that we could end up with a white elephant. I argued very strongly for it but the bid document said there had to be a legacy for athletics, so the negotiations ran into the sand. I don't believe there is a will for a multi-use stadium.
"It was a missed opportunity."
West Ham and are still trying to convince the Legacy Company that they should lease the stadium after reducing its capacity from 80,000 to 60,000 seats. The club would want to move in from the start of the 2014-15 season.
But in addition to adding key hospitality areas, I understand that the roof and the floodlights will have to be scrapped and rebuilt because they only cover a third of the seats.
It is still unclear who would pay for all of these expensive conversions although West Ham are ready to pay towards them.
The 2007 offer, made in a five-page document sent to the 2012 Olympic Board, is said to have been similar to that made by Manchester City when it took over the 2002 Commonwealth Games.
In that agreement, the club agreed to pay cash from ticket sales to fund grass roots sports facilities in Manchester, including the maintenance of an athletics track next to the stadium.
I'm Ö÷²¥´óÐã London's Olympics Correspondent, which means I report on every aspect of the preparations for 2012. I'm going to be telling you what people are saying about London's preparations - both in the Olympic corridors of power and on the streets of the capital - and I want to hear your views.
Comment number 1.
At 20th Sep 2010, JoC wrote:Interesting blog Adrian, but talk of West Ham offering to take over the Olympic Stadium three years ago saying they were 'ready to help change the design of the stadium before it was even built' doesn't really take into account the prevailing economic factors effecting them at the time. For a start West Ham's former owners were foreign (would the government be so keen to hand over ownership of the main stadium overseas?) - Icelandic chairman Eggert Magnússon was experiencing heavy financial difficulties at home and at the club which he ended up selling, they were flogging all their star players and for a time didn't even have a shirt sponsor. Hardly solid ground to build a trusting long-term relationship on? Ofcourse, things are different now with East-End chairman in charge and the club on a more stable if not affluent footing. Besides the arguement for a permanent athletics track was long and hard won...it is needed, so has to be kept.
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Comment number 2.
At 20th Sep 2010, Tiger Rose wrote:I think the difference between now & then which hasn't been mentioned in this blog is that West Ham have now agreed to keep the track which they weren't prepared to do before.
At the end of the day they had to get on & build the stadium otherwise we would probably have ended up like Athens doing it at the last minute with the inevitable increase in costs that that would bring, together with huge negative media coverage too.
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Comment number 3.
At 21st Sep 2010, JoC wrote:"rebuilding the arena for top-class football now could cost up to £100 million."
Adrian, do you know how much it was going to cost converting the stadium down to a 25,000 seat permanent arena after the Games - as originally planned?
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Comment number 4.
At 21st Sep 2010, freddawlanen wrote:If only the ECB lived in the 21st century instead of the 19th, they'd have a ready made, brand new giant stadium that would have cost them far less than the ridiculous amounts they've spent "improving" the Oval and the stadium could still be used for athletics too.
The same could have been said for the Commonwealth stadium in Manchester too, but Lancashire didn't even consider a move from the decrepit Old Trafford as there was too much "history" in the crumbling ground, or maybe there were just too many Luddites in the boardroom.
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Comment number 5.
At 21st Sep 2010, JoC wrote:Excellent point freddawlanen. I think West Ham should ground share it with Leyton Orient and both their former grounds be sold to recoup some of the costs and help regenerate their areas. Keep the stadium athletics friendly and together with the Olympic Park it could also play host to music festivals and concerts away from the noise restrictions you'll find in many other London 'outdoor' venues.
Is the basketball arena still being shipped to Brazil? We could have hosted a decent London team when the NBA finally expands overseas?
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