LIVERPOOL have been told that building work on their proposed new 60,000-capacity stadium can finally begin early next year if they can secure the external investment needed to fund the spiralling construction costs.
The Merseyside club have encountered a series of frustrations since announcing in June 2000 that they planned to leave Anfield for a purpose-built stadium on Stanley Park, barely a quarter of a mile away, but, after a frustrating saga, it seems that the last of those bureaucratic obstacles is about to be overcome, meaning that the only remaining hurdle is the small matter of securing outside investment.
The cost of the project and the associated regeneration of the area has been set at £215 million — more than three times the outlay that was originally anticipated — with about £26 million coming from the public sector, £15 million from European Union funding and the rest covered by the club. Liverpool are continuing to explore various sources of funding, including the possibility of bank loans until external investment is secured, and hope to be able to satisfy both Liverpool City Council and Objective One, which is a source of European Union funding, by the end of the month.
There remains much to be done, but Liverpool City Council offered encouragement yesterday with the indication that it will ratify a decision to lease land in Stanley Park to the club when it meets on Friday. “There have been some objections to the loss of open space and clearly we will consider these very carefully before making any decisions,” the council leader, Warren Bradley, said yesterday. “But this is a golden opportunity for north Liverpool to be transformed.”
Liverpool hope that construction can begin on the site within months, with a view to relocating from Anfield, their home since their foundation in 1892, in time for the start of the 2009-10 campaign.