Downturn halts Liverpool stadium

Leon Walker, Regeneration & Renewal, 5 September 2008

Construction of the new 60,000-seat stadium at Stanley Park and its associated regeneration scheme has halted, with the club this week blaming the lack of liquidity in the financial markets for the setback.

Liverpool FC said "global market conditions" are the reason for the problems. They added that they expect the standstill to last for around a year.

Tied in with the new stadium project is the mixed-use Anfield Plaza regeneration development planned on the site of Liverpool's current ground, Anfield. The development, aimed at improving the Anfield and Breckfield areas of the city, will also be delayed for around a year.

Furthermore, the delay means that £5 million of European Regional Development Fund financing earmarked for the scheme's community facilities has been withdrawn. The project can no longer spend the ERDF money within European time limits, but Liverpool FC said they now expect to pay for the community facilities from their own coffers.

This week's announcement is the latest in a series of problems that have dogged the stadium development.

Liverpool City Council originally resolved to approve the stadium proposals in 2004, but full planning approval was only granted in June this year, after the arena had been redesigned three times due to concerns about its size. The footprint of the agreed scheme is around a quarter smaller than that of some previous designs.

Enabling work began at the Stanley Park site on 23 June this year - 16 months after George Gillett, one of the club's two US owners, said that "the shovel needs to be in the ground within the next 60 days".

Liverpool FC have now said that they plan to use the time created by the delay to investigate the possibility of increasing the new stadium's capacity to 73,000 seats.