Big day wed re stadium plans confirmation: THE VOTE IS 'YES'

[Whitterz]

If I lived in Falmer and had nothing to do with football, and did not support the Albion, then I would be pissed off at the building of a new stadium. Sadly though, times HAVE changed, and the social economical benefits of the stadium mass surpass the worries of a quaint villiage in in the locality. The advantages of the stadium will not be fully recognised until a long while after it is built. It will become the centre piece, and the icon of the city. Football is the countrys leading sport, it generates HUGE volumes of income for the economy. And given the current state of affairs in this country, the building of the site will not only keep people IN work, but will create lots more jobs over the next two years of development. After the stadium is built, more and more jobs will be created, as the club expands. The potential is huge for Brighton, and indeed Sussex as a county. I doubt that this is fully realised by your "average" fan, but you can be assured that the Government and local authorities knew exactly what this would bring to the area, hence giving it the thumbs up.

But with all that bollocks aside, as an Albion fan, and only a mere two years to wait until we move into our new home, I cannot believe it is happening. The day it is signed off as "project complete" will be be very emotional for many. And heres a toast to that day.

From here onwards.

 

[severnside gull]

Any doubters out there about the funding, no need to worry anymore.

I think I have died and gone to heaven

 

[Lord Bracknell]

there was not ten individuals there, they have to follow Party policy in the voting.

No they don't. The law on Planning decisions is that councillors must take their decisions on planning grounds, not party policy.

If party policy was the driving factor, how come some of the members of the majority group on the City Council failed to vote for the stadium?

 

[clapham_gull]

Not trying to sound controversial, but I've always been a little uncomfortable about how the whole fight got personalised to be honest.

.. and in retrospect I suspect it didn't really help matters. Just meant heels were dug in a bit further.

I've always thought that the real enemy wasn't those who opposed it, but the apathy of those who didn't care whether the club had a stadium or not.

Hopefully once the thing is built those who couldn't give a toss will understand what all the fuss was about and buy a season ticket.

 

[skipper734]

No they don't. The law on Planning decisions is that councillors must take their decisions on planning grounds, not party policy.

If party policy was the driving factor, how come some of the members of the majority group on the City Council failed to vote for the stadium?

Formed my opinion from conversations with my best man and my best mate of forty odd years who was a councillor and has been on the planning committee in the past. Tales of Party Grouping left him and I with the opinion that it is impossible to have an individual vote within a party. So, you may have an opinion, which you can express in the group, but not many votes go against the groups opinion. As in Westminster. Theoretical free vote aside. Maybe the majority group on the council is not as keen on the stadium as the past majority group.

 

[BensGrandad]

Dont know a lot about this planning application business, in fact very little, but just listening on the net to the debate there never seemed any doubt that it would get passed as the opposition to it sounded very feeble and clutching at straws. The major points to me appeared to be that the external size and look is not going to be much different and the biggest problem appeared to be over car parking for indoor functions on non match days, which MP answered very well.

 

[Uter]

No they don't. The law on Planning decisions is that councillors must take their decisions on planning grounds, not party policy.

And rightly so.

It does arouse suspicion, however, when all the yes voters coincidentally happen to all belong to one party, and all the no voters to other.

For instance, for the recently rejected Marina application (and I'm being lazy and not checking, so my memory may be incorrect) all the yes voters were Labour councillors and all the nos were Conservatives and Greens. And this was another project that was recommended for approval by planning officers. I expect the developers will appeal.

 

[Lord Bracknell]

Formed my opinion from conversations with my best man and my best mate of forty odd years who was a councillor and has been on the planning committee in the past. Tales of Party Grouping left him and I with the opinion that it is impossible to have an individual vote within a party. So, you may have an opinion, which you can express in the group, but not many votes go against the groups opinion. As in Westminster. Theoretical free vote aside. Maybe the majority group on the council is not as keen on the stadium as the past majority group.

I'm not going to argue that political whipping has completely disappeared from the planning process.

Like Clapham Gull, I don't think this is the time to open up old wounds, but the thing that annoyed me most about Ann de Vecchi's behaviour wasn't her opposition to the stadium, it was the brutality with which she prevented Lib Dem supporters of the stadium on LDC from speaking publicly on the subject.

The people of Lewes district have lost some honourable representatives as a result of that.

 

[Jimmy Grimble]

See you at Falmer

 

[Tooting Gull]

Not trying to sound controversial, but I've always been a little uncomfortable about how the whole fight got personalised to be honest.

.. and in retrospect I suspect it didn't really help matters. Just meant heels were dug in a bit further.

I've always thought that the real enemy wasn't those who opposed it, but the apathy of those who didn't care whether the club had a stadium or not.

Hopefully once the thing is built those who couldn't give a toss will understand what all the fuss was about and buy a season ticket.

I'd agree with most of that - though a couple of the personalities opposing didn't help themselves by misleading, misrepresenting, outright lying, refusing to follow democratic procedure, and misusing the law enforcement authorities for their own ends. That's always going to make people very angry.

But you're certainly right about the deeper passion for the club in the community (ie outside the regular fans). Up north, where the football club tends to be much more of a centrepiece of the town/city, we wouldn't have had all these problems.

 

[The Oldman]

In case anyone wants to see the planning committee in action it's now on their archive section. Falmer about 15 minutes in

Planning Committee - Brighton and Hove Council Webcasting - Webcast Player

 

[e77]

It's Fiddler on the Roof

Are we getting Nigel Kennedy in to do the stadium opening, in the style of Brian May at the Palace (Buckingham, not Crystal).

 

[Billy the Fish]

In case anyone wants to see the planning committee in action it's now on their archive section. Falmer about 15 minutes in

Planning Committee - Brighton and Hove Council Webcasting - Webcast Player

Just watched it. I found the whole thing quite interesting, it's good to have someone explain the plans rather than just looking at them, it joined up a few dots for me.
I can see why people people dislike cutress, just the way she carried herself and her abrasive tone made me not want to listen to her. Also she was STILL trying to get things dealyed by using spurious information. I don't see how noise from traffic will affect the village, the stadium is miles away and with the landscaping measures I can't imagine that they will hear stadium traffic over the top of the A27.

 

[Surf 'n' Turf]

Love the beginning, I am a Brighton fan and Season ticket holder!