I think you should consider forming a faux environmental group and distributing 10,000 leaflets to local homes... on recycled paper of course... as an environmental group!

Good idea, did think about a dirty cell protest but i like your idea better.

Think that got rejected didn't it, but a revised application for conversion got accepted. Might be wrong though.

Errmm...can't be 100 % sure on that. I only know that I was passing it a few months ago while working and saw some smoke coming from the premises, so went to investigate, and they were stripping the remains of the interior out, and burning them in the rear car park. I asked them what their plans were, and they said they were going to demolish the building and build a big family home.

Not for 14 days a year IMHO looks like it will be a dwelling in any event, the thatched house could capitalise though on match days

This cannot be under stated. This is brilliant news!
The fact it's all a bit "anoraky" has meant it's fallen under the radar of most.
Brilliant none the less!

Roll on the two big Thursdays (24th & 31st of May)!!!

If everything goes to plan, and planning is passed, when could we realistically expect building work to start on the stadium?

Thats pretty ambiguous to be honest. We've had comments saying the stadium will be built first and other information saying that some units need to be built first in order to fund the stadium build. Yorkcourt did say they would be starting mid 2012, but i'm not sure if thats accurate. I think to be realistic, if passed, the 2015 season will most likely be the first season at the new stadium.

NIMBY's are now running the line of 40% of the units to be built before we start on the stadium. As we established in Dec this only means having a signed tender.

I personally spent a few days at the PI & spoke to Colin Mackey (CEO of YCP) who told me a few things:

"A development like this is never done on spec, not these days"
"If it was purely about money we'd have walked a long time ago"

This man deserves a lot of praise from our fair city. Civic pride you don't see all too often these days.

The full planning application has to go in within 5 weeks of the all clear, if given.

We've been told for months it's ready to go.
The fact it includes both amendments put forward by the LDF will mean changes will be minimal & we should be good to go.

If the big unit was tendered in June we'd hit the 40% straight away.

My understanding was that a certain percentage of the units would need to built-out prior to the stadium going up, which seems perfectly reasonable.

I'd be very surprised If there aren't already some tenants in place and if it gets the official nod, I'm sure there'll be more.

The landlord at the Thatched House pub is a keen supporter of Newmarket and I have seen him in "discussion" with local doubters. He is ready and willing to make his pub a welcoming waterhole on match days !

I bet!

I can imagine - the trade for home games will be worth a fortune.

Not sure the first bit is right, wasn't it a maximum of four months, but could be as soon as five to six weeks?

And i'm not sure the planning application is ready to go as such. I was led to believe that what gets submitted for reserved matters is dependant on what level of grant funding we are awarded from the various bodies which will determine the quality of the build. I think there are various plans in place depending on how successful the applications are, and its these that are ready to go in once the thumbs up is given. Yorkcourt will fund a basic stadium, the grants will enable it to be the all singing and all dancing one that we want. Confidence is high of successful bids, especially seeing Hull KR just got awarded theirs, but until figures are known the exact design that will be built won't be known for sure. This I think is where Sir Rodney comes into his own.

As for the last bit if the talk of having a major distribution centre ready to be signed up on the passing of the scheme is still correct then I would imagine this will be built first and would satify the funding needed for the stadium build. Its a big, purpose built, unit and the reason why Yorkcourt have been interested all along. But everything is dependant on getting that go ahead from the secretary of state, we are in a state of limbo now until then. Fingers crossed that in around 12 weeks time our club takes the biggest leap forward it has for a generation or more.