KC Stadium

Quote: ComeOnYouUll "Indeed. And he is so sad that he even pretended to be a Hull fan when he first registered on West Park to continue to support City and extend the KC, perhaps considering in measured terms the planning difficulties that he would work with the council to treat sensitively, but painting in measured terms the employment opportunities it might represent? Or
2) To fabricate an illusion of making a sporting gift to the people of Hull (with unspoken and impossible/unpalatable conditions attached), winding the myopic and sensationalist local media into a nodding dogs frenzy, then failing to have anything approaching a sensible discussion with the council, producing no plans or deal but a borderline blackmail approach to acquiring the stadium, with some rather clumsy, but, surprise, surprise, highly publicised cash donations to other causes in the city?

It's the fact that he's gone for 2 that has cost him, but that's no one's fault but his own. That and the fact that his follow-up is dummy spits in the press and lunatic ramblings about the red herrings of toffee apples, comas, asbos etc.

What Pearson tried to do this week was 1. He believes that the city, and Hull City, who employ him, would be better off with this development in place and, possibly, that the council should make a contribution. At the moment negotiations will go nowhere as there are too many stumbling blocks:
a) No detailed plans have been brought forward
b) The Allams, for so-called businessmen, have taken a ridiculous stance on the "negotiations", ie they won't and are imposing ludicrous pre-requisites to an adult discussion.
c) There are onerous obligations of the existing lease arrangement which Cllr Geraghty suggested would be waived in the event of a sale, meaning co-tenants Hull FC would have no protection from eviction.
d) The land is protected by covenants and a Royal Charter. These are not insignificant barriers.
e) The deal would be hugely complex, with loads of work needed on conditional clauses. What if Allam gets the KC for nowt, uses the cash for players for City and just doesn't build the development at all? You can't then force him to build just because he's got the freehold of the KC. What if the swimming pool is loss-making and they close all the sporting elements to leave a Burger King and Carphone Warehouse on the so-called "Sporting Village"
f) Planning policy dictates that in terms of sequential preference, if you're going to build a retail/commercial park, you build something in the town centre first. I have recently spoken in my job to a head of regeneration and planning in the north west, and the appetite for out of town developments when vacancy rates in city centre retail units is so high, has never been lower. I've not been into Hull City Centre for a while, but I understand that throughout the city from Whitefriargate through Princes Quay and across to the Prospect Centre, there is a high vacancy rate, and some retailers are vacating unit on Kingston Park next to the Ice Arena. This itself IMO is because planners have allowed a proliferation of retail development beyond the population's requirements. Building yet another commercial unit out of centre will just suck more life out of the city centre.
g) It's a community asset which has its own benefits in terms of control and any sale would have to be at fair value.

To Pearson's credit, he's trying to put the deal into less ridiculous and emotive terms and articulate what it actually is. For the first time we heard that it had to be a commercial development to pay back, which is something Allam has never spoken to in his ridiculous "gift/asbo" speeches over the last few months, so we're finally getting some clarity around what it would be. IMO (and I did say this weeks and weeks ago), this is nothing to do with Olympic swimming pools and ice rinks, which sound like, when challenged, they've been binned anyway, but all to do with a new retail park, and I've heard nothing this week to change my mind. If the Allams want to do this deal, Pearson's the man to broker it and they should stay out, but personally I believe the genuine barriers in a-g above will mean it won't happen.

I don't see a conflict of interest for Pearson, unless, as people have said, he is a complete and utter liar, which I don't believe he is. He thinks developing the stadium and surrounding area, with a watertight tenancy transfer to Hull FC, would be progress. I just think there are far too many justified hurdles to it happening.

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