THE controversial sale of Meadowbank Stadium in Edinburgh may have to be halted indefinitely because of the slump in the Capital's property market, The Scotsman has learned.
Senior council sources admit the ageing arena may not go on the market for the foreseeable future because housebuilders have been so badly hit recently.
Meadowbank was due to be put up for sale within months, spelling the demolition of the athleti
cs stadium, sports pitches and the velodrome where Chris Hoy, the Olympic cycling champion, trained.
The move was expected to provide the bulk of the funding for a new arena at Meadowbank which was due to be available in the run-up to the 2014 Commonwealth Games, in Glasgow.
The sale of the site was agreed by the council three years ago and at the time it was expected to generate around £50 million. But a campaign aimed at halting the sale and a change in council administration led to those plans being scrapped.
Instead of building a new stadium at Sighthill Park, in west Edinburgh, councillors voted in March to sell a third of the Meadowbank site for housing and rebuild a smaller complex.
At the time, the value of the land earmarked for sale was around £17 million, with the council expected to make up the remainder of the funding. But officials are increasingly worried that a sale during the credit crunch may fail to raise anything like that.
The city faces a bill of up to £3 million to meet a pledge to replace the Meadowbank velodrome on an alternative site in the city and is also struggling to pay for a long-awaited revamp of the Royal Commonwealth Pool.
The council has been heavily criticised for failing to provide any details of the replacement, particularly after Hoy's triumph. However, the Scottish Government has promised to look at the case for providing new cycle training facilities, to complement the indoor velodrome being built for Glasgow 2014.
One council insider said: "There have been dramatic changes in the housing market since March. There's no doubt the value of the land at Meadowbank has plummeted and we're nowhere near putting it on the market at present."
Deputy council leader Steve Cardownie said: "Everyone knows there's been a downturn. We are having to take stock of everything."
Property expert Jason Hogg, director of development land at agents Jones Lang LaSalle, said: "The downturn in the housing market has reduced the number of housing developers prepared to buy. There's less cash available and less of an appetite to fund such purchases. The council will have difficulty finding a buyer under the terms it might have expected last year."
TIMELINEMARCH 2004: Plans to replace Meadowbank with a new stadium in Sighthill unveiled.
JULY 2004: Edinburgh awarded £17 million by the then Scottish Executive to improve the city's sports facilities.
DECEMBER 2004:The council admits it is struggling to turn a £126 million vision of new sports facilities into reality.
SEPTEMBER 2005: Plans to sell off the entire Meadowbank site to pay for the Sighthill complex are approved.
JUNE 2007: The new council admits the planned arena at Sighthill is "dead in the water". Meadowbank reprieved.
MARCH 2008: Councillors agree to sell off a third of the stadium to pay for brand-new facilities there.
The full article contains 559 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
