Background to the Shaw Forest Country Park proposal

The announcement by Swindon Town FC on Monday 22 March that they are in discussion with Swindon Borough Council to build a new 23,000 all seater stadium costing £20 million on the old Shaw tip in West Swindon came out of the blue. Residents are both surprised and shocked by the proposal and starting to consider how deeply they want to object.

Over the last ten years hundreds of Swindon residents have attended three community tree planting days designed to involve people in the development of a new public open space which has been called Shaw Forest Country Park. In particular families were encouraged to take part so that children would feel a particular affiliation to the park which would grow and mature as they did.



Thousands of trees have been planted at these events and also by council staff. The southern end off the country park is now open and walkers can explore an area of higher ground and look down on how the site is being developed.

But in a bid to find an out of town site for the football club, Swindon Council is willing to turn the country park policy on its head and to allow part of the Old Shaw tip to be used for the stadium, with associated car parking and commercial development. The football club has joined forces with St Modwens Properties plc to explore how to achieve this aim. The company is responsible for Stoke City's Britannia Stadium which has been built on reclaimed land.



A major extra element of the project is to build a 'sports village' next to the stadium. The STFC/St Modwens consortium want to hear from sport organisations interested in participating in such a development. Which sports have yet to be defined but hockey, athletics and cricket have been mentioned. So has the inclusion of a new stadium for dog racing and speedway to replace Blunsdon Stadium has been mentioned. It is presumed that sports clubs would have to approach their respective governing bodies for financial contributions, perhaps involving Sport England or the National Lottery.

Apart from the £20 million required to build the stadium, at least another £10 million will have to be found to accommodate these other sports facilities and stabilise the ground.

Swindon Town have been trying to move from the cramped County Ground location for several years because it wants space to create a wider range of commercial activities to generate revenue to reinvest and build up the quality of the playing squad.

A bid to move to Swindon's Front Garden/Southern Development Area close to M4 Junction 16 collapsed in the late 1990s when the former directors of the club could not agree a deal with Swindon Council on how much land would be made sold to allow the club to generate revenue. Again with Swindon Council owning both the County Ground and Shaw Tip the project relies on the club and the council agreeing the finances. Whereas the Front Garden was high cost housing land, Shaw Tip is a brown field site with limited uses such as sports fields; it is conceivable that a deal can be made, particularly if the sports village concept comes off which will benefit the much wider community.



Access is a major issue for residents. Mead Way through West Swindon is already heavily used and could not accommodate up to 23,000 people trying to get to a stadium. A new road to link Thamesdown Drive in the north to the Great Western Way in the south - to the east of the tip - was already proposed as part of the northern development of Swindon. A minimum requirement to proceed would be completion of this road before the stadium opened.

But even if the stadium were to have decent access and good car parking, West Swindon residents will still be worried that they will have football fans parking in their streets, as they stop off for a pizza and a pint at local pubs before the short walk across what remains of the country park to the game.

There are also worries about what is inside the tip - nobody knows. Few records of deposits were kept in the 1960s and 1970s. Disturbing an area which might contain dangerous materials such as asbestos has to be a worry.



According to the STFC chairman Willie Carson the new stadium could be ready for the 2007/8 season. St Modwens hope to put forward an outline planning application in June or July showing how much of the tip site would be used for a stadium and sports village.

Few definite details are available at present, just a lot of worry as to what might happen. However there are many stages to go through such as:

1. The council and the club have to strike the right deal for the benefit of council tax payers;
2. The planning proposal has to be acceptable to all, including residents;
3. The Government Office of the South West might have to be called in and a planning enquiry held - particularly if there are environmental issues to be sorted out;
4. Local and central government agencies with an interest National Forests have to be satisfied the development should go ahead.

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