Details of Leicester City’s training facility revealed
LEICESTER City FC have unveiled more details on its plans for an £80m transformation of the former Park Hill Golf club into a state-of-the-art training facility for the football club.
It aims to provide ‘ an inspirational place of work’ for the club’s first team, development squad and academy, with an aspirational environment for the next generation of professionals that is fully integrated into its landscape setting.
The key design principles that have shaped the emerging masterplan include:
• Retain, buffer and enhance the more valuable historic hedgerow and tree network.
• Retain and enhance the seasonally wet stream and integrate as a multifunctional ecological corridor.
• Retain the highest quality ponds creating new permanent wildlife friendly waterbodies to compensate for lost ponds.
• Create new habitats that enhance opportunities for notable species.
• Maintain and create a network of wildlife corridors across the site.
The site will feature approximately 14 pitches, plus a mix of small pitches, goalkeeper and training areas.
There will be a full-size indoor pitch and a show pitch with a small spectator area for approximately 499 people.
There will be a foundation/full-time Academy and First Team building, including accommodation, training and educational facilities, car parking facilities, sport turf academy building, ground maintenance building.
A nine-hole golf course will be retained for private use.
Addressing the transport and access issues, it is proposed to use the existing access to the site from Park Hill Lane for the new training centre.
The club is seeking to divert the existing bridleway across the site via a new, attractive route to the east of its current location. The exact route of this diversion is to be confirmed, in consultation with the county council and key stakeholders.
A club spokesman said: “The Project Team will be working over the next two months to develop detailed designs, listening to the local community and other key stakeholders received during our consultations.
“We expect to submit a planning application in late spring 2018 and hope to secure a positive decision from the planning authority in the autumn.
“Subject to planning approval, LCFC hope to start work on the training centre in autumn 2018, with the ambition of making the 2020/21 season the first in our new facility.”
A public consultation over the plans will take place between 10am and 3pm at King Power Stadium on Saturday, April 7, ahead of the Premier League fix- ture with Newcastle where representatives from LCFC, planning consultants Deloitte and KSS Design Group will be in attendance to discuss plans with the Leicester community
An exhibition and discussion of site plans and strategy for the new facility will be held outside the Family Stand - and there will be opportunities to ask questions about the club’s plans for the site.
A questionnaire will also be available on tablet devices to complete on-site. Season ticket holders and members who aren’t able to visit the exhibition will be contacted directly to contribute their views on the club’s plans, with the questionnaire and supporting information also available online at LCFC.com.