Council planners prepare to vote on Bristol Sporting Quarter scheme
If approved tonight, the plans will see a 3,600 seater indoor arena built next to Ashton Gate, plus a hotel, office space and shops
It would be a "game changer" for Bristol, if the City Council approves plans for an indoor sports arena tonight (October 5).
That's what we've been told with the plans for a so called Sporting Quarter at Ashton Gate Stadium, set to be debated by the council's planning committee this evening.
Bristol Sport, the group which owns Bristol City Football Club, the Bristol Bears rugby side and the Flyers basketball team, wants to build a 3,600 seat arena, plus a hotel, multi storey car park and shops on the site.
The plans, first revealed in 2018, also include proposals for hundreds of homes on a former landfill site at Longmoor.
We have spoken to Bristol Flyers Head Coach Andreas Kapoulas ahead of the council meeting.
"I'm excited," he told us.
"It represents a huge opportunity for the club, but also the city as well and it's a game changer, so (it's) exciting.
" (I'm) not necessarily nervous, but just looking forward to this evening's meeting."
The Flyers currently play their home games in a sports hall at South Gloucestershire and Stroud College, which only has room for a few hundred fans.
While the new arena would primarily become their new home, it would also be available for other sporting events such as darts, boxing and tennis in their off season, as well as major conferences.
"From the Flyers' perspective since we joined the top flight, the British Basketball League (BBL), we have consistently grown in success and support and we've been selling out our home games since October 2018," Kapoulas said.
"So to have a bigger venue, it will help our ambitions to grow the sport and the positive impact our sport has on our local community...it will allow us to compete at the highest level, achieve financial sustainability which is really important, invest in our women's programme...so there is a lot of positive benefits.
"And in terms of the city, just to bring basketball to BS3 alongside football and rugby, it would not just attract sport, but for business and entertainment, the impact that this can have, I truly feel it's a once in a generation opportunity."
Bristol Sport's charity the Bristol Sport Foundation offers introductions to basketball in the community and its programmes have seen a 175 percent growth in participation in the last year.
Meanwhile, the Flyers have sold out 55 consecutive home games since 2018.
Though their current home is small, Kapoulas tells us that shows the popularity of basketball in the city.
Business leaders and politicians in the city have backed the plans.
"We have been following the development of the Ashton Gate Sporting Quarter closely as it will act as a catalyst for increasing the value of the visitor economy of the city, especially in the south of the city, providing new facilities that are desperately needed for both leisure and business visitors," a written statement from Visit West, reads.
"The proposed facilities will support the elevation of Bristol to a tier one business events destination.
"For too long Bristol has lost out to other cities like Cardiff and Birmingham due to a lack of larger conferencing and events facilities with onsite hotels."
Bristol's Mayor Marvin Rees has also given the idea his "full support".
On top of all that the plans have been formally recommended for approval, meaning it seems unlikely that they will be shot down.
"Worth in the region of around £200m the proposals include more community facilities, greater pedestrianisation, and hundreds of new homes, whilst retaining green space and aiming for a biodiversity net gain," the Mayor has said.
“This investment meets a need that’s been identified and talked about for some time, and will further strengthen Bristol’s role as the cultural, sporting, and economic centre of our region.”
As well as the Sporting Quarter, Bristol Sport also want to build around 500 new homes for the community on a site at Longmoor, less than a kilometre away.
There had been many objections to this element of the plan, with the land previously designated as green belt.
However, Bristol Sport say the city council has already concluded the land does not serve the purpose of the green belt.
Just this week Natural England dropped a formal objection to the plans, saying they were no longer concerned about the potential impact on bats.
You can read more about the Sporting Quarter plans here and the Longmoor plans here.