Fruit Market OFF - Club redeveloping Mem instead.

The major stumbling blocks would be the ability and resources to purchase the site and any clean-up required from previous heavy industry usage. I would imagine council will be all over this type of development like a cheap suit though. Inner city urban renewal, enhanced community facilities, sustainable transport options everywhere. Council lap that sh** up. Planning permission will be considerably easier here than at the Mem if you ask me.

So....they sell food there, but it's no good for humans to watch a game of football? Am I missing something?

Infrastructure issues mount on an arena mostly due to the amount of people coming from all areas to watch some form of entertainment there. A lot of them drive. That needs more parking space and more road networks to get them there.

A football match for a local team is going to be occupied by... Locals. And a few thousand travelling fans at most. Much less hinging on car parking space, for instance.

Alongside the stadium will be commercial outlets. Commercial outlets want footfall and traffic and may well be what makes this deal financially viable. That requires a busy location, a city centre location, close to the main train station in the city.

In addition, the official capacity may be 20,000 but we are not using that every week, and that gives the infrastructure around the stadium time to be improved with cooperation between the club and the council as the club grows. The council want the regeneration to continue and the club can become a central part of a community built around it.

Most travelling away fans will come by train to Temple Meads if we base at the Fruit Market. Considerably easier to them to do than current situation.

These are all reasons for why the fruit market site is a viable option and would be good for us and for the council.

If all this talk is true, I wouldn't see the planning being the issue. Rather, it would be the cost of cleanup and readying the site for building the stadium that could mount up the bills.

So....they sell food there, but it's no good for humans to watch a game of football? Am I missing something?

Well I see your points but I don't go with them 100% to be honest.

Every time I have gone to Cardiff Arena I have caught the train personally.

A 20,000 - 25,000 capacity stadium will be judged on exactly that in terms of impact to the available infrastructure, not the likely crowd of 8,000 if we stay in L1.

If you live in Kingswood or Lockleaze or Lawrence Weston for example you are likely going to drive or catch 2 buses each way, and most people won't be doing the latter if they can help it. A local in Barton Hill might walk but I reckon most locals in Totterdown Knowle or Briz if they are interested in the game are teds.

If everybody could catch a train then fine, but unless you're  Patchway, Filton folk and able to walk a mile each way at the other end that's not an option.

Henbury Gas could get the No1 easy though !

I had a drink in North Street last year when that lot was at home and it was chaos with a 20,000 gate. The Bath Road and Temple Meads is always a nightmare, and a stadium at the fruitmarket will just compound that and create far more issues than Lansdown's folly imo.

Agree with you about site cleanup of the larger area around Albert Road

The latest form the BP:

www.bristolpost.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/bristol-fruit-market-shareholder-responds-3179602


One of the major shareholders of the Bristol wholesale fruit market has denied the inner city site is set to be sold to Bristol Rovers to develop into a new stadium.

Rovers president Wael Al-Qadi spoke to BBC Radio Bristol 45 minutes before kick-off at Bloomfield Road on Saturday and stated a number of locations are being considered to build a new football stadium but the area in central Bristol just north of the River Avon, between Arnos Vale and Saint Philip's, was the club's No1 option.

Bristol Rovers fans have been craving a new stadium for more than a decade, having played at the Mem since 1996, and delivering a ground was one of the promises Al-Qadi made when his family purchased the club in February 2016.

What Wael Al-Qadi has said about Bristol Rovers' new stadium and what has actually happened

Mr Al-Qadi said: "We have identified one site, along with others, we are very interested in. We have options but one of the sites is the site at the fruit market - we are very interested in that site."

In the same interview he confirmed the club are still "hoping" to have the new stadium built within the next two years.

He said: "Two years to go from now that is still hopefully our aim and our target."

The fruit market is owned by Total Produce, Fresca Group, Arthur David & Company and remains listed as so in the Land Registry.

Total Produce regional director Nick Matthews discussed the latest developments on BBC Radio Bristol on Tuesday morning following the comments from the Rovers president.

Mr Matthews said: "It was a bit of a surprise to me as well to be honest.

"The only reason I responded to the tweet put out by BBC Radio Bristol was to put people right.


"We have offers for the fruit market on a regular basis, we had one recently but on behalf of Total Produce we declined the offer.

"We are not the only shareholder but we are a major shareholder in the market. Our view on things is we are happy where we are. We have got no desire to move. We have got no need to move.

However Mr Matthews did not close the door on the possibility of the fruit market site in St Phillips Marsh being sold altogether but he made it clear it was unlikely. He said: "The site where we are works for us currently so unless someone comes along and makes us and offer we can't refuse we will be sticking where we are."

One thing Mr Matthews was adamant about was the two year time line to have a stadium built at the fruit market site set out by Mr Al-Qadi is unrealistic.

Mr Matthews said: "With several shareholders involved it could take two to three years to find the right place to move to and then build a new fruit market, and then only when we have moved to a new fruit market and left the old one empty could somebody demolish it and even start to think about building a new stadium.

"To say they are going to be on our site in two years is fantasy really.

before it was a fruit market is was an old shunting yard for steam loco's so some contamination is possible