It's unlikely that Sophia Gardens will be housing the temporary ice rink for the Cardiff Devils.
An executive meeting of Cardiff County Council has recommended that it be built at the International Sports Village.
I say unlikely, because the executive decision still has to be approved by the planning committee on January 18th, although it would be very strange if the committee went against the recommendations of the executive in this case.
Just to clarify what's going before the planning committee - it's the application to build a temporary ice rink in the International Sports Village down at Cardiff Bay.
It is NOT the Sophia Gardens application, which was meant to be discussed at this month's meeting but has been put back until February because it was lacking various bits of information.
But regardless of where the ice rink is built, this won't affect Glamorgan County Cricket Club's application one bit - they'll still go ahead with the same plans they've submitted with, I'd imagine, a conference facility and indoor arena where the rink would have been. The 17,000 seater stadium and other facilities will also remain in the application.
The club also hasn't given up on it's ambitions to host test cricket, and says it will be look to work with the Welsh Assembly as well as the council. The club is still looking for public money.
But, having seen acopy of that executive report, it's also worth nothing a few interesting bits and pieces that weren't picked up in the Echo.
Although a £2m figure has been quoted, GCCC actually requested an extra £0.5m. The source of this half a million balance has not been identified by the council, if they were to enter into a contract with GCCC. The club also hasn't finalised arrangements for any third party funding.
The Ice Rink facility itself would not have been ready until 2007, which is too long if the Council is to honour its promises to the Devils and its fans.
But, most interesting of all, is the line "GCCC's chosen contractor has limited financial substance and to date details of its funding for this project have not been identified". The club have proposeda turn-key contract, which means no payment will be given to the contractor until 8 months after the project is started. This means costs will rise to £3.5m.
The contractor has also not been able to provide a contractors bond, meaning if the company got into further difficulties, this could delay the development even further.
The above all leads to the conclusion in the report that the venture at Sophia Gardens would be too risky.
EDIT: You can download the
pdf of the executive report here, although some of the appendicies remain confidential.
