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Queens Park Rangers this week kicked off a hunt for a new football ground in west London’s White City. (Property Week Magazine)
The Premier League club is close to appointing Lambert Smith Hampton to search for a 40,000 to 45,000-seat ground. Candidates include sites in the 272 acre White City Opportunity Area, where the club’s 18,500-seat Loftus Road stadium is located.
It has also emerged that local planners would favour a neighbouring council estate if the club invested in new housing and regeneration.
QPR is the latest in a string of London football clubs to join a land grab to try to boost capacity and increase revenues from larger crowds. The outdated Loftus Road is the smallest ground in the league.
Relocation plans for Chelsea, Tottenham Hotspur, West Ham and now QPR are tantalising developers with the prospect of bringing valuable sites to the market, while also creating further opportunities for the industry to sell land to the clubs.
QPR is understood to be close to agreeing to commission LSH, the agent selling the nearby BBC’s TV Centre, for the ambitious expansion plans alluded to by majority shareholder Tony Fernandes last week.
The club is likely to need a site of around 15 acres for a move from its Loftus Road ground, which occupies little more than 5 acres. Within the White City area, there are several of sufficient scale, but none would be an easy win for QPR.
Sources said the club would consider enlarging its existing ground, but it is hemmed in by private housing and a road. Any redevelopment would also require a temporary ground share elsewhere.
The more obvious move involves the White City council estate, to the west of Wood Lane, which is owned by Hammersmith and Fulham Council.
QPR is believed to have looked closely at the land between Loftus Road and Television Centre. It appears to have held discussions with the council already about this possible move, led by planning consultants at Savills.
Significantly, April’s White City Opportunity Area framework makes provisions for the estates to incorporate a “brand-new football stadium” to replace “the cramped and outdated ground at Loftus Road”.
However, QPR and LSH would have to come up with “acceptable and compatible proposals” that would regenerate the housing estate itself. Wealthy shareholders including Fernandes and Indian steel dynasty the Mittal family would be called on to help pay for the new homes, and this could take in BBC land north of Television Centre.
Sites owned by Helical Bar and Marks & Spencer to the west of Wood Lane are closer to public transport links, but not large enough individually, and landowners are pursuing their own plans there.
Chelsea Football Club has also been linked to sites at White City, but owner Roman Abramovich is understood to have been put off by its proximity to QPR. All parties, including QPR and LSH, declined to comment.
The Premier League club is close to appointing Lambert Smith Hampton to search for a 40,000 to 45,000-seat ground. Candidates include sites in the 272 acre White City Opportunity Area, where the club’s 18,500-seat Loftus Road stadium is located.
It has also emerged that local planners would favour a neighbouring council estate if the club invested in new housing and regeneration.
QPR is the latest in a string of London football clubs to join a land grab to try to boost capacity and increase revenues from larger crowds. The outdated Loftus Road is the smallest ground in the league.
Relocation plans for Chelsea, Tottenham Hotspur, West Ham and now QPR are tantalising developers with the prospect of bringing valuable sites to the market, while also creating further opportunities for the industry to sell land to the clubs.
QPR is understood to be close to agreeing to commission LSH, the agent selling the nearby BBC’s TV Centre, for the ambitious expansion plans alluded to by majority shareholder Tony Fernandes last week.
The club is likely to need a site of around 15 acres for a move from its Loftus Road ground, which occupies little more than 5 acres. Within the White City area, there are several of sufficient scale, but none would be an easy win for QPR.
Sources said the club would consider enlarging its existing ground, but it is hemmed in by private housing and a road. Any redevelopment would also require a temporary ground share elsewhere.
The more obvious move involves the White City council estate, to the west of Wood Lane, which is owned by Hammersmith and Fulham Council.
QPR is believed to have looked closely at the land between Loftus Road and Television Centre. It appears to have held discussions with the council already about this possible move, led by planning consultants at Savills.
Significantly, April’s White City Opportunity Area framework makes provisions for the estates to incorporate a “brand-new football stadium” to replace “the cramped and outdated ground at Loftus Road”.
However, QPR and LSH would have to come up with “acceptable and compatible proposals” that would regenerate the housing estate itself. Wealthy shareholders including Fernandes and Indian steel dynasty the Mittal family would be called on to help pay for the new homes, and this could take in BBC land north of Television Centre.
Sites owned by Helical Bar and Marks & Spencer to the west of Wood Lane are closer to public transport links, but not large enough individually, and landowners are pursuing their own plans there.
Chelsea Football Club has also been linked to sites at White City, but owner Roman Abramovich is understood to have been put off by its proximity to QPR. All parties, including QPR and LSH, declined to comment.
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