11mGBP facelift hope for historic park

icLiverpool - 11m facelift hope for historic park

Feb 16 2005

By Nick Coligan, Liverpool Echo

CAMPAIGNERS have given a cautious welcome to plans to spend 11m on Liverpool's Stanley park.

The council wants to transform the rundown park, including the restoration of its conservatory.

They want to give it a facelift to coincide with Liverpool FC's controversial plans to build a stadium on part of the site.

Initially, £390,000 would pay for drawing detailed designs to attract more funding.

But campaigners today cast doubt on whether the £11m scheme would ever take place.

They say the long- awaited improvements could be scuppered if they successfully challenge the Reds' stadium scheme in court. Joe Kenny, chairman of the Anfield Regeneration Action Committee, said: 'We support any investment to protect and restore the park, which should have happened a long time ago.

'But there are still some outstanding issues about the stadium which we plan to challenge in court.

'We have seen funding agreed for schemes which later collapse so it would be no surprise if we are going down a similar road here.'

The entire regeneration of the area surrounding the new stadium is expected to cost £140m and create hundreds of jobs.

Liverpool's famous stadium would be demolished and replaced with a new Anfield Plaza, home to a hotel, office space, restaurants, cafes and open space for a market.

Stanley park is described by the council as 'seriously degraded, vandalised and perceived to be unsafe'.

The £11m scheme aims to bring more families into the park, improve security and make surrounding communities more attractive to prospective residents.

Some of the cash would be spent on the park's Gladstone conservatory to see it renovated and turned into a function centre similar to the Sefton park palm house.

The conservatory, which was built in 1898, would also have a visitor centre with displays about the history of the Gladstone family.

Councillors are set to agree the £390,000 funding package which will be spent on detailed designs and drawings.

Planners say the detailed plans are vital to attract government and European funding.

Existing football pitches on Stanley park would be relaid and new changing facilities constructed within the new stadium.

Plans would also see the renovation of the neighbouring Anfield cemetery and an innovative genealogy centre."