LFC: City planners hold key to club’s future, says chief

Jul 26 2007 by David Bartlett, Liverpool Daily Post

LIVERPOOL FC chief executive Rick Parry last night said the club was now in the hands of the city’s planners.

The club’s planning application was received by the council yesterday afternoon and officials were last night working to check it over.

After it has been validated and advertised it will go out to public consult-ation with the hope it will be considered by planning committee members in the autumn.

The council’s executive board has set down a timetable that permission should be granted or refused by the end of October.

The Government has powers to “call in” plans on major developments, and if that happened it could mean a public inquiry, with a potential to delay the project by a year.

But insiders say it is not anticipated this will happen as the previous stadium application was not called in.

Work can begin as soon as the plans are given the go-ahead, after which Liverpool will submit another application for the intended capacity of 76,000.

“We can’t put a timescale on precisely when the work will start,” said Mr Parry. “It will start as soon as it is practical, once the planners have finished their deliberation.”