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Indoor Stakepark
Indoor Stakepark
The possibility of building an indoor skatepark on this site was briefly explored as part of SP002. The agenda for this meeting included a tentative design for a facility (shown on the right).
The site is nominally flat but may need extra surveys because of being on the old site of a petrol station.
A "finger in the air" cost to build an enclosed empty warehouse (7m x 45m covering A&C on the map) would be around £550-600k.
Once the warehouse had been constructed, installing an indoor (wooden) skatepark of around 30m in size would cost around £80k.
As shown in the meeting minutes for SP002 the decision was taken for the Skatepark Committee to explorer both options as viable alternatives going forward.
Discussions where advanced with Highways (who own the land) regarding transferring the ownership to Bar Hill Parish Council.
Key:
A – Skatepark area, 530 sq m, just like the previous skatepark
B – Café area on the site of the old Burger King
C – Shop
D – Car park, owned by Dominos and therefore only really used 9-5 Mon-Fri E – Unused space (approx. 4300 m2)
The response (from Highways) to "land ownership changes" was that;
There are a number of planning issues involved in the decision to allow building - not least would be access to the site - and Highways would be unable to answer these as they would be an issue for local planners (i.e. Bar Hill Parish Council and South Cambridgeshire District Council).
Transfer of the land to the Parish Council would have to be at market prices (although not necessarily via a public sale/ purchase). The Treasury Rules regarding the disposal of public land are specific (in part available here) and require that the land be transferred at the current market price. Given the proximity of the business park, and the likelyhood of access being through the business park, the cost of this land is likely to be considerable.
The exact cost of the land cannot be determined without the access issues being addressed. More information on the complexity of land ownership in this area is available on the Derelect Buildings page.
The decision was taken at SP002 to proceed with investigations for both indoor (on the petrol station site) and outdoor (on the old skatepark site).
The indoor skatepark idea was dropped around SP004 (14th June) as this was the last meeting when any work was done on the indoor skatepark alternative.
The implication is that the complexities (access rights, planning, land ownership, development cost, etc.) made the option unattractive compared to the outdoor option which is not clearly stated in the minutes.
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