More arena meetings

Leeds City Council love to have to host functions.






It means they can hire out some fancy conference room at a posh city centre hotel, have a flamboyant lunch with some expensive Fair Trade coffee whilst putting it on a decent sized expenses account.

So when you like to have these meetings, open days, conventions or whatever you like to call them, it pays to have a few good excuses for one and at the moment, there's no better excuse than the Leeds Arena, or more to the point, lack of one.

A meeting has also taken place today to discuss the development of the Elland Road site, currently a half-modernised home to an ailing football team, some industrial units and a vast spread of wasteland that gets used as a car park for 25 days of the year next to a motorway. It's a complete eyesore as you approach the city and there are few worse ways of saying 'Welcome to Leeds' as you come downhill from the Pennines.

And it's probably no coincidence that the two 'events' have taken place with just 24 hours between them. The council want an arena, they want to improve the Elland Road site - two birds with one stone. Oh, and Leeds United chairman Ken Bates wants to stick in his two penneth as well.

A city centre location is up for discussion as well, a bloke from London has even offered to pay for one, but when he was sounding out his plans, the council seemed more interested in turning the Town Hall into a world class venue. That bloke seems to have vanished in these parts and I can only assume he got fed up of the heel-dragging from our elected leaders.

Long story short, Leeds doesn't have an arena. It effectively rules the city out of hosting indoor sporting events, conferences and major indoor concerts. Outdoor venues we are well catered for and Leeds has successfully hosted major acts in the past at Temple Newsham, Roundhay Park and Millenium Square. This weekend sees the O2 Wireless Festival at Harewood House and the annual Leeds Carling Festival will be coming to Bramham Park this August Bank Holiday. That's OK when the weather's fine, but when the winter comes, Leeds is very much off the radar, with loiners having to make the trip to either Sheffield or Manchester.

Hopefully, something fruitful has come of all this. Leeds has been crying out for a venue like this, be it just for conferencing and pop concerts, or if it is to also play host to an ice hockey - Sheffield Steelers have been crying out for a proper derby clash. My only worry is that the usual 'feasibility studies' continue for a good few years to come to the point where nobody cares anymore.

Support Leeds Arena

Those of you who live in Leeds may well be aware of the current campaign for a Leeds Arena being trumpeted by the Yorkshire Evening Post and various figures in the local music scene.

There have been rumblings of a Leeds Arena for many years. After Queen's Hall closed down in 1989, Leeds has been left without a high capacity music venue whilst state-of-the-art arena's have been built in Sheffield, Manchester and Newcastle.

Plans were drawn up in the late 90's for a 10,000 seat arena to be built alongside Elland Road stadium, complete with Ice Hockey and Basketball franchises, yet those proposals were abandoned after Leeds United's financial troubles began to get out of hand.

In the meantime, venues such as the Refectory and Leeds Met have their place, but are nowhere near big enough to fill the void and music fanatics from Leeds are still left with the prospect of late-night journeys up the M1 or across the M62 to see world famous acts.

In 2004, private investor Patrick Nally came knocking on the door of Leeds City Council with his own cash. However, whilst he was ready to get his chequebook out, the council were seemed more interested in converting the Town Hall into a music venue, disregarding the fact that both the capacity and acoustics of the building were unsuitable for a top-class venue. The problems with Supertram didn't exactly go down well either.

Then we tried Millennium Square.
Millennium Square is effectively just a public square. It has been used in the past for art exhibitions, an outdoor ice rink every winter and it's a popular venue for fans to watch major football matches on the big screen that's attached to the facing Carriageworks Theatre. This time, the square would be tested for it's suitability as a rock venue and local bands Embrace and then Kaiser Chiefs played gig's in front of 6,000 people crammed into a public square directly outside Leeds General Infirmary.
Whilst the venue has it's place like most overs and whilst the gig's were a major success, Millennium Square was added to the list of "not quite suitable venues".

Then Robbie Williams came to town, bringing chaos, 180,000 people and traffic carnage to the area of Roundhay, closing 11 local schools and outraging the local residents. That has revitalised the current campaign behind Leeds Arena.

The music acts are wanting to come to Leeds, the Sheffield Steelers Ice Hockey team want a fixture with a bit more rivalry than their current "derby" against Nottingham and I dare say that fans both sides of the Pennines would relish a Leeds v Manchester roses battle.

The city needs a top quality entertainment, sports and function centre. The economic gain and prestige that comes with hosting major acts and events is something that Leeds lacks against it's neighbours in Sheffield and Manchester. All the proposed sites would benefit the local area bringing regeneration and business to some neglected parts of the city. This is long overdue.

Sign the petition and support the Leeds Arena.