Former Aylesbury football stadium demolished as developer's plan 42-home project

This week, new drone footage shared on Facebook shows the former home of Aylesbury United is no more. Earlier this summer, outline permission was granted to GPS Estates Ltd to move forward with its plans to turn the Buckingham Road stadium into housing.

Bucks Council’s conditional approval, granted in May, allowed the developer to authorise a demolition of the area. However, more assessments around noise mitigation, ecological viability, traffic control, parking, and more, must be approved before construction can begin.

In the proposals that were first submitted to the local authority in 2020, developers detailed plans to build 42 dwellings alongside new green spaces for the public. Homes at the site would be a mix of two to four bedroom houses and apartments.

Prior to the projects conditional approval, hundreds of Aylesbury residents criticised the scheme, with most stating a belief that the site would be vulnerable to flooding. These concerns come from the ground’s close proximity to the River Thame. Also, the nearby Meadowcroft Open Space area is often plagued with flooding problems, which often leads to the cancellation of Aylesbury’s Park Run and training sessions for the Aylesbury Dynamos Football Club teams.

Other concerns were raised with the increase in traffic the new properties would cause in an already busy part of Aylesbury. Similar concerns were raised when plans for a new Lidl supermarket were approved nearby.

Local councillors also raised the alarm over loss of the sports pitch, affordable housing provision, economic issues, highways safety, climate change impacts and other reasons.

Planning officers representing the council have advised developers to engage with the Lead Local Flood Authority before submitting formal proposals. This recommendation has been made due to the ‘complexity’ of the drainage system needed to make the housing site viable.

Elsewhere, the future of the football team that was evicted from the ground in 2006 remains uncertain. In 2022, Aylesbury Town Council announced plans to ‘Bring the Ducks Home’ citing the former Aylesbury Golf Club as the ideal area for a multi-use sports site, including a new football ground. But since the town council published a feasibility report 10 months ago, no new updates have been made publicly regarding the project.

When a decision on the potential development was deferred at the end of 2023, Aylesbury United chairman Graham Read said: “I know it’s a very sad day, but I really think we should support the application and move on. The old ground is now too small to accommodate our 60 plus teams – we have come a long way since 2006.”

Mr Read said that the club had fielded a few offers that potentially offered a route to returning home games to Aylesbury and away from the club’s temporary base in Chesham.

The planning application for the development replacing the stadium shows the company aims to build a “mix of new homes which integrate with the existing community, while respecting the environmental assets of the River Thame and its corridor”.

Developers say their homes would be high quality, attractive, and sustainable. Some 35 per cent of the total number of houses would have ‘affordable status’ according to the plans submitted to the authority.