Nottingham Forest’s plans to extend the City Ground have taken another step forward after Rushcliffe Borough Council said the football club need not provide an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) as part of the planning process.
Forest had permission granted in June for the demolition of the Peter Taylor stand and an increase in capacity of at least 5,000 at the stadium, which proposals had been in the works for since 2019.
But three weeks ago at the start of October, altered documents were submitted to the council, detailing yet another change to the plans.
The club now wants to fill in the corners of the Trent End stand, rounding out the stadium, while an idea to build 170 residential units next to the stadium has been scrapped, according to the papers.
As part of planning regulations, Forest had to ask the council to provide them with a “screening opinion” about whether an EIA was necessary – that is, whether the environment in the vicinity of the stadium could be impacted negatively.
Some developments automatically need an EIA, but the City Ground plans do not fall into that category of proposals.
If the answer was yes, Forest would have had to then complete their own thorough research about the potential impacts on the enviroment in the EIA.
But Rushcliffe’s head of planning decided that it wasn’t needed.
A letter addressed to the company behind the City Ground’s redevelopment says: “The environmental sensitivity of this area has been considered and it is not located within a sensitive area for the purposes of the EIA.
“The Borough Council therefore concludes that proposed development is not likely to have significant effects on the environment and its screening opinion is that an Environmental Statement is not required in this instance.”
Reasons included that the proposal related to an “existing stadium within an existing urban environment,” and that the impact of the size and scale increase associated with the additional spectator seating would not be of significant impact to warrant being assessed in an EIA.
A 2019 screening opinion, offered by the council for a different plan for the City Ground, considered there’d be a “significant” effect on the environment from vehicles and construction due to the stadium’s proximity to Air Quality Management Zones (AQMAs).
But Rushcliffe Borough Council has scrapped a nearby AQMA and impact on a Nottingham City Council AQMA 200 metres away would now not be considered significant.
The letter ends: “The site is not considered to be a sensitive area and any effects are considered to be capable of appropriate identification and mitigation through appropriate techincal studies during the course of a planning application.
“As a result, it is not considered that the proposed development would give rise to significant effects on the environment and that the project would not consitute EIA development.”
