Gateshead Arena and Conference Centre update
North East leaders are still working out whether a major Tyneside regeneration project can become “feasible”, councillors have been told.
Plans to build a 12,500-seat arena and an international grade convention centre on the Gateshead Quayside have stalled, with its costs having escalated substantially in the years since the “world class” development was first announced.
While the exact scale of the funding gap faced by the project has not been announced, Gateshead Council leader Martin Gannon told the Local Democracy Reporting Service recently that it was “less than £100 million”.
It had emerged in April that the North East Combined Authority (NECA) had stepped in to fund a £500,000 study that will determine whether it is financially viable to go ahead with a version of a plan which it has been claimed could deliver a £70 million annual boost to the region’s economy.
And NECA’s chief executive informed councillors this week that officials were still trying to come up with a “good product” that could finally kickstart the scheme.
Henry Kippin told a scrutiny committee on Tuesday that NECA was working with the council to “set a proper direction of travel” for the Quays vision and understand the market demand for the development.
In response to Gateshead councillor Dot Burnett asking for an update on the arena and conference centre after the “major issues”, he added: “What we are doing is a piece of work at the moment with colleagues in the council to give us a really clear picture of what is possible and feasible. And we will come back when there is a good product that is feasible.”
It is understood that downsizing the major building project into a smaller-scale development is among the options being considered to reduce the amount of public funding it would require.
Coun Gannon also suggested recently that the council could return to an earlier “Plan A” for the land, a prime plot nestled between the Baltic art gallery and the Glasshouse music centre, which included a mixture of housing, retail, and commercial ventures.
Building work was meant to begin on the riverside site in autumn 2023. But, while the land where a car park once sat has been cleared, there has been no sign of construction starting.
The intention has been for the new arena to act as a replacement for the Utilita Arena in Newcastle.
In January 2023, it was stated that the estimated cost of the arena and conference development, which would be known as The Sage, had jumped from an original £260 million to more than £350 million.
It is thought that the cost has continued to rise since then – with a range of factors blamed, including the impact of Covid-19, Brexit, the war in Ukraine, and inflation hitting the construction industry.