QPR scraps Populous training ground plans

Queens Park Rangers Football Club has abandoned approved plans from Populous for a modern training ground in west LondonThe Championship outfit said it was ‘pursuing an alternative site’ for the facility and would no longer be using its planning consent for Warren Farm Sports Centre in Southall.Stadium specialist Populous was appointed by QPR for the project back in 2012 and pledged to ‘create an unparalleled centre of excellence for QPR’s first team and academy’.Ealing Council granted permission for the scheme in the summer of 2016 but local campaigners, who want Warren Farm to remain a fully public space, challenged the decision.A judicial review was heard in 2017 and the council’s approval of the scheme upheld. However this was then appealed and the legal process has rumbled on – with permission granted for further judicial review proceedings – until QPR changed its mind on the site.QPR chief executive Lee Hoos said a non-disclosure agreement was in place regarding the new target location for the training facility.Planning documents submitted by Populous for Warren Farm said its scheme strived ’to establish a new typology with professional sports sitting alongside a development academy and community sports’.The practice added that it would allow the club’s first team, academy, staff and the local community to use the site ‘in a coordinated, harmonious and functional manner’.As well as training facilities for elite footballers and younger players, the scheme would have featured headquarters for the QPR in the Community Trust, an indoor sports hall, a community sports hub with changing facilities, social and recreation spaces, community football pitches, cricket ovals, and spaces for other community activities.The club said it was ‘reviewing’ whether it would work with Populous on the plans for the new site.Populous declined to comment.