Post by bbcgull on Dec 30, 2008 23:53:35 GMT
A series started from an original post i made earlier in the season, mainly for any groundhoppers out there:
St.Mirren : Love Street
3rd January 2009
Weather and Cup replay permitting St.Mirren will play there last game at the wonderfully named Love Street against Motherwell on 3rd Jan.
Wiki states: When St. Mirren began to play on Love Street in the mid-1890s football clubs were still very much in their infancy and moved from ground to ground renting from local landowners. The best deal available was commonly a ten year lease and by the time St. Mirren arrived at Love Street, the club was only 17 years old and playing on its fifth rented ground. They had previously played at Shortroods Estate (1877 to 1878), Abingdon Park (1878 to 1879), Thistle Park, Greenhill Road (1879 to 1882), and Westmarch Estate, Greenhill Road (1882 to 1894).
St. Mirren moved from Westmarch in 1894 where they had been for twelve years following a 100% rent increase by the landlord. The club then found a former brickworks at the foot of Love Street which could be rented for an initial ten years on reasonable terms. It was a much smaller site than Westmarch, just wide enough to lay a football pitch with some spare ground behind the goals, poorly drained and without grass. However, it would give St. Mirren the advantage of being nearer to Paisley town centre than any of the other football clubs in the town. The site was already well known to the townsfolk as an entertainment venue, as it was where travelling circuses set up their Big Top. The original Love Street stand was built in 1894. It stretched the full length of the pitch with five rows of seats and a total capacity of 1,000.
St. Mirren played their first home game at Love Street, a 3–0 defeat to Celtic, on 8 September 1894. The club was nearly forced to move away from Love Street, much as it had been from Westmarch, shortly after the original ten year lease ran out. When the club approached the landowner with an offer to buy the site he set a high price and an ultimatum to either buy or face a hefty increase in rent. The club looked for alternatives, and began to negotiate with the owners of the Shortroods Estate where St. Mirren had played for its first season. However the landlord at Love Street ended up reducing the price and Saints stayed at Love Street.
Over the course of the next fifteen years the club’s aim was to buy the land that bordered its site on two sides – towards the town and round onto Greenock Road. However, it was not until 1920 that the land was finally secured and St. Mirren owned pretty much the site that it occupies today.
With a large site now owned, and the football pitch about to be moved 40 yards towards the town, the club had plans in 1921 for a 60,000 capacity ground with a large oval sweep of earth embankments on three sides, with the fourth side taken up by a 4,500 seater grandstand set up above a 3,000 capacity terraced enclosure, with a 440 yard running track round the pitch. However, before building began, the Great Depression in the United Kingdom tightened its grip and costs more than doubled in the space of six months.
The part of the project to suffer most was the grandstand as the final price for the work rose from an estimate of £17,500, for the full plans, to around £30,000 for the scaled-down version that was completed six months later. The steel framework was clad in corrugated sheeting to keep costs down. The St. Mirren Directors intention was to eventually complete the original plans for a full-length grandstand on Love Street in stages as funds permitted, however this was never completed.
After 1921 there were no major changes to the grounds until the late 1950s when the North Bank was covered and floodlights installed. Twenty years later the current 90ft tall floodlight pylons were installed and plans appeared for redeveloping St. Mirren Park as an all-seater stadium. There was also talk of incorporating airport car-parking, or a hotel, or commercial office space.
In the summer of 1979, the Love Street End terracing was knocked down and rebuilt ten yards from the goal. There was more talk of covering the new family enclosure at Cairter’s Corner and installing a stadium clock and even one suggestion to re-locate in Renfrew District Council’s proposed £200 million national stadium planned for a site across the railway line from Greenhill Road.
With the Scottish Football Association (SFA) preferring to redevelop Hampden Park, St. Mirren remained at Love Street and seats were installed on the North Bank terrace in 1991. Four years later, after the owner of a large building company had joined the club's Board of directors, the Caledonia Stand was built in a deal that saw some of the club’s land sold for development as housing. There were also plans to have a similar stand built at the Love Street End but the bottom fell out of the construction industry and there was the near sale of St. Mirren in 1998 as the club came close to extinction.
In the 2005–06 season St. Mirren were promoted to the Scottish Premier League (SPL) as First Division champions. In order to meet SPL regulations in their first season in the top flight, 2006–07, the club had to carry out further work on the stadium, installing seating on the Love Street terrace.
Sadly this is not one i managed to get to. Well i have only been to 44 anyway!!!
St.Mirren : Love Street
3rd January 2009
Weather and Cup replay permitting St.Mirren will play there last game at the wonderfully named Love Street against Motherwell on 3rd Jan.
Wiki states: When St. Mirren began to play on Love Street in the mid-1890s football clubs were still very much in their infancy and moved from ground to ground renting from local landowners. The best deal available was commonly a ten year lease and by the time St. Mirren arrived at Love Street, the club was only 17 years old and playing on its fifth rented ground. They had previously played at Shortroods Estate (1877 to 1878), Abingdon Park (1878 to 1879), Thistle Park, Greenhill Road (1879 to 1882), and Westmarch Estate, Greenhill Road (1882 to 1894).
St. Mirren moved from Westmarch in 1894 where they had been for twelve years following a 100% rent increase by the landlord. The club then found a former brickworks at the foot of Love Street which could be rented for an initial ten years on reasonable terms. It was a much smaller site than Westmarch, just wide enough to lay a football pitch with some spare ground behind the goals, poorly drained and without grass. However, it would give St. Mirren the advantage of being nearer to Paisley town centre than any of the other football clubs in the town. The site was already well known to the townsfolk as an entertainment venue, as it was where travelling circuses set up their Big Top. The original Love Street stand was built in 1894. It stretched the full length of the pitch with five rows of seats and a total capacity of 1,000.
St. Mirren played their first home game at Love Street, a 3–0 defeat to Celtic, on 8 September 1894. The club was nearly forced to move away from Love Street, much as it had been from Westmarch, shortly after the original ten year lease ran out. When the club approached the landowner with an offer to buy the site he set a high price and an ultimatum to either buy or face a hefty increase in rent. The club looked for alternatives, and began to negotiate with the owners of the Shortroods Estate where St. Mirren had played for its first season. However the landlord at Love Street ended up reducing the price and Saints stayed at Love Street.
Over the course of the next fifteen years the club’s aim was to buy the land that bordered its site on two sides – towards the town and round onto Greenock Road. However, it was not until 1920 that the land was finally secured and St. Mirren owned pretty much the site that it occupies today.
With a large site now owned, and the football pitch about to be moved 40 yards towards the town, the club had plans in 1921 for a 60,000 capacity ground with a large oval sweep of earth embankments on three sides, with the fourth side taken up by a 4,500 seater grandstand set up above a 3,000 capacity terraced enclosure, with a 440 yard running track round the pitch. However, before building began, the Great Depression in the United Kingdom tightened its grip and costs more than doubled in the space of six months.
The part of the project to suffer most was the grandstand as the final price for the work rose from an estimate of £17,500, for the full plans, to around £30,000 for the scaled-down version that was completed six months later. The steel framework was clad in corrugated sheeting to keep costs down. The St. Mirren Directors intention was to eventually complete the original plans for a full-length grandstand on Love Street in stages as funds permitted, however this was never completed.
After 1921 there were no major changes to the grounds until the late 1950s when the North Bank was covered and floodlights installed. Twenty years later the current 90ft tall floodlight pylons were installed and plans appeared for redeveloping St. Mirren Park as an all-seater stadium. There was also talk of incorporating airport car-parking, or a hotel, or commercial office space.
In the summer of 1979, the Love Street End terracing was knocked down and rebuilt ten yards from the goal. There was more talk of covering the new family enclosure at Cairter’s Corner and installing a stadium clock and even one suggestion to re-locate in Renfrew District Council’s proposed £200 million national stadium planned for a site across the railway line from Greenhill Road.
With the Scottish Football Association (SFA) preferring to redevelop Hampden Park, St. Mirren remained at Love Street and seats were installed on the North Bank terrace in 1991. Four years later, after the owner of a large building company had joined the club's Board of directors, the Caledonia Stand was built in a deal that saw some of the club’s land sold for development as housing. There were also plans to have a similar stand built at the Love Street End but the bottom fell out of the construction industry and there was the near sale of St. Mirren in 1998 as the club came close to extinction.
In the 2005–06 season St. Mirren were promoted to the Scottish Premier League (SPL) as First Division champions. In order to meet SPL regulations in their first season in the top flight, 2006–07, the club had to carry out further work on the stadium, installing seating on the Love Street terrace.
Sadly this is not one i managed to get to. Well i have only been to 44 anyway!!!
Ray Ford was one of my contemporaries who used to play for Harbertonford in his youth and moved away to eventually become Station Officer at Brixton Fire Station in London. He and I began refereeing around the same time (he used to "commute" back from London) and he elevated to the Western League the season after me I believe. He and I didn't get to "do" many games together but he always struck me as one of those excellent" authoritive" types who allied his impressive physical presence to the man management skills he gained in his professional life. 
) tell a few tales about Chris and I, there is nothing of Ray that could possibly interfere with the subsequent "political" career he embarked on as a local football administrator.......................but if you've reffed in local circles and haven't fallen foul of the "duelling banjo" kiddies of Teign Village, you ain't lived buddy! 
