Australian Football League side Hawthorn "has moved a step closer to securing a new home that it hopes will be the foundation of the club for 100 years," according to Glenn McFarlane of the Sydney DAILY TELEGRAPH.
The Hawks "lodged a planning permit for the proposed super headquarters on 28ha at Dingley."
Hawthorn "also released key details of its masterplan for the Old Dandenong Rd site, which includes a world-leading training base with space to accommodate new facilities well into the 22nd century."
It includes three ovals -- a Melbourne Cricket Ground-sized ground with extra room to allow for running drills; an Etihad Stadium-sized ground, and another which could host a women’s team and VFL training.
The development will cost A$40M-A$60M ($29M-$44M) and could take five to 10 years to build. Long considered "one of the AFL’s innovators," Hawthorn "has outgrown Waverley Park after 11 years and after a feasibility study looked at various parcels of lands to allow for future developments."
Hawthorn "is believed to have the capacity to purchase the land outright" -- for about A$7M ($5.1M)-- and has already "made a conditional offer to buy the site at the end of 2016, pending the due diligence of a planning application to the Kingston City Council and an environment examination of the land, part of which was used as a landfill site" (DAILY TELEGRAPH, 12/3).
