Town Moor is just across leazes park from St James' but I take your point that its not directly adjacent - there was talk in the late 90s of building a new ground on the town Moor as the St James' footprint is restricted, but they just built upwards instead. Surely there's no reason it couldn't be held at another reasonably accessible open space in Hull? It's a travelling fair after all and Walton St site is an eyesore that sits vacant most of the year.
That sounds like total made up bollocks to be fair. Is there actually anything factual in the council comments made in this thread, other than people's willingness to believe that the council are useless, thieving ****s?
Not sure if this was already known but someone at the training ground today saw Josh Emmanuel was fully involved in the session. Given what happened it’s nice to see
I very much doubt it makes an accountable profit to the City, and the complexity of justifying it is more likely to be the reason that they are cagey. There are articles from showmen that hint at the costs to them, but the rent would barely cover the Council costs incurred in operating the site, infrastructure and associated services required. That's before the cost of that asset for the rest of the year, and the loss of trade to others in the City. I know of some that take their holidays around Hull Fair, as their customers are unlikely to have money that month. I suspect the Council will argue that it attracts people to the City, and the perceived wisdom is that there is little difficulty getting visitors back to Hull, the problem is getting them here in the first place. That was the logic for the Deep. I suspect that there is an expectation that fair visitors will return to see the rest of the City. Personally, I don't think that happens to any great extent, but I've nothing to back up that gut feeling. EDIT: £3,500 for the bigger rides for eight days, plus about £500 for leccy and camping. I very much doubt that covers the cost of sparkies, H&S, food hygiene inspections, Police etc etc etc https://www.hulldailymail.co.uk/whats-on/whats-on-news/hull-fair-rides-showmen-pay-613540
4 grand for one of those big rides seems way too cheap, how much does a 2 or 3 minute ride cost these days?
The back of mine is a bit wobbly. I tried to take a screwdriver in once to mend it but had it confiscated.
I understand the council did a feasibility study to move the fair about 20 years ago. Part of the relocation cost was Health and Safety issues. Apparently as it is temporary and occupying the same site for years there are concessions in respect of H&S. Any proposed new site would have to have hundreds of flushing toilets to comply with current regs. Also all the cabling would have to be ducted rather than simply buried under spare tarmac. At the time the upgrade cost was IRO £2m so was shelved.
This could presumably be factored in to a selling price, so would potentially not an obstacle, unless there are additional ongoing costs related to these upgrades.
I used to work for a local electrical contractors the council used to provide test certificates to the ride owners to allow them to trade. We had a prick of a foreman who conveniently decided to get his tools out during the week running up to fair opening. He was adamant only he could do this as he “knew how the fair guys worked”. One year, he was off ill (genuinely very ill) so he missed the pre fair week. It turns out there was a great reason he wanted that testing all to himself- as it got closer to the fair opening, the fair ride owners got more and more desperate to get their certificates signed off, they were literally throwing money at him. He worked out that if he used a “Magic Pen*”, he could churn out dozens of pre-filled certs and would fill out the top parts in his van and take loads (and I mean loads) of cash. Straight into his back pocket. Thousands of pounds every year. The ****er used to pass comment how he “didn’t need overtime because he knew how to save his money”.
I suppose one thing could be, outside companies don’t tent to rock up, sell a load of tat and then **** off leaving all their **** got other people to tidy up?
Is this the standard three page back and forward guff, or can it be stretched to four pages? Asking for a ****.