Cardiff Arms Park
Cardiff Arms Park, also known as The Arms Park, is primarily a rugby union stadium, and also has a bowling green. It is situated in Cardiff, Wales, next to the Millennium Stadium. The Arms Park was host to the British Empire and Commonwealth Games in 1958, and hosted four games in the 1991 Rugby World Cup, including the third-place play-off. The Arms Park also hosted the inaugural Heineken Cup Final of 1995–96 and the following year in 1996–97.
The history of the rugby ground begins with the first stands appearing for spectators in the ground in 1881–1882. Originally the Arms Park had a cricket ground to the north and a rugby union stadium to the south. By 1969, the cricket ground had been demolished to make way for the present day rugby ground to the north and a second rugby stadium to the south, called the National Stadium. The National Stadium, which was used by Wales national rugby union team, was officially opened on 7 April 1984, however in 1997 it was demolished to make way for the Millennium Stadium in 1999, which hosted the 1999 Rugby World Cup and became the national stadium of Wales. The rugby ground has remained the home of the semi-professional Cardiff RFC yet the professional Cardiff Blues regional rugby union team moved to the Cardiff City Stadium in 2009, but returned three years later.
The site is owned by Cardiff Athletic Club and has been host to many sports, apart from rugby union and cricket; they include athletics, association football, greyhound racing, tennis, British baseball and boxing. The site also has a bowling green to the north of the rugby ground, which is used by Cardiff Athletic Bowls Club, which is the bowls section of the Cardiff Athletic Club. The National Stadium also hosted many music concerts including Michael Jackson, Dire Straits, David Bowie, Bon Jovi, The Rolling Stones and U2.
History
Early history of the site
The Cardiff Arms Park site was originally called the Great Park, a swampy meadow behind the Cardiff Arms Hotel. The hotel was built by Sir Thomas Morgan, during the reign of Charles I. Cardiff Arms Park was named after this hotel. From 1803, the Cardiff Arms Hotel and the Park had become the property of the Bute family. The Arms Park soon became a popular place for sporting events, and by 1848, Cardiff Cricket Club was using the site for its cricket matches. However, by 1878, Cardiff Arms Hotel had been demolished.The 3rd Marquess of Bute stipulated that the ground could only be used for "recreational purposes". At that time Cardiff Arms Park had a cricket ground to the north and a rugby union ground to the south. 1881–2 saw the first stands for spectators; they held 300 spectators and cost £50. The architect was Archibald Leitch, who also designed Ibrox Stadium and Old Trafford. In 1890, new standing areas were constructed along the entire length of the ground, with additional stands erected in 1896.
1912 redevelopment
By 1912, the Cardiff Football Ground, as it was then known, had a new south stand and temporary stands on the north, east and west ends of the ground. The south stand was covered, while the north terrace was initially without a roof. The improvements were partly funded by the Welsh Rugby Union. The opening ceremony took place on 5 October 1912, with a match between Newport RFC and Cardiff RFC. The new ground was opened by Lord Ninian Crichton-Stuart. This new development increased the ground capacity to 43,000 and much improved facilities at the ground compared to the earlier stands.In 1922, The 4th Marquess of Bute sold the entire site and it was bought by the Cardiff Arms Park Company Limited for £30,000. It was then leased to the Cardiff Athletic Club for 99 years at a cost of £200 per annum.
North and South Stand redevelopments
During 1934 the cricket pavilion had been demolished to make way for the new North Stand which was built on the rugby union ground, costing around £20,000. However, in 1941 the new North Stand and part of the west terracing was badly damaged in the Blitz by the Luftwaffe during the Second World War.At a general meeting of the WRU in June 1953 they made a decision "That until such time as the facilities at Swansea were improved, all international matches be played at Cardiff". At the same time, plans were made for a new South Stand which was estimated to cost £60,000; the tender price, however, came out at £90,000, so a compromise was made and it was decided to build a new upper South Stand costing £64,000 instead, with the Cardiff Athletic Club contributing £15,000 and the remainder coming from the WRU. The new South Stand opened in 1956, in time for the 1958 British Empire and Commonwealth Games. This brought the overall capacity of the Arms Park up to 60,000 spectators, of which 12,800 were seated and the remainder standing.
The Arms Park hosted the 1958 British Empire and Commonwealth Games, which was used for the athletics events, but this event caused damage to the drainage system, so much so, that other rugby unions complained after the Games about the state of the pitch. On 4 December 1960, due to torrential rain, the River Taff burst its banks with the Arms Park pitch being left under of water. The Development Committee was set up to resolve these issues on a permanent basis. They looked at various sites in Cardiff, but they all proved to be unsatisfactory. They also could not agree a solution with the Cardiff Athletic Club, so they purchased about of land at Island Farm in Bridgend, which was previously used as a prisoner-of-war camp. It is best known for being the camp where the biggest escape attempt was made by German prisoners of war in Great Britain during the Second World War. Due to problems including transport issues Glamorgan County Council never gave outline planning permission for the proposals and by June 1964 the scheme was abandoned. At that stage, the cricket ground to the north was still being used by Glamorgan County Cricket Club, and the rugby union ground to the south was used by the national Wales team and Cardiff RFC.
By 7 October 1966, the first floodlit game was held at Cardiff Arms Park, a game in which Cardiff RFC beat the Barbarians by 12 points to 8.
National Stadium redevelopment
The National Stadium, which was previously known as the Welsh National Rugby Ground, was designed by Osborne V Webb & Partners and built by G A Williamson & Associates of Porthcawl and Andrew Scott & Company of Port Talbot. In 1969 construction began on the stadium which replaced the existing rugby ground built in 1881. The stadium was home to the Wales national rugby union team since 1964 and the Wales national football team since 1989. In 1997 the stadium was demolished to make way for the new Millennium Stadium.Millennium Stadium
Thirteen years after the National Stadium had opened in 1984, it was considered too small and did not have the facilities required of the time and it was demolished and a new stadium, the Millennium Stadium, was built in its place. This would become the fourth redevelopment on the site.Construction involved the demolition of a number of buildings, primarily the existing National Stadium, Wales Empire Pool in Wood Street, Cardiff Empire Telephone Exchange building and the newly built Territorial Auxiliary and Volunteer Reserve building both in Park Street, and the Social Security offices in Westgate Street. The Millennium Stadium is now on roughly two-thirds of the National Stadium, but it no longer uses the Arms Park name. Since 2016, it has been known as the Principality Stadium.
Timeline
Current site
Rugby ground
Only the rugby ground and the Cardiff Athletic Bowls Club now use the name Cardiff Arms Park. The rugby ground has two main stands, the North Stand and the South Stand. Both the Stands have terracing below seating. The other stands in the ground are the Westgate Street end Family Stand, which has rows of seating below executive boxes, plus the club shop, and the River Taff end, which has 26 executive boxes. The rugby ground has two main entrances, the south entrance, and the Gwyn Nicholls Memorial Gates, which was unveiled on 26 December 1949 in honour of the Welsh international rugby player Gwyn Nicholls. The Cardiff Athletic Clubhouse is situated in the corner of the ground between the South Stand and the Westgate Street end.The South Stand of the rugby ground formed a complete unit with the North Stand of the National Stadium. Now the same structure of the South Stand of the rugby ground is also physically attached to the North Stand of the Millennium Stadium. This section is known colloquially as Glanmor's Gap, after Glanmor Griffiths, former chair and President of the WRU. This came about because the WRU were unable to secure enough funding to include the North Stand in the Millennium Stadium, and the National Lottery Commission would not provide any additional funds to be used for the construction of a new ground for Cardiff RFC. The Millennium Stadium was therefore built with the old reinforced concrete structure of the National Stadium and the new steel Millennium Stadium structure built around it.
There was doubt about the future of the Arms Park after 2010 following the move of the Cardiff Blues to the Cardiff City Stadium. Cardiff RFC Ltd, the company that runs Cardiff Blues and Cardiff RFC, still has a 15-year lease on the Arms Park, but talks are underway to release the rugby club from the terms of the lease, to enable the Millennium Stadium to be redeveloped with a new North Stand and adjoining convention centre. However, it still has the original requirement on the lease, that the land will only be used for "recreational purposes", as stipulated by the Bute family. But the Arms Park site is a prime piece of real estate in the centre of Cardiff, which means that it may be difficult to sell the land to property developers. The estimated value of the whole Arms Park site could be at least £25 million, although with the "recreational use" requirement, its actual value could be a lot less than that figure. A decision by Cardiff Athletic Club on the future of the Arms Park has yet to be made. In 2011, the Cardiff Blues regional rugby union team made a £6 million bid for the Arms Park, later the WRU made an increased bid of £10 million for the site. Both bids were rejected by the trustees of the Cardiff Athletic Club. However, in 2012 Cardiff Blues announced that they would be making a permanent return to Cardiff Arms Park following declining attendances at the Cardiff City Stadium. During the 2013 off-season, the pitch at the rugby ground was replaced with an all weather 3G artificial turf surface from FieldTurf at a cost of £400,000, intended to prevent any adverse weather conditions from affecting the rugby.
; Proposed redevelopment
An agreement in principle was reached in December 2015 between the landlord of the stadium site and its tenant to give the club a 150-year lease on the stadium site. This could see the redevelopment of the Arms Park, including a new 15,000 seater stadium at 90 degrees to the existing stadium costing between £20 million and £30 million and surrounded by new offices and apartments. If the final agreement goes ahead, Cardiff Athletic Club would receive an upfront payment of approximately £8 million. As part of the agreement, the bowls section would have to vacate its current site at the Arms Park and move to a new facility. At present Cardiff Blues pay Cardiff Athletic Club rent of around £115,000 per annum, however this would nearly double to around £200,000.