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Universal Great Britain

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A You Tube video from yesterday. Two more houses empty in Manor Road, these are at the far end where the intention is to straighten Manor Road. The contributor also says that residents say one more house in the road is sold but the residents are yet to move.

The video shows the empty houses identified in the video having been fenced off with those concrete barriers.


Beautiful houses tbf, but all for a good cause
 
A You Tube video from yesterday. Two more houses empty in Manor Road, these are at the far end where the intention is to straighten Manor Road. The contributor also says that residents say one more house in the road is sold but the residents are yet to move.

The video shows the empty houses identified in the video having been fenced off with those concrete barriers.


I have had it on good authority (ok, a friend who knows a relative of one of the residents) that Universal are still actively trying to buy all the residential property in Manor Road, and may have bought more than we know about.

There were also cars on the old brickworks site today, and more new concrete barriers now blocking the access to the field opposite the old brickworks site. Things are definitely still bubbling and I am getting hopeful that news will break soon.

I think we may need the drone up again to see if anything is going on. :) :)
 
Things are definitely still bubbling and I am getting hopeful that news will break soon.
I’m past the point of thinking that an official announcement is important. There are so many individual pointers that things are progressing (from Universal having spent £250M on land acquisition, to them continuing to buy inconveniently located houses, and many other signs) I’ve concluded that this thing is happening and I don’t need Comcast to publicly say that for me to be confident. Groundwork was well in hand by the time that Epic Universe was officially announced, I think we might see the same here.
 
I’m past the point of thinking that an official announcement is important. There are so many individual pointers that things are progressing (from Universal having spent £250M on land acquisition, to them continuing to buy inconveniently located houses, and many other signs) I’ve concluded that this thing is happening and I don’t need Comcast to publicly say that for me to be confident. Groundwork was well in hand by the time that Epic Universe was officially announced, I think we might see the same here.
I tend to agree. A lot of water is under the bridge now.
 
Why would you continue to buy up housing in the area if you were then just going to say nah not worth it, I think we will just have to be patient and wait for comcast to comcast. ie 2 days before it opens announce it lol
 
I’m past the point of thinking that an official announcement is important. There are so many individual pointers that things are progressing (from Universal having spent £250M on land acquisition, to them continuing to buy inconveniently located houses, and many other signs) I’ve concluded that this thing is happening and I don’t need Comcast to publicly say that for me to be confident. Groundwork was well in hand by the time that Epic Universe was officially announced, I think we might see the same here.

I agree with you there. Too much has been happening for this to fall on its face.
 
Why would you continue to buy up housing in the area if you were then just going to say nah not worth it, I think we will just have to be patient and wait for comcast to comcast. ie 2 days before it opens announce it lol

It probably helps the resale value, if you've already gone to the effort of sorting potential future risks like nearby houses that have an unknown acquisition cost. But it's clear they still have people on salary here to actually do this stuff, which is at least somewhat reassuring.

I made the mistake of bookmarking this thread back when we thought the announcement was going to be end of June, so every time I come back I see "Well it's not end of June yet!" and internally cry a bit, it's disappointing things haven't been given the go ahead, I try to be optimistic, but I was around back when Disney wanted to build in Dorset and remember reading the flyers we had through the door and getting all excited, before they eventually buggered off to Paris with the park instead, I was only young but it taught me not to get my hopes up, but I also vaguely recall the locals not being happy about it at all, which certainly isn't the case here.

The UK is so depressing, especially if you love theme parks, watching our own parks deteriorate thanks Merlin's virtual monopoly. Just imagine how exciting it would be if groundwork started, I'd be googling for updates everyday for years, lapping up all the drone footage etc.

Anyhow, I sent my letter in support of the project, just have to hope and pray now!
 
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I’m past the point of thinking that an official announcement is important. There are so many individual pointers that things are progressing (from Universal having spent £250M on land acquisition, to them continuing to buy inconveniently located houses, and many other signs) I’ve concluded that this thing is happening and I don’t need Comcast to publicly say that for me to be confident. Groundwork was well in hand by the time that Epic Universe was officially announced, I think we might see the same here.
In Germany they bought land and everything (very close to the Dutch border from where I live currently and eventually they sold it to Amazon who build there a huge facility. It's not over until the "large" lady sings, or so they say...
 
In Germany they bought land and everything (very close to the Dutch border from where I live currently and eventually they sold it to Amazon who build there a huge facility. It's not over until the "large" lady sings, or so they say...
I guess it depends if they were actually at the point of discussing anything with the local authorities over there? Or if they thought they were interested enough.

I guess the fact they are buying properties that are unfortunately located too close is a good sign. I think they are just waiting on the government to show its hand. They’ll want them to take care of the infrastructure costs or a large portion.
 
Why would you continue to buy up housing in the area if you were then just going to say nah not worth it, I think we will just have to be patient and wait for comcast to comcast. ie 2 days before it opens announce it lol

I agree. If you had decided to not proceed, you wouldn’t continue to buy up houses. It won’t increase the resale value of any land later on so why do it?
 
I guess it depends if they were actually at the point of discussing anything with the local authorities over there? Or if they thought they were interested enough.

I guess the fact they are buying properties that are unfortunately located too close is a good sign. I think they are just waiting on the government to show its hand. They’ll want them to take care of the infrastructure costs or a large portion.
Yes it depends on whatever, my point is that there is never a point of no return up until they start building.
At this point there is no point in reading something in Comcast buying up homes, they can be sold to recoup a bit.
Don't get me wrong, I am willing this park in existence with all my might.
 
Yes it depends on whatever, my point is that there is never a point of no return up until they start building.
At this point there is no point in reading something in Comcast buying up homes, they can be sold to recoup a bit.
Don't get me wrong, I am willing this park in existence with all my might.
Yes I already understood your point
 
I watched the latest Brick Dust video on Youtube. I think the chap who makes them is superb.

This covers the Milton Keynes to Bedford proposed waterway, which handily is planned to run fairly close to the Universal site.

He even mentions it may well be possible to take a canal boat and stop off for a day at Universal Studios which I quite liked.



Apparently it’s “happening”. The website has a really cool interactive map showing the route from Milton Keynes down to Wootton and beyond, with artist sketches.

Bedford & Milton Keynes Waterway

It’s interesting because you can see certain parts of the route have been accounted for in recent works, such as crossing under the A421 near the Stewartby landfill and potential Universal entrance.

It’d certainly make the area more appealing if it weaves round the new build estate in Wootton I’d guess.
 
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Even after groundwork has commenced there can be a change of plan. An even worse pandemic or another global financial crisis could significantly alter the environment for major investments. So even with the certainty of an announcement, events might conspire against Universal opening a UK theme park.

What I'm interested in is the balance of probabilities that this thing will go ahead roughly on the timetable outlined by Universal. So far it seems that every stakeholder wants this theme park to happen: the general public, local residents, local government, national government, Universal itself and parent company Comcast. This has been backed up by hundreds of millions of pounds of expenditure, unlike plans for the London Resort or speculation about a UK location for Disney, which never amounted to much more than sticking a finger in the air to see which way the wind was blowing. As we've seen littered through this thread, there's loads of indications that the major stakeholders are working through the process to prepare for a multi-billion dollar investment, which I assume is not something to be rushed as there are many moving parts which needed to come together to make it all work. So on the balance of probabilities I'm confident this thing will happen. Those people who want absolute certainty will have their fears eased on the day they walk through the turnstile (actually, through the face-recognition portal) on their first visit.