The families resident on the site of the new Coventry City arena have been found a new home.

The Hodgkins families had lived in caravans on the Rowleys Green site for around 40 years but their home is due to be swallowed up by the £120 million, 44,000 all-seater stadium.

An initial attempt to move them was blocked by residents close to the proposed new location but the football club has now won planning approval near Rowleys Green Working Men’s Club.

Project director Stuart Guest said: 

"There are around 20 people involved covering three generations of the family. They are quite happy with the new location and we would expect them to move around April time and that suits them and us.

"They have been very helpful and supportive of the our project and we are delighted this has all reached a satisfactory conclusion."

The new arena, complete with sliding roof and retractable pitch, is due to open in August 2001 and is being marketed as a national stadium in the heart of the Midlands.

Clearing work on the former gas works site has now been completed and it has been stripped of greenery.

That will allow decontamination work to start in earnest and contractors are currently testing the site to establish conditions ahead of the work. Building work is expected to start in the summer after the final gas holder has been purged and demolished.

A new gas pressure reducing station, designed and constructed by Warwickshire engineering company Glendee Engineering, is being installed. All underground pipework, serving the whole of the Coventry conurbation, has been re-routed around the site and along the banks of the adjacent canal to allow builders full access to the site.

Glendee have discovered plans of the site from earlier this century revealing part of it was used as a football pitch for a gasworks social club.