Milan city mayor Giuseppe ‘Beppe’ Sala has revealed that as much as he likes San Siro, like many others do, the Milan city council simply cannot obstruct San Siro joint tennants Inter and AC Milan from building a new stadium.
San Siro has been open for close to 100 years now and the clubs have presented plans upon plans for a new state of the art stadium and complete renovation of the surrounding area, with costs reportedly expected to exceed the €1 billion mark.
There are currently two architectural firms in the running to build the stadium and the two clubs are expected to chose which of the two projects to proceed with just shortly.
“Like many, I am fond of the San Siro stadium, but I have to behave responsibly, because we have an asset, a patrimonial asset that we cannot throw away,” Sala explained in an interview with Sportcafe reported via FcInterNews.
“There is a very long discussion with Inter and Milan that is based on the fact that we, as an administration, cannot obstruct the idea of building a new stadium.”
He then spoke on what would happen in the event that the two clubs chose to move away from the San Siro area of the city, perhaps to private land to build the new stadium.
“If the teams were to go somewhere else, we will look really stupid, with an empty San Siro with cobwebs.
“We have been in discussions for some time, knowing that there are important stakes involved, starting with the future of that area.”
He concluded the interview by adding why the project that the two clubs go with must make sense: “It is not that the stadium alone guarantees a financial return for the clubs who, therefore, want to build more.
“We are entrusting the development of a district in Milan, so the project must make sense.”
