ST KILDA'S $10 million redevelopment plan for Frankston Oval may have hit a snag, with the club investigating other potential development sites around the bayside suburb due to substantial blow-outs in cost estimates for the new base.

St Kilda announced this year that it would relocate its training and administration base from Moorabbin to Frankston Oval by 2010, in a bid to further strengthen the club's existing ties with the bayside community.

The state-of-the-art development was to include a range of facilities available for use to the local community as well as the St Kilda and Frankston football clubs.

St Kilda CEO Archie Fraser said yesterday that initial indications from cost estimations were that "some significant site preparation costs" could force the club to consider its options within the Frankston area.

"The first design estimate for the Frankston Oval site is well over what we expected," said Fraser.

"We have a budget of $10.25 million for the development and the first estimate came in some $6 million over that figure."

Fraser said the club was in the process of cutting back the cost estimate, and had already trimmed $2 million from the initial figure.

"We need to ensure we can offer the Frankston community what we set out to, either at the existing Frankston Oval site or at a new site," he said.

Fraser confirmed that a possible alternative development site could be Belvedere Park in Seaford, a site that St Kilda could share with TAC Cup team Dandenong Stingrays.

"What we've asked the local council at this stage is basically do you have any flat bits of land, and if the cost of building on a flat bit of land is significantly different then we will consider our options," he said. "The council said to us during discussions that they'd be keen to get the Stingrays on board and develop Belvedere Park, and that's certainly an option. If we could consolidate some of the administration facilities and the Stingrays could use some of our facilities, then that would be a good alternative option.

"The council will come back to us in the next couple of weeks with some options."

Frankston mayor Alistair Wardle said that the council would do all it could to ensure that the Frankston Oval would become the site of the development.

"We are continuing to work with both St Kilda and Frankston football clubs to make the Frankston Oval site work. The ground is already at an AFL standard, which is a big advantage," Wardle said.

Despite the blow-out, Fraser said that St Kilda remained committed to the Frankston community and was still aiming to have a presence there by 2010.

"Frankston is a big part of our bayside community base and through the Frankston development and our recent alignment with Sandringham in the VFL, we are shoring up our bayside community base. We're not even considering moving out of Frankston," Fraser said.

Meanwhile, Melbourne is yet to finalise its plans for a training base at Casey Fields in Cranbourne and talks with the City of Casey and VFL club Casey Scorpions regarding the proposed $1.6 million development are continuing. It is believed there have been no talks on a possible alignment between the Melbourne and Casey football clubs.