Only a couple of minutes from Kaalheide you can find a national treasure in The Netherlands. Pure gold - a fantastic lost ground. Even more; a lost ground you don't see visited that often by other groundhoppers.
People seem to have forgotten the history in the Heerlen area. Stadion Kaldeborn is an awkward stadium that currently contains two hockey pitches, but used to contain one football pitch in a remarkable square shape. It was built to accomodate one big team in Limburg but unfortunately that never really happened. When you are looking for this stadium, you really have to watch out as the stadium is built in a pit and you'll drive by it very easily.
Since 1950 there have been talks about a massive stadium in Heerlen and finally in 1954 Rapid (part of the current Roda JC) decided to participate in the plans by moving to Heerlen and this stadium. The plans fell through due to the merger with Juliana, but the stadium was built after all.
In 1957 Kaldeborn construction started. In 1962 the stadium was finalized, but a political game started in getting a professional team to move to Kaldeborn (big enough to contain 25.000 people and considering a possible extension to even 50.000 people). For years there have been talks, but two professional teams in the neighbourhood didn't want to move after all and finally in 1967 (after a merger of two amateur teams in Heerlen) Heerlen Sport started playing there.
Heerlen Sport was actually founded in 1916 as VVH '16 and in 1967 they merged with RKSV Vrusschemig to become Heerlen Sport. The team never got to the big leagues and in 2012 they merged again. This time with SV Heerlen to become Sporting Heerlen. Unfortunately the decision was made to play in the facilities of the former SV Heerlen. Kaldeborn was left behind, but not for long. A couple of months later a hockey team moved to this stadium, although this story didn't last long. Ever since they left, Kaldeborn is officially abandoned. There used to be a main stand as well, but this has been torn down already.
