2028 US City Options

[JMarkSnow2012]

37 minutes ago, gromit said:

But the Stade de France was not built on host the final of an athletics event ... it was built to host the final of a Football event

And not only has the Stade to France held the 2003 World Athletics event, it hosts France's Diamond league fixture every year so another 60,000 event day with all that extra revenue. If an NFL team relies simply on 8 days of revenue as it's core stream a single meet adds maybe an extra 12% of revenue per year.

Anyone can post pictures taken from different angles ... plonk your backside on a seat and then comment

And Wembley wasn't built as a national stadium. It was built by the Football Association privately costing £947 million in today's money. No real tenant. England might play there about a dozen times a year, they hold some finals and semi finals so the FA looks at additional revenue streams

 

Wembley was a typical English "national prestige" project, not exactly publicly funded, not exactly privately funded:

http://www.wembleystadium.com/Organisation/Stakeholders.aspx

 

The Stade de France is a typical French prestige project, not exactly privately funded, not exactly publicly funded ...

http://archyworldys.com/great-rugby-stadium-the-court-of-auditors-does-not-want/

 

[Quaker2001]

Oh, gromit my dear boy, you make it too easy for me..

New venue for Paris' Diamond League

Quote

 

Paris' Diamond League meeting will leave the 80 000-capacity Stade de France in 2017 for a stadium a quarter of the size, French athletics chiefs said on Monday.

The French Athletics Federation (FFA) said the cost of hiring the national stadium in the northern Paris suburb of Seine-Saint-Denis had become "incomprehensible".

Instead, the meeting will move to the 20 000-capacity Charlety stadium in the south of Paris, where Stade Francais rugby team played their home matches from 2010-2013.

FFA general manager Julien Mauriat said the money saved on avoiding the €800 000 needed to hire the Stade de France would be put to attracting the highest level of athletes with "the aim of making this the top meeting in the world".

The move is in keeping with the will of Diamond League organisers to hold meetings in smaller, packed stadiums rather than larger ones that feel half empty, in order to create a better atmosphere.

 

So yes, tell me more about the success of athletics in Stade de France and how we could replicate that here if only we had the vision!  You talk about an extra 12% of revenue, but at what cost?  Compare that with a concert or college football or soccer or anything else that doesn't require a design for movable stands.  Only 1 sport requires that and even at Stade de France, it's no longer a preferred option.

Thank you for those images of Stade de France.  Completely proves my point about the amount of extra space on the ends.  Not a comparison.  How about showing a picture from behind the goal, which is most affected by the "compromise" for a track at Stade de France.

[JMarkSnow2012]

18 minutes ago, JMarkSnow2012 said:

Wembley was a typical English "national prestige" project, not exactly publicly funded, not exactly privately funded:

http://www.wembleystadium.com/Organisation/Stakeholders.aspx

 

The Stade de France is a typical French prestige project, not exactly privately funded, not exactly publicly funded ...

http://archyworldys.com/great-rugby-stadium-the-court-of-auditors-does-not-want/

 

PS: New Wembley's £120,000,000 of National Lottery funding in 1999 was for a project named "English National Stadium, Wembley"

http://www.lottery.culture.gov.uk/GrantDetails.aspx?ID=97002875&DBID=SE

[Nacre]

Some points on an American version of Stade de France:

1. NFL teams only play 8 regular season home games per year, which is less than Stade de France gets from its national football and rugby teams. So the argument that it does not have a major tenant seems unfair in the extreme.

2. Paris is not a big football city as it is a city of transplants. (And it's worth noting that Los Angeles was the same way when I grew up there.) London has enough big teams to make use of multiple large football stadiums, but Paris only has Paris Saint Germain.

3. American football fields are longer (and a bit narrower) than soccer/football fields, so the endzone area would not be quite as bad as it is in soccer. (Though the sidelines would also be a tad bit worse.)

4. Even though I wish Seattle had built something like Stade de France instead of 2 huge football stadiums, it only makes sense for an NFL team to accept such a stadium if it does not have a better choice. (IE the Raiders would be thrilled to play in a clone of Stade de France instead of the Oakland County Coliseum.) Once a better football stadium is built, no team is going to accept moving into a worse option. The Jets and Giants would not accept a stadium like Stadium Australia or Stade de France when they already have MetLife.

5. I've seen probably two dozen American football games in a stadium with a track in it. (Husky Stadium) The "cheap seat" views from the upper deck are fine even with a track. But the premium seating is not comparably great. And that's why highly commercialized teams don't like these stadiums. It weakens the club seating, luxury suites, etc. So a college football team would be much more likely to accept a stadium with a track than a professional team. It's just unfortunate that New York and Chicago do not have huge universities like Los Angeles does.

[zekekelso]

8 hours ago, Rob. said:

This kind of stadium - which works very well in France as a National Stadium, a stadium for big occasions, not a club stadium - wouldn't be built in the US. An NFL team wouldn't accept it because of its compromises, and the notion of a National Stadium isn't one that would get off the ground. 

Why not? This is the point I was unsuccessfully trying to make earlier. If England and France can support a national stadium, why can't the US? 

[Rob2012]

4 minutes ago, zekekelso said:

Why not? This is the point I was unsuccessfully trying to make earlier. If England and France can support a national stadium, why can't the US? 

I'm sure technically it could. Logistically, how would it happen though? Who would propose, pay for and maintain it? And how would it work in much less centralised country without one dominant city? Wembley works because England play all their home fixtures there plus the major domestic cup finals are played there. Would the Superbowl permanently locate to a new US national stadium, for example, and would the US be happy with its national teams being based and playing in one city only? Would a national base for your teams and finals work in the US or would it have to have some other (as yet unknown) purpose?

Really though, it's not for you to ask me "why not?" It's for you to tell me why and how it could happen and what purpose a national stadium would serve in the US. Maybe it could work, but I've never heard of such a proposal - there must be a reason why that is. And I struggle to imagine how it would work myself. Maybe you have some ideas...

[Quaker2001]

27 minutes ago, zekekelso said:

Why not? This is the point I was unsuccessfully trying to make earlier. If England and France can support a national stadium, why can't the US? 

Could NASA send a manned spaceship to Mars like we've seen in so many movies?  Probably.  Are they going to anytime soon?  Probably not.  And it's not because they can't, it's because the question isn't why not.  The question is why.

Like Rob said, you tell us how it could work.  Be more specific than "random billionaire wants to spend a lot of money on something."  England and France each have 1 and only 1 alpha city, so it makes sense to have their biggest games played there.  And especially in England, it's not like they lack large stadiums if they wanted to move big games around.  Not so easy to centralize that here in the United States if you want it to belong to the entire country.  More money in bidding out events like the Super Bowl or the College Football national championship or the Final Four.

We know you like being contrarian, but you can't keep making the "it could happen, don't say it can't" when no one is making that argument.  But I'm pretty sure you're aware of how unlikely it is and don't disagree it would be a near impossible sell.

[zekekelso]

24 minutes ago, Rob. said:

I'm sure technically it could. Logistically, how would it happen though? Who would propose, pay for and maintain it? And how would it work in much less centralised country without one dominant city? Wembley works because England play all their home fixtures there plus the major domestic cup finals are played there. Would the Superbowl permanently locate to a new US national stadium, for example, and would the US be happy with its national teams being based and playing in one city only? Would a national base for your teams and finals work in the US or would it have to have some other (as yet unknown) purpose?

Really though, it's not for you to ask me "why not?" It's for you to tell me why and how it could happen and what purpose a national stadium would serve in the US. Maybe it could work, but I've never heard of such a proposal - there must be a reason why that is. And I struggle to imagine how it would work myself. Maybe you have some ideas...

My idea is that you build it as the Olympic stadium with Olympic money. 

The NFL would never have a permanent home for the Superbowl (they use the Superbowl as a bargaining chip as one of they ways they get cities to pay for stadiums), but you could host several neutral-site college football rivalry games, a college bowl game or two, USMNT east-coast games (too much West Coast support to host all games in one stadium), European Soccer games,  concerts, etc. I've got to believe you could find 8-10 events a year to support the think in a place like NYC. 

[zekekelso]

3 minutes ago, Quaker2001 said:

Could NASA send a manned spaceship to Mars like we've seen in so many movies?  Probably.  Are they going to anytime soon?  Probably not.  And it's not because they can't, it's because the question isn't why not.  The question is why.

We know you like being contrarian, but you can't keep making the "it could happen, don't say it can't" when no one is making that argument.  But I'm pretty sure you're aware of how unlikely it is and don't disagree it would be a near impossible sell.

For what it's worth, NASA has an active program leading to a manned Mars mission. 

And I'm pretty sure Rob just said it couldn't happen in the US. 

I honestly think that you could easily build a national stadium as part of an Olympic bid without an NFL/MLB tied in as a legacy host. 

[Quaker2001]

37 minutes ago, zekekelso said:

My idea is that you build it as the Olympic stadium with Olympic money. 

The NFL would never have a permanent home for the Superbowl (they use the Superbowl as a bargaining chip as one of they ways they get cities to pay for stadiums), but you could host several neutral-site college football rivalry games, a college bowl game or two, USMNT east-coast games (too much West Coast support to host all games in one stadium), European Soccer games,  concerts, etc. I've got to believe you could find 8-10 events a year to support the think in a place like NYC. 

How is that different though from every city's main football stadium, NFL or college?  What's the added utility of having another stadium in the NYC area when there are already several capable of hosting football games and soccer matches and whatever else they would want to host there? 

36 minutes ago, zekekelso said:

For what it's worth, NASA has an active program leading to a manned Mars mission. 

And I'm pretty sure Rob just said it couldn't happen in the US. 

I honestly think that you could easily build a national stadium as part of an Olympic bid without an NFL/MLB tied in as a legacy host. 

So when Rob started his post with " I'm sure technically it could," you took that as Rob saying it couldn't happen?

Again, if you're going to build a stadium, what does that add to a city that already has a stadium?  Why did Chicago propose a temporary stadium that they would downsize?  Ditto for Boston and San Francisco.  You keep saying "could easily" but here are all these cities that prove otherwise.  Make it's not as easy as you're making it sound because actually coming up with a financial plan to make it work is stupid.  Ask the Boston folks how the "we'll just pay for the Olympics with Olympic money" line worked out.

[zekekelso]

1 hour ago, Quaker2001 said:

How is that different though from every city's main football stadium, NFL or college?  What's the added utility of having another stadium in the NYC area when there are already several capable of hosting football games and soccer matches and whatever else they would want to host there? 

So when Rob started his post with " I'm sure technically it could," you took that as Rob saying it couldn't happen?

Again, if you're going to build a stadium, what does that add to a city that already has a stadium?  Why did Chicago propose a temporary stadium that they would downsize?  Ditto for Boston and San Francisco.  You keep saying "could easily" but here are all these cities that prove otherwise.  Make it's not as easy as you're making it sound because actually coming up with a financial plan to make it work is stupid.  Ask the Boston folks how the "we'll just pay for the Olympics with Olympic money" line worked out.

It isn't a matter of needing another stadium, or added utility of another stadium. Almost none of the stadiums we build are needed or add utility. Minneapolis did just fine with one stadium to house an NFL team, MLB team and major NCAA football team. But, hey, they decided to build three stadiums to replace one. 

I'm just saying you can support and justify a stadium without a permanent NFL of major college football tenant. Especially in NYC. Minneapolis can support two major football stadiums, if Seattle can, I'm sure NYC can as well. 

It was when Rob posted "This kind of stadium ... wouldn't be built in the US... the notion of a National Stadium isn't one that would get off the ground." that I took as Rob saying it couldn't happen. Couldn't being too strong a word, but still...

The Rose Bowl was built to essentially host one major game a year. In more recent times, San Antonia built the Alamodome. 

 

[Nacre]

It is important to note that many sports franchises in the US do not pay their fair share in facilities rentals.

Indianapolis spent $260 million in 2016 dollars building an arena with public money, and pay something like $15-20 million per year on upkeep. Yet the Pacers pay -or at least they did the last time I checked- a total of $1 per year in rent. The city would be far better off hosting other events in the arena than hosting an NBA team. Seattle's arena also went from a money loser with an NBA team to a profit maker for the city without one. And St Louis will probably be better served using their stadium for conventions than hosting an NFL team.

A New York Olympic Stadium should do just fine with concerts, conventions, occasional soccer matches, a college football bowl game, etc. Even if it did not have a "primary tenant." (And, as I said before, NYCFC should be able to serve as an adequate tenant for a 40,000 seat stadium capable of handling expansion to 80,000.) The problem is finding the land for it.

[Quaker2001]

4 hours ago, zekekelso said:

It isn't a matter of needing another stadium, or added utility of another stadium. Almost none of the stadiums we build are needed or add utility. Minneapolis did just fine with one stadium to house an NFL team, MLB team and major NCAA football team. But, hey, they decided to build three stadiums to replace one. 

I'm just saying you can support and justify a stadium without a permanent NFL of major college football tenant. Especially in NYC. Minneapolis can support two major football stadiums, if Seattle can, I'm sure NYC can as well. 

It was when Rob posted "This kind of stadium ... wouldn't be built in the US... the notion of a National Stadium isn't one that would get off the ground." that I took as Rob saying it couldn't happen. Couldn't being too strong a word, but still...

The Rose Bowl was built to essentially host one major game a year. In more recent times, San Antonia built the Alamodome. 

The Rose Bowl was built in the 1920s at a cost of $272,000 (under $4 million in today's dollars).  Compared with the Coliseum, built around the same time for more than 3 times the cost.  And the Alamodome was built to try and attract an NFL team.  They did have the Spurs there for awhile, so it's not like they were without tenant in the early years of the stadium.

So, the Metrodome.  This is their "fine" stadium..

 

Did Minneapolis "need" to have the dome's 3 primary tenants all go their separate ways?  No.  They decided to do so because they all had their own interests.  Multi-purpose stadiums are quickly becoming a thing of the past.  The Twins wanted an outdoor stadium to call their own.  The Gophers built a new stadium (which could be expanded in case the Vikings decided they wanted to join them, not that that ever was going to happen).  And the Vikings used a veiled threat of moving to LA to get the Metrodome replaced with US Bank, which has a Super Bowl headed to Minneapolis.

But at least all that was done with purpose.  There was still a plan behind it.  Do you think someone in New York is going to wake up 1 morning and say "you know what, I have a lot of money, I'm going to build a stadium!"  What's the point?  There was a point in Minnesota and in Seattle.  I fail to see how that would come to pass here.  Doesn't mean it can't happen, but it's going to take someone with the vision to make it work in order to make it a reality.  London proposed a stadium they didn't need and had some trouble figuring out a legacy plan for, but they had a lot of backing for that.  Where is NYC's backing going to come from?  Who is going to take on that project if there's no anchor tenant and they're competing in a marketplace that already has an 80,000 seat stadium, a 50,000 seat stadium, a 40,000 seat stadium, and a 25,000 seat stadium.  Maybe if NYCFC is involved, but they probably would like their situation settled long before 2028.

[Quaker2001]

4 hours ago, Nacre said:

It is important to note that many sports franchises in the US do not pay their fair share in facilities rentals.

Indianapolis spent $260 million in 2016 dollars building an arena with public money, and pay something like $15-20 million per year on upkeep. Yet the Pacers pay -or at least they did the last time I checked- a total of $1 per year in rent. The city would be far better off hosting other events in the arena than hosting an NBA team. Seattle's arena also went from a money loser with an NBA team to a profit maker for the city without one. And St Louis will probably be better served using their stadium for conventions than hosting an NFL team.

A New York Olympic Stadium should do just fine with concerts, conventions, occasional soccer matches, a college football bowl game, etc. Even if it did not have a "primary tenant." (And, as I said before, NYCFC should be able to serve as an adequate tenant for a 40,000 seat stadium capable of handling expansion to 80,000.) The problem is finding the land for it.

Did some research and found this on Key Arena.  KeyArena turns a bigger profit than it ever did with the Sonics.  And here's 1 of my favorite lines from that article.. " Ironically, if the NBA ever returned to Seattle, likely in a new arena, the Sonics’ old home would suffer. Another reason KeyArena has remained sustainable is because it hasn’t had to compete with another arena. "

So here's the problem with a new stadium in the NYC area, aside from, you know, where to put it, how to fund it, and a legacy plan to justify its construction in the first place.  Small details.  How exactly is that stadium supposed to attract those events (even in New York, the supply of such events is limited) when you have other stadiums out there that can do the same.  MetLife Stadium cost $1.6 billion to build.  Is this new NYC Olympic Stadium going to be able to draw soccer and college football away from MetLife?  Is it even worth the money and the effort when that's the uphill battle they're facing from minute one.

[stryker]

Minneapolis is able to sport two 50,00 seat plus stadiums because they have the teams to do it. That's what it comes down to. The Minnesota Vikings were destined to get a stadium to replace the Metrodome. The University of MInnesota, which shared both Metropolitan Stadium and the Metrodrome, wanted an on-campus stadium for revenue and recruiting reasons. Neither New York or Chicago have that big money college football team that can support an additional stadium of significant size. This talk of NYFC agreeing to a stadium that could be expanded later in ridiculous (I've noted mulitiple times how massive amount of temporary seating is a failed concept). The club isn't going to jeopardize sight lines or potential revenue with some clause to make it available for a future Olympics. The idea that the city could hold this over the club's head for a building permit is even crazier. If that occurred, it would wind up in court, and the worst case scenario would be the courts say the city has violated the lease and NYFC could pack their bags and move elsewhere.

Bottom line is until either the Jets or the GIants need a new stadium, there isn't going to be one, let alone any bid for an Olympics.

[zekekelso]

17 hours ago, Quaker2001 said:

 Do you think someone in New York is going to wake up 1 morning and say "you know what, I have a lot of money, I'm going to build a stadium!"  What's the point?  There was a point in Minnesota and in Seattle.  I fail to see how that would come to pass here.  Doesn't mean it can't happen, but it's going to take someone with the vision to make it work in order to make it a reality. 

No, I'm saying someone in New York is going to wake up one morning and say, let's host the Olympics here. We'll build a great stadium for the Olympics. If the Jets or Giants (or Raiders) want to move there, great. If not, we'll find other tenants. 

If Atlanta has a Billy Payne, surely there is somebody with vision in NYC. 

[Nacre]

18 hours ago, Quaker2001 said:

Did some research and found this on Key Arena.  KeyArena turns a bigger profit than it ever did with the Sonics.  And here's 1 of my favorite lines from that article.. " Ironically, if the NBA ever returned to Seattle, likely in a new arena, the Sonics’ old home would suffer. Another reason KeyArena has remained sustainable is because it hasn’t had to compete with another arena. "

That part of it is not accurate. In fact there are two new medium arenas in the area as well as the Tacoma Dome of roughly comparable size. (And then the 10,000 seat arena for the University of Washington.) Seattle has more arena capacity per capita than New York, and yet Key Arena is still profitable.

Barclays Arena in Brooklyn makes more on its concerts and other special events than it does from Nets games. And I believe it and Madison Square Garden are the two most profitable venues in the USA. New York definitely has the ability to add another convention center/stadium while retaining profitability at the other sites.

18 hours ago, Quaker2001 said:

So here's the problem with a new stadium in the NYC area, aside from, you know, where to put it, how to fund it, and a legacy plan to justify its construction in the first place.  Small details.  How exactly is that stadium supposed to attract those events (even in New York, the supply of such events is limited) when you have other stadiums out there that can do the same.  MetLife Stadium cost $1.6 billion to build.  Is this new NYC Olympic Stadium going to be able to draw soccer and college football away from MetLife?  Is it even worth the money and the effort when that's the uphill battle they're facing from minute one.

The land and financing are indeed major obstacles, which is why I would argue it hasn't happened yet.

But you are focusing too much on major league sports events as necessary for stadiums. The Alamodome's "major" tenants are the Alamo Bowl and a Conference USA college team, yet it turns a profit.

Edited September 27, 2016 by Nacre

[Quaker2001]

1 hour ago, zekekelso said:

No, I'm saying someone in New York is going to wake up one morning and say, let's host the Olympics here. We'll build a great stadium for the Olympics. If the Jets or Giants (or Raiders) want to move there, great. If not, we'll find other tenants. 

If Atlanta has a Billy Payne, surely there is somebody with vision in NYC. 

You mean like Dan Doctoroff?  Right guy in the right place, but not the right time so far as the IOC was concerned.  Atlanta used to Olympics to promote the image of the city as the capital of the American south and a focal point of the civil rights movement.  They did that with purpose, just like Doctoroff first started to conceive of back in 1994.  If the vision here is "let's build a stadium and we'll figure out what to do with it later" (yes, I know that's what London did, but they had a lot more support to back them), no one is going to wake up to that realization because it's without purpose.  That a couple of people have brought up NYCFC.. if they can't find a place to play so they can leave Yankee Stadium, how exactly is this dream Olympic Stadium supposed to come to fruition?

[Quaker2001]

6 hours ago, Nacre said:

That part of it is not accurate. In fact there are two new medium arenas in the area as well as the Tacoma Dome of roughly comparable size. (And then the 10,000 seat arena for the University of Washington.) Seattle has more arena capacity per capita than New York, and yet Key Arena is still profitable.

Barclays Arena in Brooklyn makes more on its concerts and other special events than it does from Nets games. And I believe it and Madison Square Garden are the two most profitable venues in the USA. New York definitely has the ability to add another convention center/stadium while retaining profitability at the other sites.

The land and financing are indeed major obstacles, which is why I would argue it hasn't happened yet.

But you are focusing too much on major league sports events as necessary for stadiums. The Alamodome's "major" tenants are the Alamo Bowl and a Conference USA college team, yet it turns a profit.

Economics is not one of your strong points, is it?  And you can please stop with this per capita stupidity as if that would justify another arena/stadium in the NYC area.

Where are you getting that Barclays and MSG are the 2 most profitable venues in the US?  I'd be curious to see who is saying that.  And it's funny that you say Barclays does better from concerts and other events than it does from the Nets.  If that's the case, why is it then that they brought the Islanders in to call the arena home?  Because if they're not making money on the Nets, how exactly are they making money on the Islanders?

More than that though, to say an arena is profitable is to ignore the start-up costs.  Barclays Center cost a billion dollars,  That included over $500 million in bonds.  Are we going to ignore that factor when we talk about a new stadium being profitable?  MSG just spent a billion dollars in renovations.  When you're calling it a profitable venue, are we making that claim relative to the amount they spent to make it that way?

The Alamodome cost $186 million to build.  Thanks to largely public financing (good luck getting that to happen in NYC with all the billions of dollars spent on sports facilities here in the past decade), that money was paid off within 18 months.  The Alamodome has also hosted multiple Final Fours that, for the lack of a major tenant, have been of major economic benefit to the arena and to the city.

The moral of the story is this.. building a stadium or an arena is a massive investment, particularly if we're talking about a city like New York.  If you're not going to get a positive return on your investment, then it's not worth making the investment in the first place.  The Alamodome is not a good comparison because it's the only stadium in the city.  In the past decade, over $5 billion has been spent on new sports facilities here, plus throw in another billion for the renovations at MSG.  Do you not think we have enough stadiums that we should build more?  Are you going to keep talking about this magical "ability" to add more stadiums even though it hasn't happened yet?  Did you forget that there are 2 arenas in the Izod Center and Nassau Coliseum that largely sit empty with their primary tenants having left?  No, please tell us more about how able the NYC market is to add another facility when the Islanders are stuck in a terrible situation at Barclays and NYCFC can't find their own home.  

Maybe it's because stadiums aren't as profitable in reality as they are in your fantasy where we're supposed to entertain the idea that these things could happen.  There are so many studies out there that tell a story that sports infrastructure is usually not a winning proposition.  To say that land and financing are indeed major obstacles is like me saying I want to play in the NFL, but the main obstacle is that I'm not very good at football.  Tell us how this is supposed to work.  I don't think you understand how this works and if you did, you would realize there are better ways to make money than building a stadium no one needs.

[zekekelso]

15 hours ago, Quaker2001 said:

You mean like Dan Doctoroff?  Right guy in the right place, but not the right time so far as the IOC was concerned.  Atlanta used to Olympics to promote the image of the city as the capital of the American south and a focal point of the civil rights movement.  They did that with purpose, just like Doctoroff first started to conceive of back in 1994.  If the vision here is "let's build a stadium and we'll figure out what to do with it later" (yes, I know that's what London did, but they had a lot more support to back them), no one is going to wake up to that realization because it's without purpose.  That a couple of people have brought up NYCFC.. if they can't find a place to play so they can leave Yankee Stadium, how exactly is this dream Olympic Stadium supposed to come to fruition?

Note that Atlanta's purpose had nothing to do with a stadium. NYC needs a guy with a vision to bring the Olympics to NYC. That vision doesn't have to include a plan for an NFL of MLB team to take over the stadium after the Olympics are done. And you are right... they need to say what the future of the stadium will be... it can't just be "we will figure it out later." But it can be just about anything that seems reasonable. 

[Quaker2001]

1 hour ago, zekekelso said:

Note that Atlanta's purpose had nothing to do with a stadium. NYC needs a guy with a vision to bring the Olympics to NYC. That vision doesn't have to include a plan for an NFL of MLB team to take over the stadium after the Olympics are done. And you are right... they need to say what the future of the stadium will be... it can't just be "we will figure it out later." But it can be just about anything that seems reasonable. 

Had nothing to do with the stadium, but the timing of that did happen to work out nicely that the bid occurred around the time the Falcons and Braves, like many teams at the time, were looking to escape from their multi-purpose stadiums.

So yes, there needs to be vision.  Still, "just about anything that seems reasonable" is a ridiculously tough sell, and part of that comes from the city having spent billions of dollars on sports stadiums in the past decade.  I don't know what that narrative could be or how to sell it to the city, but after seeing Doctoroff spend more than a decade trying to bring the Olympics here when the timing was much better for the city, it's going to be that much harder for someone else to come along and put together a compelling narrative that works when the timing isn't as friendly.

[TeamBlakeUSA]

San Francisco Would Be A Good Choice To Bid For 2028.

[FYI]

So after all that back & forth, all roads will lead back to an L.A. 2028 bid (if need be). Cuz Chicago & San Fran would also fall in the same boat as New York in all this.

Have to agree with Quaker here, just bcuz something "could be reasonable", still doesn't mean that it would be a smart thing to do in the end.

For all the incessant harp of "who's going to pay for it", I can't believe the notion of "someone 'just' needs to wake up with a vision" is coming from the same source.

[Nacre]

On 9/27/2016 at 11:03 PM, Quaker2001 said:

Economics is not one of your strong points, is it?  And you can please stop with this per capita stupidity as if that would justify another arena/stadium in the NYC area.

First of all, there's no need for insults. Second, I think you will find that the ratio of supply to demand is indeed a principle feature of economic theory.

On 9/27/2016 at 11:03 PM, Quaker2001 said:

Where are you getting that Barclays and MSG are the 2 most profitable venues in the US?

Apologies. I should have said "highest net revenue" instead of most profitable.

http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/barclays-center-sells-46-9m-show-tix-article-1.1407182

Unfortunately Barclays Arena has a massive load of debt, which eats up all of its revenue. And that's the same thing stopping an Olympic Stadium from being built. If it was built with cash it could operate at a profit. But if it was built by the kind of highly leveraged hedge fund managers who try to get into sports nowadays, it would probably operate at a loss simply because of the debt.

On 9/27/2016 at 11:03 PM, Quaker2001 said:

More than that though, to say an arena is profitable is to ignore the start-up costs.  Barclays Center cost a billion dollars,  That included over $500 million in bonds.  Are we going to ignore that factor when we talk about a new stadium being profitable?  MSG just spent a billion dollars in renovations.  When you're calling it a profitable venue, are we making that claim relative to the amount they spent to make it that way?

The Alamodome cost $186 million to build.  Thanks to largely public financing (good luck getting that to happen in NYC with all the billions of dollars spent on sports facilities here in the past decade), that money was paid off within 18 months.  The Alamodome has also hosted multiple Final Fours that, for the lack of a major tenant, have been of major economic benefit to the arena and to the city.

And that's why I said the land and financing are the problem with a New York Olympic stadium rather than the tenant.

On 9/27/2016 at 11:03 PM, Quaker2001 said:

And it's funny that you say Barclays does better from concerts and other events than it does from the Nets.  If that's the case, why is it then that they brought the Islanders in to call the arena home?  Because if they're not making money on the Nets, how exactly are they making money on the Islanders?

It's not the ticket sales or venue rental that makes the NBA attractive, but rather corporate fees and so on. IE luxury boxes/suites, club membership, etc. (Owners of franchises in the USA also love suites because the revenue from general tickets is shared among all teams in the league while those other fees like luxury suites get pocketed directly by the team.) I assume that's why Barclays Arena wants the Islanders: so it can sell its luxury suites, set up expensive catering for corporations, etc.

Those things are not an issue with stadiums and arenas reliant on general ticket sales and venue rental fees. Such as Olympic stadiums.

Anyway, my point is not that arenas are always profitable (they are not), but rather that a modest stadium does not need huge revenues to survive and that the New York market is fairly under-served compared to Los Angeles, London, etc. If New York was willing to write off $500 million on something like Moses Mabhida Stadium in Queens for NYCFC for the sake of getting the Olympics it would probably operate at a profit thereafter.

Edited September 30, 2016 by Nacre

[Quaker2001]

4 hours ago, Nacre said:

First of all, there's no need for insults. Second, I think you will find that the ratio of supply to demand is indeed a principle feature of economic theory.

You're right that there's no need for insults.  Much as there is no need for another stadium in New York.  Yet here we are.  And yes, thank you for introducing me to basic principle of economic theory.  Pretty sure when you use the word "demand" though, you're equating that solely with population, which may not apply here.  Hence where talking about per capita doesn't really work.

4 hours ago, Nacre said:

Apologies. I should have said "highest net revenue" instead of most profitable.

http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/barclays-center-sells-46-9m-show-tix-article-1.1407182

Unfortunately Barclays Arena has a massive load of debt, which eats up all of its revenue. And that's the same thing stopping an Olympic Stadium from being built. If it was built with cash it could operate at a profit. But if it was built by the kind of highly leveraged hedge fund managers who try to get into sports nowadays, it would probably operate at a loss simply because of the debt.

Yes, Barclays has a massive load of debt.  I wonder why that is.  Could that have something to do with the fact that the arena didn't cost nothing to build in the first place?  This is why your economic model wouldn't stand up to real world scrutiny.  Even if you're building a stadium with all cash, it's not really profitable until you've generated more money in revenue than it initially cost.  Especially if we're talking about New York here, that's going to take a long time.  It's not like the city is going to invest its money or try to impose upon its citizens to pay for something that is very much a luxury and far from a necessity.  If the alternative is to have the private sector pay for it (whether its financed or otherwise), the same rules apply.  And again, to spend all that money where it's going to take years if not decades to see a return on that investment, there's no sensible reason to do it in the first place.

FYI, here's some background on the nitty gritty of Barclays and you're right that the debt is a problem for them.. http://atlanticyardsreport.blogspot.com/2015/02/barclays-center-profit-some-63-behind.html

4 hours ago, Nacre said:

It's not the ticket sales or venue rental that makes the NBA attractive, but rather corporate fees and so on. IE luxury boxes/suites, club membership, etc. (Owners of franchises in the USA also love suites because the revenue from general tickets is shared among all teams in the league while those other fees like luxury suites get pocketed directly by the team.) I assume that's why Barclays Arena wants the Islanders: so it can sell its luxury suites, set up expensive catering for corporations, etc.

Those things are not an issue with stadiums and arenas reliant on general ticket sales and venue rental fees. Such as Olympic stadiums.

Anyway, my point is not that arenas are always profitable (they are not), but rather that a modest stadium does not need huge revenues to survive and that the New York market is fairly under-served compared to Los Angeles, London, etc. If New York was willing to write off $500 million on something like Moses Mabhida Stadium in Queens for NYCFC for the sake of getting the Olympics it would probably operate at a profit thereafter.

I'm guessing NYCFC would like their stadium situation resolved less than 12 years from now, so that might not be an option.  Again, it's amusing how casually you talk about writing off $500 million as if that's some tiny expense.  And if we're talking about bringing the Olympics to NYC (which is no small task, needless to say), what happened to New York has the ability to add another stadium?  Sounds like that math only works if you discount the cost of building that stadium/arena in the first place.  Still seems like a really bad investment to me.  That you mentioned the Alamodome earlier, that cost much like than a similar building would here in New York (not to mention it wouldn't be the only stadium in town) and their ability to attract a couple of big events helped pay that money back.  Until the total revenues of the Alamodome for the life of the stadium exceeded the total costs, then it wasn't profitable.  That's how you have to look at this, especially when you're talking about a stadium in a city that already has several and in no way needs another one just because the per capita comparison to other cities says we have the 'ability' to add one.  If a business or a city has a billion dollars to spend and this is more about making money than civic improvements, I can think of much better and less risky ways to make more money than building a stadium, an endeavor that if I'm lucky make start to give me a return on my investment years down the line.