February 02, 2005
Spanning the globe
News has been piling up while I focused on the New York Jets stadium controversy, so it's bullet-point time today, with news items from three sports and two countries (including, inevitably, still more Jets news):
- At a Salt Lake City council hearing last night, the Real Salt Lake expansion soccer team revealed that they're considering adding - no, seriously - a retractable roof to their proposed stadium, lifting the price tag from $60 million to $90 million. (Unless I'm mistaken, this would be the first 20,000-seat facility on the planet with a flippable lid.) Council members also learned that the cost of the land for the stadium would likely be $20 million - so with the city being asked to pay for all land costs and half of construction costs, that could leave taxpayers on the hook for $65 million, or five times what the team itself cost its owner, former NBA exec Dave Checketts.
- Lewis Wolff, the real-estate developer who's in the process of buying the Oakland A's, says his first priority will be getting a new stadium built, preferably in Oakland but elsewhere if necessary. (Since Wolff only wants to put up $100 million of the stadium cost himself, this might be a tough one to accomplish, unless some former D.C. councilmembers decide to move to the East Bay and run for office.) Contrast Wolff's remarks with those of Kansas City Royals owner David Glass, who repeatedly stated in an interview with the K.C. Star that a stadium was not his team's top need: "If a downtown stadium doesn't happen, we will be playing baseball at Kauffman Stadium. Our lease runs through 2014, and right now we intend to play baseball there. ... We would have no problems with playing at Kauffman Stadium through 2014 and beyond that. The Royals aren't going anywhere."
- The New York Jets have introduced a "scaled-down" version of their $1.4 billion stadium proposal, mostly by lopping off the wind turbines that were formerly going to rise above the building's roof. (The turbines were a key element of the Jets' claims that the stadium would be a "green" building, but everyone seems to have forgotten about that by now.) There's been some speculation that the Jets might be trying to reduce the building's bulk to convince arbitrator George Mitchell to reduce their land costs - for his part, Mayor Michael Bloomberg declared that while the MTA "should drive as tough a bargain as they can," they "should complete a deal because without that, they're not going to have the money, and we all know how badly we need those monies." So let me get this straight: The Jets are the only possible buyer in the market for the site's development rights, yet the MTA is expected to sell the excess development rights to raise the $600 million in land value that the Jets don't want to pay? Somebody failed Logic 101 here...
- New York Post columnist Eric Fettmann says a voter referendum on the Jets stadium would be a copout, since: "That's why we choose a mayor ó to use his or her knowledge, judgment and experience to make those tough choices. That's what being an executive is all about (besides, it's not as if the issue is Bloomberg's to decide all alone, with no other governmental input)." Er, actually, Eric...
- The Los Angeles Dodgers have suspended work on seismic improvements to Dodger Stadium, insisting that the current building is "seismically safe and responsible." The stadium does meet all current city building codes, but as one seismologist told the L.A. Times: "If you owned the stadium, you'd sleep better if you took care of it." Chalk this one up to Dodger owner Frank McCourt's rumored money woes, to lingering thoughts of abandoning the ballpark for newer digs, or to simple stinginess.
- Rogers Communications, owners of the Toronto Blue Jays and the SkyDome, have announced that the building will henceforth be known as the Rogers Centre. (No sniggering, Britons.)
Posted by Neil deMause
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