The Atlanta Falcons stadium’s projected cost has risen again, this time to $1.4 billion, which would make it the second most expensive NFL stadium in history, after the $1.6 billion stadium shared by the New York Giants and Jets. No real word on why the inflated price tag, though the Atlanta Business Chronicle cited Falcons CFO Greg Beadles as indicating that “more detailed design plans allowed the team to more accurately budget the cost of the stadium” (i.e., “we guessed wrong”) and saying that “construction costs across the board continue to increase as the economy improves and demand grows” (i.e., “we have to compete for steel with stuff like the new Braves stadium now”).
The Falcons will cover the increased costs, though you have to wonder if they’ll take some of it out of that “waterfall fund” that the state set up for them out of any hotel tax revenues that aren’t needed to pay the initial stadium debt. Though the team’s owners were going to avail themselves of that money one way or another, no doubt, so it shouldn’t matter much to state taxpayers what in particular the team uses it on. Anyway, crazy roof, people! Who can put a price on that?
Their current stadium is just a tad over 20 years old. Why is it considered obsolete?
Because I’m pretty sure that the GWCC got the bulk of the luxury suite money at the Georgia Dome. So Blank wasn’t pocketing enough money from what happened inside the stadium he didn’t pay for. Now, he’ll pocket a lot more money from inside a stadium that he’s not paying the vast majority of the cost for.
Wow, neat drawing of a neat roof. Here’s our tax dollars.
The cost of steel is dropping and it’s much lower than it was when Metlife was built.