The owners of the Chicago Bears are reportedly set to announce today that they have won their bid to purchase the Arlington Park raceway property in Arlington Heights. According to The Athletic, the team has signed a purchase agreement for the 326-acre site for an undisclosed price.
So do this mean the Bears are now moving from Soldier Field to a new stadium in the burbs? Not necessarily:
- The team still has a lease at Soldier Field through 2033, but the price for breaking it would only be a relatively piddly $84 million in 2026, and would reduce each year after that.
- A bigger concern would be the price tag for a new stadium in Arlington Heights. There’s been talking of a $7.5 billion development project for the enormous site, but nobody knows how realistic that number is or how much would be for the stadium or how much would be recouped by revenues from the rest of the development. For that matter, we don’t yet know how much the Halas McCaskey family is set to pay for the site, or whether they can back out of the purchase agreement if they decide they don’t want to build there (though more on that may be forthcoming later today). Bers president Ted Phillips said in June that “if selected, this step allows us to further evaluate the property and its potential,” so it’s not like they are now committed to a move — even if they’re locked into the purchase, they can always sell it off to someone else later if they decide not to build there.
- With the Bears owners mum on the report for now, most of the news coverage has focused on Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot, whose office issued a statement that “we remain open to discussions” with the Bears and that the city “must explore all options to both enhance the visitor and fan experience at Soldier Field year-round” and that “our door in City Hall remains open to engage the Bears.” Some of this could be butt-covering — hey, I offered to figure out a way for them to stay — but clearly Lightfoot is ready to haggle, and the Halas McCaskeys would be crazy not to at least see what they can get out of her, even if they’re mad about being denied a sports gambling permit or whatever.
In short, now the real game begins: The best place to be when you’re a sports team owner trying to get public stadium money is to have a move threat in your back pocket, whether you’re serious about it or not, and the purchase of Arlington Park gives the Bears owners their needed leverage. We’ll start to see what they plan to do with it when they make today’s announcement; so watch the language there closely, and how Lightfoot responds, to get a sense of where the Bears — and the Illinois public’s tax dollars — will likely end up.
Oh how great it must be to be wealthy and always looking to further enrich yourself through handouts.
And of course being able to get the media to do your bidding, and having a seat at the billionaires club doesn’t hurt.
If the Bears move to the far (and it will be a HORRIBLE commute up 90/290/53 to Arlington Heights) NW suburb of Arlington Heights, again, IF, I hope my friends in Arlington Heights will enjoy paying even more in taxes to subsidize the construction of a billion dollar stadium for a billion dollar organization. Brutal Capitalism for us, Socialism for the Billionaires…god this country is absolutely insane.
Most Bears ticket holders do not live in the city and this is a better location for the stadium.
One of the nice aspects of the site is a Metra Station on the UP-NW line sits on the edge of the property, though I’m not sure if Metra would be willing to run dedicated trains to and from that location on Sundays.
If you’re the city of Chicago – and I’m going to posit this in a fantasy world where elected officials make smart decisions – isn’t it a good idea to tell the Bears to pound sand? If the Bears go to Arlington, the city gets to redevelop the area. Knock down the stadium and redevelop the land. That plot has to be more valuable to Chicago without the Bears than with them. You’d actually make money doing something else with the land – as opposed to lighting money on fire.
Soldier field sits in the middle of designated parkland. That really limits what type of redevelopment you can possibly do to the site (see the failed George Lucas museum).
But your point is still a good one. I see no good reason why the city should throw any more money the bears way. When the stadium gets its 1 Super Bowl, most people will stay in the city anyway
Just like the City of Oakland told the A’s to “pound sand” asking for a $855 million handout. OH! wait a minute!… (Soldier Field could/would then be the exclusive home of Fire FC, so no need to knock it down if this ever came to fruition.)
It doesn’t matter in the real world because Chicago politics are a mess, but the ideal scenario would be to find some ex-industrial area of the city or some space near McCormick and give the Bears the land and infrastructure to do a stadium development in the city. That would be best for jobs and overall economic prosperity in Chicago.
That said, Chicago is a huge city. The museum area will likely become blighted in the near future, but at some point it will get redeveloped.
There is no space near McCormick place and any desirable large open areas have already been spoken for by other mass developments. (The Bears are not building on the old U.S. Steel site on the southeast side, though I’d love to see that proposed just for the reaction.) Considering that Bears ownership basically dictated the terms for the Soldier Field renovation and now are unhappy with what they got, telling them to go pound sand is most likely the best choice for the economic prosperity of the city.
Also I’m chuckling at the idea that the Museum Campus will become “blighted” if the Bears don’t play 10 games a year at Soldier Field.
Museums bring in more people to that area than the Bears, and are open more than 8 regular season games and a handful of concert dates. The downtown area of Chicago is wonderful, and that is independent of the Soldier Field and the Bears. The fact that the mayor isn’t giving away valuable real estate is a sign that it isn’t that corrupt. They aren’t giving away a sweetheart deal to a powerful family. Downtown real estate in the city is a valuable asset, and they are protecting that asset.
When Glenview Naval Air Station closed, the suburb redeveloped the land into a mixed use area, The Glen, which has made Glenview a much wealthier suburb today than it was in the 1990s. Stadiums that are rarely in use are not a great use of valuable real estate.
Absolutely!!! Nice example. The former Michael Reese property may have been a good site too, but I believe redevelopment of that area is already being done. Giving ANY money to Billionaire sports team owners for a stadium that hosts MAYBE 20 events a year would be both short of fiscally moronic.
Redevelop the land.. in a park? The same park where they turned down the adding the Lucas Museum to the existing museum campus? Not likely.
There’s no need to “redevelop” it. The Fire are a tenant now and they can still host concerts and other events.
$197.2 million purchase price. Deal closes in late 2022 or early 2023.
That’s plenty of time for them to use it as leverage to extract concessions from Chicago if they want, then. Not that that’s necessarily the plan, or the only plan, but a lot can happen in a year and change.
Mayor Lightfoot stated on Chicago sports talk radio this AM that the Bears have refused to provide specific demands
They are going to move to AH, for better or worse. The McCaskeys have no other assets, except the Bears. When Virginia is gone her kids will sell the team to someone because they will not be able to pay the estate tax on their inheritance. I love Soldier Field, looks ugly as hell on the outside and it is a pain in the ass to get to, but inside there is not a bad seat.
I will be shocked if the McCaskeys sell the team. The move to the west suburbs is to give the Bears a shot at competing with the Cowboys for the most valuable team in American sports.
They aren’t going to have a choice. There’s no one within the family who (a) has sufficient experience/knowledge to effectively run the business, plus (b) has enough support within the family to collectively stop a sale from happening. The Bears going out of Halas family hands is a fait accompli.
It is hard to overstate what a fool Sanderson, the econ prof who calls himself a sports economist quoted in the Tribune article, comes off as. He thinks stadium revenues barely matter to NFL teams?? It takes five minutes of looking at the annual Forbes estimates to see how wrong that is.
Forbes doesn’t break down NFL revenues by “stadium” vs other sources. But the Bears, 13th in revenue in the NFL, had total revenue in the last pre-COVID year of $477 million, while the lowest-revenue team (the Lions) brought in $411 million; and the percentage difference between the high and low end will only go down under the latest TV deal, in which the NFL is getting about $7 billion a year from Fox, CBS, and ESPN, which comes to $219 million per team. So Sanderson is correct: The Bears could play on the moon and still make money.
But but but but but…. you are using facts to refute ideology! That’s just not fair, man…
John, John, John. Have you learned nothing? How many times must I tell you. Alternative facts are the same as facts!
Well, I guess I might be stating the obvious here, but… at least once more?
Apologies, John. My poor attempt at sarcasm.
My response to “Supply Side” economic theory proponents (aka trickle-down economics. And we all know what trickles down on whom).
NEW ARENAS AND STADIA FOR EVERYONE (every city, every franchise, no matter professional or amateur, across the nation)! THE RESULTING ECONOMIC BOOM WILL CATAPULT THIS NATION TO STRATOSPHERIC HEIGHTS (never known and never imagined)!
Economic benefits (increased business) felt by local businesses (not to mention all the new businesses that will spring up), communities (redevelopment and growth the follow arena and stadia builds because, well just because. Who doesn’t want to live right next to a brand, spanking new stadium. Amirite) and the nation are immeasurable!
LET’S DO THIS THING!
To understand the lack of stadium sites in Chicago, the 2016 Olympic bid involved ripping up half of Washington Park since it was one of the only spaces large enough for an Olympic Stadium. (The plan was to downside the park after the games to something that didn’t totally destroy the park.) Soldier Field was not an option because, ironically, the Bears’ renovation demands ensured it could no longer fit a Olympic track.
To stay in the city, it’s basically Soldier Field or bust and even though I’m confident Lightfoot would propose some awful deal to keep the Bears, the McCaskeys can’t get what they want without moving so I’m confident, if they can make it work, they’re building at Arlington.
At the end of the day, I know as an Illinois taxpayer, I will be against it because it will have a lot of public money involved. They may not call it public money, but it will be public money.
And I am not entirely against public money being spent on things public money is supposed to be spent on — some infrastructure, fire, police, ambulance, upgrading the train station. But I don’t want the Bears given a free stadium and then not paying for services.
That said, a few miscellaneous things
1. What becomes of Soldier Field itself? The Fire have moved back but they don’t need 60K+ seats and a bazillion luxury boxes. There will be concerts, but Wrigley could fill the role of the big ticket in city site. Special events such as US national team games and Soccer regional championships (like Gold Cup or Copa America) OK, but still, how many do they have a year, and they usually don’t need 60K+. Boxing / MMA? Does boxing fill up an arena anymore?
2. Maybe downsize a post Bears SF. But that seems like a waste and probably more expensive then knocking it down and building a 35K seat stadium.
3. Will concerts go to Arlington Heights?
4. I see some asking if Metra will have dedicated game day trains. I guess it depends. Ravinia has concert day trains, but those probably are a different crowd.
5. SF is parksite. So if you don’t build a downsized stadium there, what happens with the site? Build another museum? Add to the McCormick Center? Keep the land fallow for when the Bears are trying in 20 years to whine Arlington Heights into building them a new stadium?
At the end, I don’t care much what the Bears do, as long as I do not have to pay for it. But I know I will.
The Bears aren’t getting county or state money, which is fine. If the McCaskey’s want to sell off a percentage of the franchise to build a mini real estate empire in Arlington Heights, they can. It seems unfortunate that the mayor of Arlington Heights seems willing to do whatever is necessary to bring them in, because that probably means he might Bridgeview his city for the team.
I have some doubts as to whether it will work as an investment. The Sofi complex, when it is done, will also serve as a convenient place for people with a layover at LAX. It is 4 miles away. I think it is closer than All State arena is to O’Hare. The hotels and restaurants on the site will have a market for the whole year. I’m not sure how long it will take to make the price tag work, but year-round use would seem to be there. Arlington Park is 16 miles away from O’Hare and 30 from downtown. Who is headed out that way on a non-game day?
I love that bridgeview is a verb now.
As it should be.
Truth is Seat Geek is a nice stadium for soccer. It is just a pain to get to. Traffic on the Stevenson is awful, it is far away from public transport and the area is some bare of amenities (though sone things finally are opening on Harlem outside the stadium.
Last night my son was meeting some friends at the Fire game which was relocated to Bridgeview. After a 45 minute L ride he got to Midway and the bus that was supposed to leave in 10 minutes decoded to leave 15 minutes earlier. So he needed a $30 Uber ride during rush hour.
People say Soldier Field is hard to get to but it is is a nice and not too long walk from Roosevelt L station.
Seriously anyone who says Soldier Field or Bridgeview is hard to get to has NEVER BEEN TO LA, where EVERYTHING is ALWAYS a 2 hour ride and/or a $75 Lyft from Everything Else.