Too much news to recap this week to have time writing an amusing intro, sorry!
- WUSA-TV “went in search of tax plans for the new [Washington Commanders] football stadium. What we found was so much more.” Actually, they didn’t find anything about the tax plans, but they did find an internal document from December, provided by “a source close to the Washington Commanders stadium project,” showing which three sites in Virginia team owner Dan Snyder is looking at for a stadium: the Loudoun Quarries in Sterling, across the highway from Dulles Airport; a plot of undeveloped land between Summit School Road and Telegraph Road in Woodbridge, off I-95 about 25 miles south of D.C.; and Potomac Shores in Dumfries, a new development even farther south along the west bank of the Potomac River. Each site would be developed with not just an NFL stadium and training facilities but “a 14,000-seat amphitheater, hotels and a conference center, residential buildings and mixed-used retail including nightlife.” No price tags were included ($3 billion has been the going figure), nor plans for who would pay for acquiring the land, whether it would be on the public rolls and thus skip out on paying property taxes, or anything like that, but if anyone wants to start debating the vital question of how long it would take to drive to Commanders games — up to 90 minutes during a Thursday night rush hour, according to WUSA — have at it.
- One Orchard Park councilmember wants the Buffalo Bills owners to pay for extra police on game days if they get a new stadium, and one New York state assemblymember wants the Bills owners to lower food and drink prices if they get stadium subsidies. Both of which are reasonable asks — if you’re going to hand over close to a billion dollars in tax money for a stadium, you may as well get something in return — but both are also likely to amount to a rounding error compared to the state’s price tag for a stadium, so neither would be so much a win as a consolation prize.
- Oklahoma Lt. Gov. Matt Pinnell says there’s talk underway of building a new stadium for the F.C. Tulsa USL team on the site of the Tulsa Race Massacre, and surprisingly this isn’t going over real well, not just because the city already built a Tulsa Drillers minor-league baseball stadium on a possible burial site for victims of the massacre, but because the surviving descendants of the city’s Black community still live there, and a soccer stadium isn’t especially at the top of their development list.
- Bruce Murphy of Urban Milwaukee reports on the roots of the Milwaukee Brewers owners’ demands for upwards of $70 million in stadium upgrades under their state-of-the-art lease clause, and notes a list of things the money would go for, including replacing the air conditioning, replacing parts of the retractable roof, replacing all the seats, replacing all the lights, replacing the LED ribbon ad boards, replacing the LED ribbon ad boards again 10-15 years later, and upgrading the sound system to a “multi-zone system.” A Brewers exec said this list wasn’t “comprehensive,” so put on your owner goggles and imagine your own wish list as well!
- “Will a new Denver Broncos owner mean a push for a new stadium, too?” The Denver Post actually has no idea, but the Broncos‘ current stadium is a whole 21 years old already, you can’t expect these things to just last forever before tearing them down and building a new one, and another new one, and another…
- John Mozena of the Center for Economic Accountability, an FoS reader and maker of excellent stickers, published an essay at Baseball Prospectus asserting that the baseball lockout makes stadium subsidies even worse, since now stadiums aren’t even providing the meager tax revenues that they usually do when baseball games are being played. This prompted an email discussion between myself and John about whether the substitution effect means that when stadiums are shuttered people will just spend money elsewhere in the area so it’s really a wash; and then more emails between myself and an economist about what the data shows about whether, say, a stadium in a city can at least be a net plus by siphoning off spending from the suburbs. No conclusive evidence yet, will report more later if and when I find out if we have yet another reason to hate Rob Manfred.
- Chris Fedor of the Cleveland Plain Dealer tweets: “NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said they are estimating a roughly $100 million economic impact for the city of Cleveland as a result of All-Star Weekend.” Asked and answered!
- Neither the Boston Red Sox nor the Chicago Cubs are planning to move out of their popular, historic ballparks, and yup, that qualifies as a reason to write a whole Athletic article these days.
- And here’s a whole article about the housing group that pointed out that the Los Angeles Angels‘ stadium land purchase likely violated the state Surplus Land Act, I guess there’s just a lot of sports-page space to fill what with spring training getting wiped out by the lockout. Not that I’m complaining, they’re interesting enough overview articles, but it would be nice if publications were investigating things we didn’t know instead of rehashing what we already do, that’s all.
Wasn’t one of the points of building a new WFT stadium to bring the team closer to the DC? Those are all outside of the beltway. What a joke.
Yeah, when I left the DC area about a decade ago, the plan was to build a new stadium where RFK is now since it doesn’t have a tennant anymore (DC United and the Nats have their own stadiums in DC now).
That would be ideal for fans – fairly centrally located, transit accessible.
But the NFL does not care about the regular fans in the regular seats and I guess DC is never going to offer the public funds that Snyder thinks he can get out of Virginia.
Playing out by Dulles would probably be worse than where they are now.
The problem is that the land is own by the NPS and the lease expires and at the end of the lease the land must be returned to how the city got it.
It limits what the city can do with it and the NPS under multiple administrations has been unwilling to part with it.
Serious question: where do all (few) WFT fans live? In D.C.?
Suburbs? Shouldn’tthey new stadiumbe close to them?Granted, transportation is centralized at RFK (may he and his brother RIP) but is that a long trip for fans? An Austinite wants to know…..
Yep, that was my first thought too. Nevermind the Virginia Commanders, who wouldn’t want to drive 90-120 minutes on a week night to go see a second rate act play at an outdoor amphitheater with 13,000 of your closest strangers before spending another 60-90m to drive back?
This plan is nothing but genius….
The athletic article about the Cobs and Sox is more newsworthy than any of the news articles about the a’s and rays ballpark in the past 5 years
Maybe it’s just me but if I were a legislator offering a team a $3 billion subsidy for a stadium and surrounding development, I’d at least require the team to carry my state’s name. Particularly since the above posters, who seem much more familiar with the area than I am, indicate that this area is hardly convenient for DC area residents at all.
The Loundon location is at least close to where the Metro will be, but that cuts into parking revenue and the team has already gotten into fights with their current city about trying to prevent people from metroing to the stadium.
A lot of their fan base is in Virginia so it isn’t that bad to be over there though.
Stopping people from using the Metro!!?? WTF!!??
Yup, that’s Mr. Snyder.
I have to call him that, if I don’t I might get sued…..
Neil,
As a rule wasn’t the NE Patriot stadium fairly tax payer friendly?
I could go back to the archives but I’m lazy and it is Friday. I recall that the CT. felonious governor offered the baby and the bath water to have the Pats move to Hartford and instead of having a sword fight Massachusetts simply upgraded a single lane road to a highway.
Yes I’m simplifying but the “upgrades” weren’t crazy.
Short answer: “fairly,” yes. It was more than just a highway — there was a special exit ramp for season ticket holders, etc.
Thanks I bring it up since it really seems benign compared to what is offered being bandied about to an accused sexual abuser.
At least Kraft paid for his happy endings.
Moral to NFL owners – just take and abuse don’t pay.
Happy Endings!
You said it not me!
Looks like the Commanders are really trying to alienate us Maryland fans. I feel like the owners are trying to pull an Atlanta Braves and move out of the urban core to appeal to more affluent fans. I get that the trend is for new stadiums to be part of larger mixed use real estate developments but this is getting ridiculous.
Or turn up the heat on the Maryland legislature: “Give us a stadium or we’ll take the team to North Carolina, practically!”
As probably more than half of the Maryland legislature are Ravens fans, the answer to that threat is sure why not.
He’s gotten zero traction in Maryland just for that reason, which is why the focus has been on creating a bidding war between DC and Virginia.
Of course they are fans.
The Ravens win…..
Don’t worry Grego, this ‘trend’ will only continue until owners think they can get even more subsidies to move out of these “blighted, isolated locals” into newly revitalised (by the stadium, naturally) downtown cores” with what, maybe $10bn in public funding by then?
Are we even through the “stadiums need to be downtown” phase yet? Not in some locations…
*locales*
I think Virginia Commanders is a better name than Washington Commanders, but that’s just me. And never going to happen.
I can’t believe Snyder is missing the obvious solution here… The Buzzard’s Point stadium is approaching FIVE YEARS old. It’s got to go.
Raze the site, divert the Anacostia, bring in 2Bn cubic yards of fill and redo the entire district as a Commanders/Skins (you’ve got to cater to ‘both sides’ of everything today…. not morally, but it’s where the money is…) themed entertainment zone. Sure, it might cost $40Bn, but who cares? Someone else is paying.
I enjoyed the Maps review for the Loudon Quarries. Sounds like it’ll get even more noisy with a football stadium:
About twice a week, randomly, at around 9:30 in the morning, my house, which is not very far from this establishment shakes and booms because they are blowing things up. 10/10 would be scared s**tless by distant explosions again.
Have Maryland pay for upgrades to the 20 year-old stadium, have Virginia pay for a new stadium. Play 4 homes at each; have both sets of fans bid for play-off games.
Don’t give them ideas dude!