76ers arena plan draws six hours of hate at first city oversight meeting

A group of architecture and planning experts and members of the public weighed in on the proposed Philadelphia 76ers arena design yesterday at the first official city meeting to discuss the project — how’d that turn out?

“It’s a serious proposal … and there’s a lot of great aspects of what would make a successful downtown arena included,” said Dan Garofalo, vice chair of the CDR committee, which is composed of architects and planners. But “we’ve never had an experience just like this one. There hasn’t been anyone speaking in favor of this project in, what, six hours?”

Yikes! What did people so uniformly hate about this plan? Actually, first, can we get a rendering, preferably a creepy one that makes it look like the arena is floating weirdly in space, disconnected from any surrounding neighborhoods?

Sweet. Now, on with the six-hour hate!

  • “I want to be honest as to … what are the disruptions to the bus routes that go along here?” said committee member Ashley DiCaro. “What does it mean to shut down these streets and to have these thousands of people here at a given time?”
  • “I don’t know that that’s enough retail space to effectively engage pedestrians when the building is dark,” said Philadelphia Chinatown Development Corp. director John Chin.
  • Asian Americans United interim director Neeta Patel said the review “violates the zoning code” and must “be halted immediately.”
  • “We’ve seen other examples in other cities, whether it be L.A. or New York, where previous arenas have now been repurposed into smaller venues that house different types of events that may not be currently in the larger 20,000-seat attendees,” said Sherveen Baftechi, head of design and construction for the 76ers.

Oh, hold up! That last one is an argument in favor of the arena, on the grounds that if the 76ers ever move out, the arena could, like L.A.’s Forum, become a concert venue, or, like the Meadowlands Arena, a soundstage. Or, like the L.A. Sports Arena, get torn down and replaced by a soccer stadium, which is actually bigger, or like the third Madison Square Garden, torn down and left as a parking lot for 20 years before being replaced by an office-and-housing complex. So many options!

The Philadelphia Inquirer notes that there wasn’t much to talk about at the meeting other than the general design, since “traffic, community, and other impact studies that were promised by year’s end are not yet publicly available.” So sure, let’s look at some more design renderings:

It’s certainly interesting that the Sixers design team thinks that in the year 2031, which is the earliest the arena could possibly open, Sixers fans will still be wearing shirts of Joel Embiid and Allen Iverson. Other than that, there are a whole lot of basketball fans wandering around the arena entryway in shorts, which is an odd look for a sport whose season goes from October to May, though by 2031 it’s entirely possible it will be shorts weather in Philadelphia in January. I’m also desperately interested in what the small type is at the top of that “Rock” banner — here’s the full-size version if anyone else wants to try — though that element looks so AI-drawn that it’s possible it just says “Gud who mellled is a Rock” like it appears to. I bet Gud who mellled is a Rock will be huge on TikTok in 2031.

Other Recent Posts:

Share this post:

One comment on “76ers arena plan draws six hours of hate at first city oversight meeting

  1. At least the 76ers are being honest in admitting they will eventually move out of this arena, just like the Wizards are planning to do.

Comments are closed.