Public money has been used by a lot of cities forand events center. After seeing how the Oilers bent the city of Edmonton over to build Rogers the Flames will try and do something similar.
Look at the Raiders earlier this week. The owners almost unanimously supported the move largely due to the $750M of public (tourist) money coming from a hotel tax.
In the ownership fraternity I believe there is pressure to try and coax as much public dollars out of the cities to build an arena. It sets precedents with future projects and allows these rich owners to get their buildings while paying for 50% or less then reaping the new revenues from increased pricing.
The big challenge with Victoria Park for the Flames is they are already developing the area. Edmonton sold the city on the ice district which was needed. I see how calgarynext was similar in terms of developing a key piece of currently wasted land but the costs are too high.
From the get go I wanted the Flames-Stamps arenas to be separate. I couldn't care less about the CFL and enjoy attending games at McMahon sitting in the sun in the middle of the summer. Put them in an indoor arena I would never go to a game but that is me, others will say it needs to be torn down and the Stamps deserve better.
As a season ticket holder for the Flames I HATE the Dome it is a complete dump compared to other buildings around the league.
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