[corporatejay]

Originally Posted by Roughneck

I don't blame the city at all. They're making the right decision both for the long-term future of the area, and where it would be best to have the arena in the inner city. People acting like NEXT was anything more than the Flames saying "give us free land here" is bothersome, like the Flames really can make any demand for where the arena will go. They're in a position where the city will tell them where an arena can go, and they can agree to contribute or not.

The list of reasons the West Village was a bad spot for NEXT is long, and the reasons why the city wouldn't want it there are even longer. And supposedly (according to frinkprof, who I know is connected), this was passed on to CSEC before they ever made NEXT public, something that undoubtedly annoyed administrators.

Not sure if it was finkprof, but Bunk (aka Josh White):

“If they proposed West Village, they’d be nuts,” policy analyst Josh White wrote to his colleagues in January 2013. “We told them two years ago the challenge with this site … The business case only makes sense if you can fully build it out at very high density. An arena sucks up a huge (piece) of land, leaving a lot less to pay back a CRL (community revitalization levy).”

In another e-mail, White suggested West Village shouldn’t be opened up for at least a decade, lest it “cannibalize market demand” for East Village.

http://calgaryherald.com/news/local-...e-flames-arena