Flames to announce plans to announce arena plans in the... future...

[_Q_]

Originally Posted by valo403

Wait, you were referencing Wrigley as an example of an awesome stadium? I mean I love Wrigley, one of the best places to watch a game, but if that's something we're shooting for we'd be better off renovating by sending in a bunch of hobos to piss everywhere, a few guys with sledgehammers to break some things, closing off some areas on the concourse to make it as narrow as possible and closing all the parking lots.

Having never been to Wrigley, I wouldn't know. I assumed it was famous because of how awesome it was, but I guess it's just a case of all the history that was there that makes it so well known.

I retract my Wrigley comment then. Last thing we need in Calgary is a dumpier version of McMahon.

[valo403]

Originally Posted by _Q_

And I agree with that. Honestly I do, but that's kind of my point.

Shouldn't a country as awesome as Canada and a city as awesome as Calgary be able to fund stadiums that are better than Syria's or Lebanon's as well as fund other important things here because we're so much better?

That was the whole point of my argument.

You're missing the point. When you prioritize public welfare over stadiums you might not have a few hundred million kicking around to build a stadium. When you're okay with your citizens living in third world conditions you tend to have some cash left over to spend on things that only the upper classes can use.

[kipperfan]

Originally Posted by _Q_

And I agree with that. Honestly I do, but that's kind of my point.

Shouldn't a country as awesome as Canada and a city as awesome as Calgary be able to fund stadiums that are better than Syria's or Lebanon's as well as fund other important things here because we're so much better?

That was the whole point of my argument.

Ok, well I guess I understand what you're saying a bit better, but would still say your logic is rather flawed.

We show our superiority over the places you mention by providing for our less fortunate citizens, our freedom of the press, our free and open democracy and our general way of life. We don't need to compete with third world countries (who are robbing their citizens in most cases in order to do the competing) in who can build the fanciest sports building - the reason Canada is such a great place is because we put the needs of our citizens first and our citizens simply don't need a new rink or stadium.

We do have a free market which dictates if there is enough private interest in a new rink or stadium they can and will be constructed – as mentioned before I think personal seat licenses would be a great way to go.

[_Q_]

Originally Posted by valo403

You're missing the point. When you prioritize public welfare over stadiums you might not have a few hundred million kicking around to build a stadium. When you're okay with your citizens living in third world conditions you tend to have some cash left over to spend on things that only the upper classes can use.

Who said the public should spend a few hundred million on this? I think everyone in here that wants tax payer money to be used has stated that they don't want this thing 100% financed by tax payers. That would be irresponsible.

Say however, the city/province fund road improvements for this project, pitch in a significant amount on public areas between buildings like building a plaza with a giant screen so fans can come watch playoff games for free and pitch in a certain amount of dollars to the stadiums for the owners to meet certain criteria (ie. NHL rink larger than the 18,000 that the owners want, making sure they meet certain architectural standards to compliment the area, etc.)

[valo403]

Originally Posted by _Q_

Who said the public should spend a few hundred million on this? I think everyone in here that wants tax payer money to be used has stated that they don't want this thing 100% financed by tax payers. That would be irresponsible.

Say however, the city/province fund road improvements for this project, pitch in a significant amount on public areas between buildings like building a plaza with a giant screen so fans can come watch playoff games for free and pitch in a certain amount of dollars to the stadiums for the owners to meet certain criteria (ie. NHL rink larger than the 18,000 that the owners want, making sure they meet certain architectural standards to compliment the area, etc.)

If that's what you were advocating perhaps you should have listed examples of public plazas in Lebanon, not stadiums.

[_Q_]

Originally Posted by valo403

If that's what you were advocating perhaps you should have listed examples of public plazas in Lebanon, not stadiums.

Honestly:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beirut_Central_District

It's actually beautiful in real life.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by _Q_

Or how about a tax on all tickets using the venues? Even tax concessions at a higher rate than the standard 5% GST to recoup some of the $$.

That would be the preferable way, the direct users foot at least a portion of the costs with the owners and the owners should find third party investors as needed.

I just don't like the idea of adding to the tax bill when this city has more important things to focus on.

It would be nice to add a public element and allow the team to sell bonds at plus interest as a individual investment and eventually get paid back.

There has to be more creative ways to top up dollars then hammering provincial and municipal governments who have what I think is a fairly large budget vs infrastructure issue.

I would love to see a building announcement followed by a "Buy Flames bonds" campaign where you can sell them privately or get a return on investment. I don't think it would be that tough to sell a million at $50 or $100.00 a shot.

[Barnes]

I didn't find Wrigley that bad. I guess the nostalgia makes up for its shortcomings. Wrigleyville is a pretty awesome area.

[Resolute 14]

Originally Posted by valo403

What events would skip Calgary if McMahon was not replaced? A U2 concert every 5 years? And that's assuming that renovations wouldn't solve the problems.

Renovations don't fix the problem of the stadium being right in the middle of a residential area, resulting in noise related restrictions. And, as we've both argued in the Coyotes thread, you can't renovate your way out of a bad geographical location. Though at this point, bad geography for a 10-game football season is drastically less critical than a 45-game hockey season.

[valo403]

Originally Posted by Resolute 14

Renovations don't fix the problem of the stadium being right in the middle of a residential area, resulting in noise related restrictions. And, as we've both argued in the Coyotes thread, you can't renovate your way out of a bad geographical location. Though at this point, bad geography for a 10-game football season is drastically less critical than a 45-game hockey season.

The city could easily alter the noise restrictions in that area if they wanted to. Either way, we're talking about missing out on 1 concert every few years, and with the way that tours are changing to more of a festival format that might even be a high number.

[shutout]

The other aspect to it is that the University owns the land the stadium is on and is looking to expand academic building space in the next ten years. I would think that they would love to be able to use the McMahon stadium space for new school buildings.

I do not think that there is a rational, non emotional person that has experienced McMahon and any other stadium that is NFL or NCAA that would not agree that there needs to be a new stadium built.

The questions are: Who are the tenants going to be? How often is it going to be used? What is the cost going to be? Where is it going to be located? And how much public money is going to be required?

There will always be some public money.
Just a matter of how much, and for what.

CFL, MLS, track and field, national soccer, outdoor concerts every month.

If the citizens of the city get nothing more than a place to go and watch sports and some economic return from visitors than I dont think we should be covering more than 25% of the cost. I would go up to 50%, if 30% of the cost was based on bonds that were to be repaid over 20-30 years based on a percentage of revenues.

I think that something like this is what the agreement is in Seattle.

[Bend it like Bourgeois]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

That would be the preferable way, the direct users foot at least a portion of the costs with the owners and the owners should find third party investors as needed.

I just don't like the idea of adding to the tax bill when this city has more important things to focus on.

It would be nice to add a public element and allow the team to sell bonds at plus interest as a individual investment and eventually get paid back.

There has to be more creative ways to top up dollars then hammering provincial and municipal governments who have what I think is a fairly large budget vs infrastructure issue.

I would love to see a building announcement followed by a "Buy Flames bonds" campaign where you can sell them privately or get a return on investment. I don't think it would be that tough to sell a million at $50 or $100.00 a shot.

Crowdfunding infrastructure Cooool.

[CaptainCrunch]

Are you making fun of me

[valo403]

Originally Posted by shutout

The other aspect to it is that the University owns the land the stadium is on and is looking to expand academic building space in the next ten years. I would think that they would love to be able to use the McMahon stadium space for new school buildings.

I do not think that there is a rational, non emotional person that has experienced McMahon and any other stadium that is NFL or NCAA that would not agree that there needs to be a new stadium built.

The questions are: Who are the tenants going to be? How often is it going to be used? What is the cost going to be? Where is it going to be located? And how much public money is going to be required?

There will always be some public money.
Just a matter of how much, and for what.

CFL, MLS, track and field, national soccer, outdoor concerts every month.

If the citizens of the city get nothing more than a place to go and watch sports and some economic return from visitors than I dont think we should be covering more than 25% of the cost. I would go up to 50%, if 30% of the cost was based on bonds that were to be repaid over 20-30 years based on a percentage of revenues.

I think that something like this is what the agreement is in Seattle.

I'm not sure if you're calling me irrational and emotional or not, but I'll put my hand up as someone who has experienced plenty of both NCAA and NFL stadiums and doesn't think Mcmahon needs replacement. It does need improvements, but full replacement implies that there are fundamental issues that need to be addressed, and that's simply not true. The fact that dozens of comparable stadiums are in use across North America, and are being renovated rather than replaced, is all the evidence I need to show that thinking replacement is not needed is a fully rational position. If the university wants the land for another use that's a completely different issue.

The other uses you list are either pipe dreams (MLS, which would also ideally have a soccer specific stadium anyways), events which do not require any sort of stadium infrastructure (track and field, not to mention that the inclusion of a track would make a stadium loathed by pretty much everyone) or events that may occur once a year at most (national soccer games in Canada are infrequent, and Calgary would be competing with numerous other cities to host. Outdoor concerts every month is an idea that may be applicable to San Diego, but this is Calgary so I'm going to say that's not realistic).

Expanded concourses, additional amenities (bathrooms, concessions etc.), updated a/v, updated/additional boxes and perhaps some cosmetic work would keep McMahon right in line with other comparable stadiums, both in the CFL and elsewhere.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by valo403

I'm not sure if you're calling me irrational and emotional or not, but I'll put my hand up as someone who has experienced plenty of both NCAA and NFL stadiums and doesn't think Mcmahon needs replacement. It does need improvements, but full replacement implies that there are fundamental issues that need to be addressed, and that's simply not true. The fact that dozens of comparable stadiums are in use across North America, and are being renovated rather than replaced is all the evidence I need to show that thinking replacement is not needed is a fully rational position. If the university wants the land for another use that's a completely different issue.

The other uses you list are either pipe dreams (MLS, which would also ideally have a soccer specific stadium anyways), events which do not require any sort of stadium infrastructure (track and field, not to mention that the inclusion of a track would make a stadium loathed by pretty much everyone) or events that may occur once a year at most (national soccer games in Canada are infrequent, and Calgary would be competing with numerous other cities to host. Outdoor concerts every month is an idea that may be applicable to San Diego, but this is Calgary so I'm going to say that's not realistic).

Expanded concourses, additional amenities (bathrooms, concessions etc.), updated a/v, updated/additional boxes and perhaps some cosmetic work would keep McMahon right in line with other comparable stadiums, both in the CFL and elsewhere.

The Stamps are really missing out on a lot of revenue due to the poor concessions at McMahon stadium, getting some of the third party food venders paying rent of concourse space would be big dollars, on top of that, finding a way to heat the concourse for the fall games and adding private boxes could mean a larger profit for the team.

Unfortunately its never going to be a summer concert destination due to the noise bylaws.

[Plett25]

Originally Posted by valo403

Expanded concourses, additional amenities (bathrooms, concessions etc.), updated a/v, updated/additional boxes and perhaps some cosmetic work would keep McMahon right in line with other comparable stadiums, both in the CFL and elsewhere.

Doesn't it come down to how much those improvements/renovations cost compared to the cost of a new stadium?

$50 million renos vs. $250 million new stadium? I vote reno
$100 million reno vs. $200 million new stadium? I vote new stadium.

[SebC]

Originally Posted by Tyler

Just a point about those "dastardly billionaires".

Doc's estate JUST left $119M to the Calgary Foundation. Harley was a huge philanthropist and I'm sure Murray Edwards has put millions of dollars into Calgary.

We're not talking about Mr. Burns here.

These guys love this city and while public money may help get enormous infrastructure projects built to support teams they own, they are certainly model Calgarians with a huge focus on civic duty.

Again, I don't think any single owner has gone out in public and stated they're looking for a dime to date. Am I wrong?

That's an interesting thing to bring up. I think it's very fair to say that few Calgarians love(d) the Flames as much as those guys, yet when it came down to it, they choose to put their money towards other things. That's not to say that they won't be putting money towards a new stadium as well, but as far as their philanthropy goes I'm sure the new venues are far from the top.

[Resolute 14]

Originally Posted by Plett25

Doesn't it come down to how much those improvements/renovations cost compared to the cost of a new stadium?

$50 million renos vs. $250 million new stadium? I vote reno
$100 million reno vs. $200 million new stadium? I vote new stadium.

Part of the problem is that the Stampeders don't control the facility. It is owned and operated by the University (though the Flames are contracted to handle concessions), and the costs of a renovation would have to be approved and likely funded, in part, by the University. The U of C is unlikely to do that, and the Stamps/Flames aren't going to pony up the money without some kind of significant concession.

On the flip side, if the Stamps/Flames build a new facility on other land, they gain control of revenue streams like parking and any concerts/other events that occur. And while this would obviously be small potatoes, the Dinos and Colts would be paying rent to the Stamps/Flames instead of the U of C. That would also be relevant if they try putting an NASL team there as well (because lets face it, MLS is a pipe dream at this point).

For the most part though, this conversation is putting the cart before the horse, as we don't yet know what, if any, public assistance the organization would be looking for, or what form it would take.

[Bend it like Bourgeois]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

Are you making fun of me

If you meant me, nope not at all.

I think it's quite smart.

[jayswin]

Are there any posts in this thread that indicate what Valo43 thinks of McMahon stadium in comparison to US high school and college football stadiums?