NYC Stadiums

[Deleted]

So let's review:

1) Mets are getting a new park next to Shea
2) Yankees are going to move to Macomb's Dam Park about 10 inches from Yankee Stadium
3) New Jersey and the G-Men are putting up a new stadium near the old Meadowlands
4) The Devils are moving to Newark
5) The Nets are eventually going to Brooklyn

Which leaves the Jets out in the cold for now. I assume if worse comes to worse they could move up to the new Giants Stadium - but how much longer will Woody Johnson rent? About 7-10 years from now when the above five projects are completed, the Jets stand to be playing in the most "dilapidated" stadium of the NYC area teams (you could argue the Islander's home in Nassau County is the worst, but an NFL team should always have a nicer home than an NHL team... so I'd say the Jets are in a worse position).

Wonder what those dopey J-E-T-S are going to do now?

On a side note, my hat's off to Sheldon Silver and the other state officials who blocked $300 in public funds to a stadium the majority of the state will never use or get any benefit from - especially when the Yankees and Mets are funding their stadiums themselves (every stadium gets some public "funding" for infrastructure work, so I'm ignoring those relatively minimal costs), and especially when the state is in such dire straits fiscally.

[thebin]

So what if people upstate don't use the stadium, they sure benefit from the tax revenue generated in Manhattan. That area where they were going to put a stadium is a dead area- the only one in Manhattan, that stadium would have been fantastic for the city. Passing up an opportunity to see private investors put $800 million into what would have been the premier stadium in the world was not good for the city or the state if you ask me. And you can be sure Silver was doing nothing but protecting his insterest$ in lower manhattan by blocking it.

[Deleted]

Of course he was. He said it himself, bin. New York State needs $300 million spent on a stadium like I need a case of the gout.

The stadium - like pretty much all NFL stadiums - would have done little to revitalize the area as it would have been used for what... 15-20 events per year [EDIT: 15-20 events OUTSIDE of the Jets]? Please. Waste of money and would have sat vacant the majority of the year. That's why teams can afford building them out in the boonies like Foxboro, MA or Orchard Park, NY. If they want more and more conventions and events of that nature, then redevelop the Javits Center on its own and add a bit to the surrounding area. The whole tax revenue thing is a joke, too. I don't see any part of the city, county OR state of New York benefiting from any Yankee Stadium or MSG revenues - schools are still broke, small business development is lagging, the list goes on. Put the stadium in Queens for a fraction of the cost and still recoup the sales tax gains.

The fact is, whatever is put there will generate the same revenues for the state whether its a stadium, convention center, apartment complex, whatever. And 100% private funding can be used to develop those other options. I don't object to a stadium, just the use of $300 million from the coffers of a state that has a lot more pressing issues.

If the Mets and Yankees can do it, the Jets certainly can.

[Deleted]

Overall, bin, I agree it would be great to have a state-of-the-art facility in Manhattan. The fact of the matter is, its being pushed so hard purely because of the Olympic angle. If it were just the Jets moving to the West Side and nothing more, there'd be a lot more people passing them on to Queens without a second thought, especially when it would cost the taxpayers a lot less.

I simply think there are better ways to develop that part of the city and still keep the revenues a stadium would have generated... all the while saving $300 million for other, more pressing issues.

[EDIT] - One more thing: I think we can all agree the Olympics to Paris is a foregone conclusion anyway? For years the IOC has been trying to "de-corporatize" the Olympics, and going to Paris would presumably be a perfect step.

[Deleted]

Oh another one to add to the list - my Staten Island Hoya buddies report there are talks to put a NASCAR track out there.

NYC should follow Philly's lead and build a complex of stadiums in Queens: Mets, Jets, the tennis center, and the Nets if this Brooklyn thing never comes off. Talk about increasing tax revenues, improving access and developing neighborhoods...

[nychoya3]

It's ironic the Silver is getting so touted for this, since he made the decision on remarkably insular considerations. He holds that vote by virtue of his title as Speaker, which implies a little larger responsibility than his parochial concerns about his district.

Still, while I'm not fan of Silver, and he did it for stupid reasons, I'm glad we've reached this point. The stadium was being pushed in a very dishonest way, and costs were simply ridiculous. I'm all for developing the West Side, but pretending that a stadium hosting 8 games (c'mon, we know the Jets won't make the playoffs!) a year will do that is absurd. That Bloomberg chose to link the stadium to the larger redevelopment plan was a strategic decision, but totally baseless from a substantive POV.

Moreover, while football stadiums are particularly feeble as a "economic" stimulus, pretty much all the academic research out there confirms that arenas and stadiums generally just redistribute economic activity that would happen anyway.

It's great that the Mets and Yankees seem poised to bear most or all of the costs of their stadiums. I'm sick of the extortion game that pro sports have been playing for so long.

As for the olympics, we weren't getting them this time around anyway. Frankly, the IOC is so used to being worshiped everywhere they go, that the rather tepid public reaction in NYC to the olympics was probably enough to torpedo it. The olympics would be fun, but a couple weeks of events should not drive an economic development strategy.

[thebin]

All previous economic studies have shown that stadia don't radically transform the economics of the surrounding area. All of that is out the window. Why? We are talking about the only fallow part of land left in....MANHATTAN. This is about the only thing big enough to make that area grow. And blow up it will, leading to massive increases in real estate taxes manhattan style that will be feeding coffers forever- or never now that the city turned down a billion dollar investor.

8 events a year? Give me a break. The stadium would instantly become the premier large concert venue on the planet Earth. The transformation that it could uniquely offer to the Javitts Center would allow it to stop turning away massive conventions (that happen all year long) it currently must decline. There would also be windfall from the massive private investment the Jets are able to make to the MTA that will probably never again happen now because they would be able to reap massive benfits from the rezoning that would have accompannied the stadium. $300 million in bonded funds (not taxes) just isn't a big deal in the scheme of the budget for what they will be losing here. Every study done says that these bonded funds will more than pay for themselves. What is a big deal is that they are turning down a willing and large private investor. Why? Partially so Silver can protect his downtown pork and partly so the Dolans can ward off an threat to their midtown monopoly. The only argument I never found compelling was for the Oylmpics because 1. I don't want them here and 2. We were never getting them over Paris or London.

The real problem, as the NYTimes noted after the defeat, is this proves once and for all that all it takes is a very small number of people looking after their own interests to kill a transformative project in NYC these days. Now and forever. This is just not a big city with big ideas anymore. Its a city of whiners.

PS. Schools in NYC suck, but they are not poor. They are just poorly run. So yeah, the schools suck, but don't cry poverty there, they are among the most expensive schools in the WORLD per student. Throwing more money and the unions and thier abonible teaching standards hasn't helped in the past and won't now- in NYC or any other metro area.




The Daily News's endorsement in small part:

"It is in the interest of New York taxpayers - and especially in the interest of the millions who ride the subways, buses and commuter rails - that Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno today give their blessings to construction of a stadium and convention center on Manhattan's West Side.

On their say-so rests whether New York gets a first-class facility that more than pays for itself, positions the Metropolitan Transportation Authority to reap well over $1 billion, creates thousands of jobs, spurs development in a fallow neighborhood, speeds an extension of the No. 7 subway line and keeps the city in the running for the 2012 Olympics, along with all the Games-related housing and recreational venues that are planned for the five boroughs.

The benefits of the stadium, which would bring the Jets home to New York while serving as an annex to the Javits Convention Center, are manifest. So much so that the project's supporters include both Rudy Giuliani and Al Sharpton, a majority of the City Council, most of the city's Assembly delegation, the hotel and tourism industry, the major construction unions and the MTA board.

The spending would more than pay for itself, according to four, count them, four studies. The most conservative, done by the Independent Budget Office, projects $55 million in new tax revenue in the stadium's first year of operation, $900 million in profit to taxpayers over the life of the bonds and almost 4,000 permanent jobs."

[CTHoya08]

The only good thing to come out of this is the fact that New York now has about zero chance of getting the Olympics, the prospect of which seemed like a recipe for disaster to me. BTW, what are your opinions on the proposed "Freedom Tower" for the WTC site? I think it's horrible, and would be totally out of place in New York.

[thebin]

I don't want the Olympics here either. Just too much hassle and negligible payoff.

I don't really know what to think of the Freedom Tower desing- its one of those architectual designs where you really can't fathom what it would actually look like, its aefully conceptual. But I do ferverently hope that they put something distinguishing and on the tall side to right the Manhattan skyline, which has looked out of whack since 911. I don't want something meek there.

[Deleted]

bin, what do you think of this idea regarding West Side development and a park: mimic Philly and set up a new Jets stadium and the new Mets stadium in Queens at a fraction of the cost to taxpayers.

You still create jobs and receive sales tax revenues you would have over in Manhattan but make the stadiums more accessible and build them at a fraction of the cost to public coffers. That way, the West Side is open to traditional developers who in the LAST 18 MONTHS have driven the price of development from around $90/square foot to over $200/square foot today. There are already projects starting up over there: there are a bunch of high rises planned for key intersections, there's a 1,500 room hotel in the works, and developers like JD Carlyle, the Witkoff Group, and Rockrose are already making plans for development. Residental and commercial development will make that area a lot nicer than a stadium would, plus there would be an added tax benefit: property taxes.

The overwhelming majority of pro sports teams that get new stadiums get sweetheart deals for land leases, if they pay any $$$ at all. In the last five seasons, the Mets paid around $24 million in taxes to NYC... but the city spent $20 million on Shea upgrades. So the options for the new stadium would be to either (a) continually fund stadium upkeep, or (b) do what the city is doing for the Yanks and Mets: allow them to build on city owned land for no rent. To me, the latter subsidy is acceptable in those two cases because the city/state isn't paying money into the stadium itself... just local infrastructure, which is the domain of government in the first place. Apartments and office buildings, on the other hand, are going to generate a lot of property and sales tax revenue where a stadium wouldn't have, and do it continuously. I agree, there'd be a LOT more than 8 events a year. The Jets alone are 10-12, concerts would likely be 10 a year (not many acts can book a 70,000 seat stadium), and you could throw a few really large conventions in there, but I just can't see the argument for Manhattan over Queens in light of what will be standing there in its place. This IS New York. Development is going to shoot through there eventually.

Another factor to consider: to date, a stadium like Camden Yards has been a net loss to taxpayers. But I doubt you'll find any Baltimorian (?) who is upset by that. The Orioles are a part of civic pride. Same goes for Cleveland, Cincy, Pittsburgh... any stadium built within a city in recent memory. Are the Jets essential to Manhattan's identity? No. If this were a competition between Newark and Manhattan, I'd reconsider all of this... but its Queens and Manhattan. And so long as they are even coming to New York City, that's a good thing revenue and city image wise. So why not do it for the cheapest amount possible while still creating new development in a "fallow" neighborhood and likely greater tax revenues over the long run?

As for the "Freedom Tower," could Trump have the best idea in simply recreating the old towers and developing the surrounding plots a bit differently?

[thebin]

I need to look more into the proposed development in absence of the stadium on the west side, because its pretty much news to me. I have to admit something here; my heart and my head pull me in two different directions on this one. Were there not so many completely diverse entities (Guiliani and Sharpton, the Daily News and the Post!) supporting the stadium, I probably would have gone with my head- which says that municipalities should not subsidize pro sports franchises in any signifigant way. But the vast range of support behind the plan, all people who know the pros and cons of this far more than I have bothered to learn, and the suspect nature of Silver's opposition, leads to me to go with my heart. Which is that NYC would be that much better with a world class stadium in Manhattan. I'll be honest with you, as a brand new Hoboken home owner, Queens is no better to me than Newark or Meadowlands. In fact, I would prefer Meadowlands to Queens for selfish reasons as I assume you would prefer the opposite for selfish reasons. The only locale that makes sense for so many bigger-than-the-Jets reasons is smack dab in Manhattan. I just love the idea, and am bothered by the fact that big projects now can be crushed by a very small handful of people with quite parochial interests in mind. But again, that is where my heart is on this. My head tells me as a fiscal conservative, that natural impediment to getting things done is actually a good thing. So there you have it.

[thebin]

I think the Trump idea about rebuilding the towers deserves at least as much serious attention as the Freedom Tower. I am afraid something really unremarkable and unworthy is going to end up there. I want to see that tallness at the other end of the island anchoring it to bring balance back to the whole scene, but I am becoming afraid it isn't going to happen. I do fear that what we will have is a few quite ordinary buildings and a massive memorial stuck upon the modern curse of too literal symbolism that makes a graveyard of the world center of finance. I truly think the best memorial to the murder victims in that site would have been a relatively rapid re-building on the area in a very bold way. That's increasingly less and less possible, partially because of the way in which a few Editeded off people can stop or severely delay just about any large project in the city these days. The Empire State building, the biggest engineering feat in history at the time, took some 13 months from start to finish- or if you prefer, it could have been built, with 1920s technology mind you, 3 times over in the period between 9/11 and today. Yeah part of that is better labor laws, etc, but not all of it. It seems we can't do anything big or do it right anymore because city planning has become far too democratized for my liking. There are a million vetos out there. Literally. Now I think we are going to get some ordinary short buildings and big reflecting pools of submission frankly with the flags of the several nations of the the people who were murdered there- as if Belgium suffered the same as the US that day and is if meekness and reflection rather than renewal and boldness is the appropriate response for a city like NYC. Its enough to make me sick.

[Deleted]

Good stuff bin. I'm with you 100% on publicly funded stadiums. While I think it helps in places like Baltimore, Pittsburgh, even Buffalo (the state and county helped a bit with stadium renovations a few years ago) because the teams are a vital part to civic life (which is a wishy-washy concept but pretty tangible when you're in those cities nonetheless), what turns me off in this instance is that its NYC, and the Jets aren't part of MANHATTAN lore, ya know? And the fact the "next best option" is Queens and still within NYC pushes me to the "no" side simply because of the tax implications.

But our NEXT topic of conversation would have to be what are the JETS going to do? It looks like the Mets are going to throw down next to the old Shea and NYC is going to turn their attention away from the Jets for the sake of the whole sacred Olympic cow - do the Jets now talk to the G-Men about moving in with them again? How much longer will Woody J. want to be in someone else's crib? If I were him, I'd be all about working with the Mets to create a Philly like stadium complex with their new park and the tennis center - and even the Nets if that Brooklyn thing ever falls through!

[thebin]

I never thought of it as a Jets stadium, I really always thought "man Manhattan could use a world class stadium."

I don't see why the Jets and G Men don't get together on this and build one massive stadium near the existing site and connect it to NYC mass transit somehow. I read today that NJ Transit plans a 2.3 mile light rail between Hoboken and the Giants Stadium- so that would actually connect the meadowlands stadium site to NYC trains, as well as all NJ Transit trains at Secaucus.

[Deleted]

Yeah I always wondered why the Jets and G-Men didn't fly over to the West Side together. They could have funded it on their own which would have worked out in such a way that they likely could have kept a CRAP load of the revenues, been in Manhattan, etc.

Oh well. Jersey just jumped on 'em too soon I guess. How's Hoboken treating you? I hear its becoming a young professionals paradise or something along those lines. Not to mention getting a shout out in "Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle"....

[thebin]

I would imagine the Jets wanted to break into the role of biggest franchise in the city- which being alone in Manhattan could have pulled off within a decade I think. But yeah, now, it seems like they should get together. On the other hand, there is NOTHING wrong with Giants stadium as is. Just get some trains going there instead.

Boken is great. It is unreal how far real estate prices have moved even in the 6 months I have been here. I know of 2 people who are not far from doubling their investments on apartments that they bought 2 and three years ago. Its insane. $500k one bedrooms are quite commonplace now. I just love the town, it reminds me a good deal of Georgetown.

[thebin]

I think I could sum up my rambling on my fears of what the WTC site will become; I am quite afraid the "Why Do They Hate Us" crowd is going to get their cowardly hands all over the architectual spirit of that site.

[Deleted]

DUH! They hate us because of our freedom. As if!