Category Archives: Coliseum

07.04.12
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News for 7/4/12

Stuff to read while you’re getting the BBQ going.

  • Late Tuesday, the 49ers successfully fought to keep $30 million in redevelopment funds out of the County’s hands until at least July 27, when another hearing will be held to determine the fate of the money. While the team was lawyered up, the County’s oversight board had no legal representation for the hearing in Sacramento. The issue is whether or not the $30 million (originally $42 million) at stake is considered an “enforceable obligation” between the 49ers and the City of Santa Clara. If it is ruled an enforceable obligation, the money should be safe to use for the stadium. [San Jose Mercury News/Mike Rosenberg & Steve Harmon]
  • AEG pulled out of a plan to help build and run a new Sacramento arena without the Kings as a tenant, effectively killing the plan outright. The next move is the Maloofs’, as they could apply to move from Sacramento before the end of the 2012-13 season (which is entirely expected). Will Mayor Kevin Johnson concede defeat and push for a different initiative, such as a stadium? Perhaps, but the teams that KJ would be interested in (A’s, Raiders) would have to show their own interest. So far they haven’t. [Sacramento Bee/Ryan Lillis]
  • Oakland’s Uptown was profiled in an All Things Considered segment as a positive example of how redevelopment can revitalize a neighborhood, while the death of redevelopment could halt further progress. [NPR/Richard Gonzales]
  • Another article from the Chronicle takes a stab at figuring out what will happen to Oakland’s three pro sports franchises. As usual, Mayor Jean Quan lacks specifics, instead using grandiose phrases such as “Staples on Steroids” to describe the Coliseum City project. She also seems to be gravitating further towards a retractable dome concept-cum-convention center, which new partner AEG would certainly champion. Careful hitching your horses to the AEG wagon, Madam Mayor. As we saw in Sacramento, AEG will ditch a city posthaste if they see no future there. Plus, all of the secrecy behind Quan’s supposed “secret committee” working on Coliseum City doesn’t help when it comes to taking her seriously, as she recently took a huge hit to her credibility with new data released about her “100 blocks” policing plan. [SFGate/Vittorio Tafur, Matthai Kuruvila]
  • Cities are looking for ways to resurrect redevelopment, and one popular one emerging is the establishment of revitalization zones via state legislation. The zones would have similar tax increment and bonding powers as redevelopment agencies did, plus they would be enshrined by state law. SF Assemblyman Tom Ammiano is pushing for the creation of an infrastructure financing district to serve the America’s Cup development along the waterfront. The problem with this method is that eventually any law passed by the Legislature still has to go to Governor Jerry Brown for approval. Brown has been steadfast in opposing any kind of old-school-style redevelopment for the past year, making it hard to see him signing any legislation that could undermine his redevelopment clawback efforts. [Sacramento Bee/Dan Walters]
  • Added 4:30 PM – Today’s the halfway point of the home schedule. Because the first two home games were played in Japan, the Attendance Watch box on the right has shown multiple representations of attendance, one with the Japan games included and one without. Projected over the rest of the season, the total 81-game attendance (with Japan) would be 1,733,521. The total 79-game attendance (without Japan) would be 1,599,938. ESPN and other statistics aggregators usually include the Japan games in their attendance tables. Based on games sold, the A’s consider today’s game #39. Attendance tends to pick up throughout July and into August, just before the school year begins, then drops off, the variance depending largely on the team’s record. At this juncture, three teams already have surpassed the A’s projected season attendance (both figures): Philadelphia, Texas, and the NY Yankees.

More as it comes.

07.03.12
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Walk-up observations

I didn’t get season tickets this year. I waffled about the decision all the way through April. In the end I chose not to get a package this year, forgoing the savings a package can provide. I’ve been fortunate to have a few friends who provided freebies on occasion. Most of the time, I’ve simply walked up to get tickets.

Years ago, before the advent of the internet and the mobile power that comes with smartphones, the A’s had freestanding booths for day-of-game tickets. The booths were located outside all of the main gates. Agents manning the booths were furnished with stacks of preprinted tickets, with different quantities for certain sections or price levels. The booths went away around the time the Wolff/Fisher group took control of the team.

For years, fans choosing to get day-of-game tickets just before the game had no choice but to buy from the permanent booths on the BART plaza and near gates C and D. This year, the booths have been supplemented with electronic kiosks, which, like the booths, charged no fees on any tickets sold (including advance tickets). This has helped alleviate some of the frequently long lines, along with providing multiple places to pick up will-call tickets.

Tonight I noticed something odd about the system. Every Red Sox game is a “premium” game, with slightly higher ticket prices compared to games against most other teams. The A’s charge higher prices knowing that demand is expected to be greater, though I’ve noticed that demand for Red Sox games has gone down precipitously in the last few years (Monday night’s attendance: 17,434). I kept track of what tickets online seller tickets.com had available through the website. By the early afternoon, I noticed that no Value Deck seats were available. There’s nothing special about the demand for Value Deck seats except when a group buys a large block of them (only 1,000 are available per game). I figured that because of the missing Value Deck tickets, demand was reasonably high. Running counter to that assertion was the fact that the team was also selling “Dynamic Deal” tickets, at $22 for Plaza Level and $10 for Plaza Outfield.

The crowd during the bottom of the 2nd.

I got one of the $10 seats, got some food, and sat in my seat at 7 on the dot. The bleachers were about half-full. So were many other sections. I thought that perhaps there might be a late-arriving crowd, but I was wrong. Based on the way the sections were filled, the place looked half full. 17,434 paid attendance seems to confirm that, though there were probably 2-3,000 no-shows as well. I looked up at the Value Deck repeatedly and noticed that those sections were also at best half full. Yet the advance tickets were sold out. So what gives?

I can’t come up with an explanation for what happened, and as a single data point it would be foolish to draw any specific conclusions from it. The A’s don’t have anything to gain from manipulating the availability of any ticket type, simply because the demand is so elastic that the gains would be worth peanuts. The observation has certainly made me want to pay more attention in the future to inventory and availability compared to the in-house optics. Next opportunity is Wednesday’s series-ender against the Sawx.

06.29.12
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Missed opportunities

Many, many years ago, just a few months after I launched this blog, I pitched this idea:

broadway_auto_row-overlay

View south towards Lake Merritt from the intersection of 27th and Broadway

I wrote to then-and-still-current Oakland Councilmember Nancy Nadel (District 3) about the potential of this site. After a bit of nagging on my part, I was told that other development was “in the pipeline”. Disappointed, I looked elsewhere.

The ballpark site was considered the southern end of Broadway Auto Row. In 2005, the City of Oakland was pushing to move several car dealerships out of the district, gambling on the idea that the area could become the city’s long lost retail mecca. The dealerships were meant to move to the Coliseum area (some did) or the Army Base (they didn’t). Now Broadway Auto Row sits either empty or with car dealerships still there, a fair albeit underwhelming use of land in the city’s urban core. It’s an area begging for redevelopment, but as a result of scuttling of the institution, it lacks the funding needed to make the sea change happen. A feature in the SF Public Press by Alexis Fitts chronicles much of the failed planning and good intentions.

There were dreams to build a retail district to rival Union Square, even as Emeryville ate Oakland’s lunch. Grandiose plans for a over 1 million square feet of retail with Nordstrom and Macy’s as anchors never materialized. It occurred to me that these massive scale plans from several years ago had much of the same lofty language being used now for Coliseum City. Oakland’s used JRDV as a master plan consultant back then, and they’re using the same firm for Coliseum City now. Sub in the Raiders, A’s, and Warriors for Nordstrom, Macy’s, and Target, and it’s very similar: big dreams, little realism.

Sights have shifted to include more housing in the plan, which is fine in that it’s in keeping with the region’s growth. The retail strategy could shift to a focus on hipsters with stores like American Apparel (the only A.A. in the East Bay is in Berkeley). Without public incentives to lure retailers in it’s a very tough sell.

It’s a similar tough sell for the pro sports franchises. During the S.O.S. meeting on Monday, I brought up the potential of infrastructure finance districts. They’re redevelopment in the new era, with less money to throw around and lower expectations in keeping with less money. I reported last week that the City of San Jose approved an extension of the Downtown Property and Business Improvement District. The PBID pays for Groundwerx, a downtown beautification program that cleans up litter and sidewalks, removes graffiti, covers utility boxes in vinyl wraps, and provides a welcome/concierge element to downtown with the crew of Segway-riding, neon-clad employees. Groundwerx will cost $2.2 million for 2013 and is worth the cost, as evidenced by the 91% approval among downtown landowners.

Before Oakland reaches for the stars again and starts dreaming about being San Francisco, it might want to see what’s feasible within city limits. If it wants to make Oakland more attractive to businesses and consumers, it should make downtown/uptown actually visually attractive to those contingents. This weekend, there are little gymnasts and their parents walking around downtown SJ, and the place looks clean, welcoming, and hospitable. Even with that image boost, there’s little hope for great retail there. Valley Fair and Santana Row have ruined downtown SJ for retail for next several decades at the very least, thanks to their free parking and safe, sealed environments. Whether Oakland goes mainstream or hipster or both, it’s going to take a long time to develop any significant retail in downtown or the Coliseum area. New measures are the new skin-in-the-game.

As for Broadway Auto Row, it’s too bad no one ran with the ballpark idea. There weren’t too many landowners. All it needed was a champion within City Hall.

06.26.12
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Save Oakland Sports meeting 6/25/12

I headed up the Nimitz to attend the biweekly Save Oakland Sports meeting at the Red Lion Hotel on Hegenberger. The meeting ran two hours and was, despite the organization’s rather young state, quite well run. S.O.S. is really just getting started with its various activities, so I’m going to refrain from appraising their efforts. I can tell you that it looks like an eager, resourceful group and broad coalition, though they’re aware that Oakland and the greater East Bay are under pressure to deliver for the three teams without much time to do so.

If you want to know more about what S.O.S. is doing, I suggest you attend one of the meetings. Again, they’re held at the Red Lion Hotel in Oakland near the airport, though the venue could change from time to time. If you’re pro-Oakland, I urge you to attend. The group needs people as a show of strength, and they’re soliciting creative ideas to help bolster support for the teams and new venues. I’ll even go so far as to say that if you are pro-Oakland and you’re not attending, you’re doing yourself a disservice.

At the previous meeting, Mayor Jean Quan gave her thoughts on the Coliseum City plan. One notable thing I picked up was that she said that the Pier 30/32 rebuild would cost $400 million, not the roughly $100 million many had estimated previously. I don’t know where that figure comes from, but it seems inordinately high. We’re talking about removing old piles from the bay, driving new ones, and building a 13-acre concrete deck on top of it. It doesn’t matter that much if you’re building on the water or on mud next to the water because around here that mud is a huge liquefaction risk (ironically, partly due to pile driving). I’ll try to verify this in the coming days.

Now, if you’re wondering how I was treated, I’ll put it this way: When I introduced myself, I got a good amount of applause. One of the members expressed reservations about having me there because he considered me a pro-San Jose guy. Given the chance to clarify my stance, I said, “No offense to Oakland, I’m just a get-it-done-quickly guy. I’m not particular about cities.” Everyone I met was friendly and respectful, even if we had disagreements about actions and motivations. Folks, we can have a clear, reasonable dialogue on these issues without resorting to name calling, accusations, and recriminations. I don’t know how S.O.S. is going to do in the future, but I have the utmost respect for what they’re doing and how they’re going about it. Good luck, Save Oakland Sports.

06.21.12
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News for 6/21/12

Good stuff in this edition.

  • Save Oakland Sports is having one of its regular meetings next Monday, June 25 @ 6 PM, at the Red Lion Hotel, 150 Hegenberger, Oakland.
  • CBS Radio and Cumulus (parent of KNBR) announced a new sports radio network that will launch in January. The network is expected to feature talent currently on CBS Sports and CBS Sports Network. A key talent on the latter is Jim Rome, whose daily TV show launched in April. Rome’s radio show is syndicated by Premiere Radio Networks (a News Corp. subsidiary), so there’s some natural friction there. I have to think that Rome came to CBS-SN with the idea that he might jump to this new radio network too at some point, though at some $30 million per year, his radio persona doesn’t come cheap. Both of the KNBR stations were identified as future network affiliates for the CBS Sports Radio, which creates a bit of a juggling situation for Cumulus. Will Cumulus continue to pay decent money to be an ESPN Radio affiliate and carry some Fox Sports Radio programming on the side? If not, does that free up ESPN Radio to move to The Game? And how does an ESPN Radio relationship conform with The Game’s cozy relationship with Comcast Sportsnet? Fantasy radio operators, start your typewriters.
  • Oakland’s City Council approved a $1 billion plan to finally remake the Oakland Army Base. Unlike some of the more glamorous or controversial plans that have been proposed (movie studio, casino, big box retail, auto row), this one will stay true to the base’s largest neighbor: the Port of Oakland. The plan will include new infrastructure, warehousing by ProLogis, and a logistics center. Every so often the base has come up in discussion here as a potential stadium site, but it’s an idea that’s never had legs within City Hall.
  • Greg Jamison’s quest to purchase the Phoenix Coyotes has hit a big roadblock in the form of a lawsuit by the Goldwater Institute. Now there are questions as to whether Jamison, who is not a billionaire, can pull off the acquisition without the sweetheart deal approved by the City of Glendale that would subsidize the team’s continued operation at Jobing.com Arena. The franchise, which is owned by the NHL at the moment, is being forced to lawyer up to complete the sale. If that can’t happen…
  • The City of Seattle and Chris Hansen are getting ready to finalize their new SoDo arena plan. Hansen would pay around 60%, with the remaining 40% coming from public sources. The political minefield is being negotiated right now, as the City Council doesn’t want the plan to come to a public vote, and the Port of Seattle is objecting because it fears that the arena will adversely impact port operations. Any team (NHL, NBA) that relocates to Seattle would play temporarily at Key Arena while the new arena is being built.
  • This week’s cautionary tale about public stadium financing comes from Chester, PA, where not only has a MLS stadium not been a development catalyst, the stadium tenant Philadelphia Union missed a $500k PILOT payment in 2010.
  • The BCS will have a four-team playoff starting in 2014. Semifinal games would rotate among the four current BCS sites, with the championship game going to the highest bidder among them.
  • Jim Caple has another one of his ballpark column series, this time an elimination tournament of all 30 MLB parks. In the tournament, fans can vote online for their favorite ballpark in each matchup. We’re at the semifinal stage, with Fenway Park (seeded #2) facing off against AT&T Park (#3) and Camden Yards (#4) vs. tourney Cinderella Miller Park (#24). The Coliseum was seeded #28 and lost in the first round to Target Field (#5) by a whopping 91% to 9% with over 60,000 votes, which is about right. Don’t feel bad though. New Yankee Stadium also lost in a landslide. The Coli’s Mt. Davis was also awarded Worst View. Finally, Caple gets a shoutout to Shibe Park, which ended up #8 in his list of places he wishes were still around.

Happy reading.

06.18.12
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It takes more than a village to raise a village (update: AEG approved)

Update 8:18 PM – The Coliseum Authority board approved AEG 7-1, the only vote against coming from Ignacio De La Fuente.

Oh to be on the Coliseum Authority board these days. The board has two weeks to decide on a firm to manage the Coliseum complex, and the firm they’re grooming to take over, AEG, is getting a lot of unexpected scrutiny over their ability to take the Raiders away even as they manage the stadium for the next several years. The Trib’s Angela Woodall reports that AEG’s status as a potential “poacher” is hanging up approval of the facilites management contract.

The JPA/Authority has sought assurances that AEG would not try to lure any of the current tenant teams away, which is fine and dandy, except that the JPA’s counsel has said that such a stipulation has little teeth. The only thing the JPA could do is terminate the contract, which would entitle them to keep $4.5 million in money promised by AEG to manage the complex.

$4.5 million is a pittance for AEG, considering their claim that they’ve spent $27 million on studies and preparation for the Farmers Field project. They’ve promised to spend $10 million on badly needed improvements to a Metro Rail station near the LACC/Staples/Live!/Farmers complex. The Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum complex may be a nice item to put in their portfolio, but Farmers Field is AEG’s big bet. It’s a beautiful situation for AEG because they can play both cities against each other – they’re practically doing it now! They’ll be in bed with the JPA as Oakland pushes Coliseum City while getting cozy with the Raiders, who are considering LA to some extent, in the process.

The whole scenario puts the Authority in a bind. They need AEG to do consulting on Coliseum City (as farfetched as it is), yet they can’t have AEG poaching the Raiders. There’s no other competitor that has anywhere near the kind of real world experience handling single-site, multiple venue development as AEG. Chris Dobbins of Save Oakland Sports and Alameda County Supervisor Nate Miley were both in lockstep about their concerns.

And let’s get real about this, the only team AEG has any interest in is the Raiders. AEG is booked solid at Staples with its three teams and the company hasn’t expressed much interest in baseball. While Oakland has expressed interest in retaining the Warriors and Athletics, they’ve taken the most steps to keep the Raiders. AEG has Oakland by the short hairs, thanks to Mayor Jean Quan putting Oakland’s chips behind Coliseum City. Even when there is a big player involved, the City part of Coliseum City can be extraordinarily difficult to get off the ground, as the St. Louis Cardinals and developer Cordish can attest. Comparisons to Mission Bay/South Beach in SF are meaningless because that area and East Oakland are on different planets economically.

Alternately, the JPA could choose incumbent SMG, with whom they’ve had an up-and-down relationship, or Comcast’s Global Spectrum, which comes closest to AEG in that they operate the Wells Fargo Center and the newly opened Xfinity Live! in Philadelphia. The latter finally came to fruition several years after the two stadia and the WFC had opened, and after the old Spectrum was demolished to make way for Xfinity Live!.

If the Raiders went to LA, that creates a situation in which the Coliseum could be available for a new A’s stadium, which is probably the only solution at the complex that MLB would sign off on (assuming the ancillary development came in). The problem with that solution is that there would still be $100 million in Mt. Davis debt to deal with and either a demolished or decaying facility, and the A’s and MLB would want nothing to do with that. That brings us back to the question, What’s in it for the A’s?

It’s a tough situation to be in. Mayor Quan believes that Coliseum City is the best hope for retaining the teams and revitalizing East Oakland, yet it can be argued that bringing in AEG is akin to letting a fox in a henhouse, which could kill the vision of Coliseum City before it even gets started. I’d like to think that the City will make a prudent decision here, but by paving the way for AEG before the decision is made they’re almost locked into a specific path. It may well be a path to ruin.

06.09.12
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Chukchansi Park and its environs

One of the entrances to Chukchansi Park is right off the Fulton Mall, a 60’s relic of urban planning deserted by one major business after another over several decades. Designed by the inventor of the shopping mall, Victor Gruen, Fulton Mall was to be the first part of a huge, outdoor, pedestrian-friendly superblock development. Even though Fulton Mall opened to wide acclaim and great amounts of traffic, all it took was the departure of one anchor tenant – Montgomery Ward’s in 1970 to a new suburban mall – to set off the eventual, gradual decay of the concept. Throughout the 80’s and 90’s, numerous ideas were pitched to help revitalize downtown, none coming to fruition.

Downtown Fresno in better times.

So it’s easy to see how many civic and business leaders felt that Chukchansi Park (opened in 2002) would become a key catalyst in the redevelopment of Downtown Fresno. Sadly, Fulton Mall is as rundown and empty as ever, the only tenants being thrift stores and other retailers catering to the Latino community. It’s an all-too-familiar example of how ballparks don’t bring urban renewal. Peeking into restaurants and storefronts before the game, it appeared that what few patrons were there were not also ballpark-bound. With a garage and a surface lot close by, there’s never a need to hang out in the dilapidated downtown.

The large buffer area between the stadium and the entry gates makes the stadium feel somewhat detached from the neighborhood.

That said, Chukchansi Park is still a decent AAA park, centrally located in the region, and easily accessible by public transit. If you’re a baseball junkie and have time for a day trip, Fresno’s reachable in four hours or less from most of the state. The single concourse at Chukchansi is vast at 50 feet wide. There are mist nozzles at the edge of the overhang that are deployed when it gets too hot. A beer garden is in the left field corner, though it mainly serves Tecate (a key sponsor) and Bud Light.

Spacious concourse provides much-needed relief from scorching summer days.

Speaking of overhangs, Chukchansi Park is one of two in the Pacific Coast League’s Pacific Conference that has two seating levels (the other is Spring Mobile Ballpark in Salt Lake City). Most PCL parks have the press/suite level above or attached to a single seating level. When building to 10,000 seats, going with one or two decks shouldn’t affect sightlines to any significant degree. Two decks puts the suites higher than you might expect at other minor league parks, though that is also not typically a deciding factor for those interested in suites.

Seating deck layout at Chukchansi Park

Perhaps the most unique aspect of Chukchansi Park is its inclusion of several amusement park attractions within the grounds. Behind the plate is a carousel. In remote right field are a ferris wheel and funhouse. The attractions were added for this season and could stay or go in the future depending on their popularity. Considering that there’s little to see in the outfield other than some cars and the portable stage that gets used occasionally, the ferris wheel is a welcome sight.

Ferris wheel provided by Hanford's Wold Amusements

After the game ended at around 5 p.m., I walked through the Fulton Mall towards the train station about 15 minutes away. My walking route took me through the office/commercial area defined by the convention center, Selland Arena, and the William Saroyan Theatre. All three were completed by 1966, around the same time as the Fulton Mall. Though these venues are a bit old and not as compelling as newer facilities (Save Mart Center has more-or-less replaced Selland Arena), the buildings themselves are in much better shape than Fulton Mall. Moreover, as I walked through the area I noticed something eerily unusual: not a living soul anywhere. Only three blocks away from a ballpark and two from the heart of downtown, absolutely nothing was happening. It was a Sunday so I suppose that was to be somewhat expected. Still, it left an impression.

The 60’s were a time of great nervous social experimentation. The 1968 film embedded near the top was put together by Victor Gruen Associates as a crowning achievement to be shown in the White House. While Gruen was known most for pioneering the indoor shopping mall, he also had bold ideas of how to transform rundown urban areas to make them more inviting. Much of his work in this vein was centered around banishing the car, which the film’s narrator cites as largely responsible for the ills of urban living. In a 2004 feature for The New Yorker, Malcolm Gladwell pointed out the irony in Gruen trying to recreate Vienna’s Ringstrasse in America, only to have it perverted by cars and developers and popularized to the point that Old World city Vienna has some America-style commercial development. It’s an important lesson to keep in mind for the next generation of urban planners. Fresno’s rebuilt downtown was done in the mid 60’s, at the same time as the Oakland-Alameda County Complex. The Coliseum was done without an ancillary commercial component, which in hindsight didn’t help Downtown Oakland as much as it could have. If Coliseum City were to come to fruition, effectively creating a second downtown, it’ll be interesting so how much it adversely affects the current downtown. As we’ve seen in Fresno and San Jose, legacy downtowns don’t suffer competition well.

05.31.12
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Tuman: Oakland should be like Brooklyn, not Detroit

Joe Tuman re-entered the public sphere in Oakland today with a scathing indictment of Oakland’s attempts (such as they are) to keep its pro teams in town. In an op-ed in the Tribune, Tuman called the Coliseum City project’s proponents in City Hall “depressing” and “in denial”. Those words could be important a five months from now, as Tuman is running for the At-Large City Council seat this year against Rebecca Kaplan. Both were also in the 2010 mayoral election, with Kaplan finishing 3rd and Tuman 4th to Jean Quan.

First, back to Tuman’s column. Tuman, who is also a professor of communications at SF State, compared Coliseum City (and indirectly, Victory Court) to China Basin and AT&T Park.

What did work in San Francisco is the new AT&T baseball park. But while we in Oakland admire that, we often overlook that economic redevelopment of SOMA (south of Market area) was under way before the new ballpark was planned or constructed.

It occurred because so many tech companies and startups wanted office and loft space in the less-expensive SOMA area.

Tuman absolutely nails it here. Yes, the Giants deserve credit for transforming a rundown section of San Francisco, but let’s remember that in 1997, the region was in the throes of the dot-com boom, epicentered only a few blocks from the ballpark site. That’s why when people ask, I say that South Park was just as important or more important than Pac Bell Park. Back then, SOMA was one of the last redevelopment frontiers in SF (remember the live-work zoning weirdness?). In most cities with new ballparks, the ballpark district is where you can find reasonably priced apartments, condos, and office space. In SF? Yeah, right.

Every so often I get a question from an East Bay citizen or fan about why companies from the SVLG couldn’t just support the A’s if a ballpark were built in Oakland or some such. I usually reply with an answer along the lines of, “You know how a San Jose stadium wouldn’t be convenient for you? Well, an Oakland stadium isn’t convenient for them.” Things are different from football, which plays the majority of its games on Sundays, or basketball/hockey, where the schedules aren’t as rigorous as MLB’s. Convenience is only one factor, with civic/regional pride and the attractiveness of the location are major factors. In the post-redevelopment era, with tax increment usage forbidden or severely curtailed, these redevelopment-based models need to be replaced with something more practical and smaller in scale (I’ll go into this more later tonight).

Tuman also goes on to point out how there’s no Airport Connector stop along Hegenberger which could be a focal point for transit-oriented development.

Zennie Abraham got Tuman to comment on Zennie’s blog about the A’s during his mayoral campaign.

Should Oakland Sue The Oakland A’s?

Tuman’s not in favor of using the legal process against the Oakland A’s, which seems to be threatening to leave Oakland every year, as he thinks it just encourages them to try harder to do so. But suing the City of San Jose is something Tuman’s willing to consider, as that municipality has worked to try to take the A’s away from Oakland, interfering with contracts between the parties in the process.

Tuman says he will be a friend to all of Oakland’s sports teams, but does not want to give away public money to retain them.  But he does leave tax increment revenue as an exception because of it’s market  generated nature.

Tuman isn’t anti-sports. He is realistic about the City’s interests and likelihood in keeping one or more of its teams, and frankly it’s good to hear this kind of talk. It’s a lot more honest than anything that’s been coming out of City Hall for the last few years. Now, Tuman probably isn’t going to beat Kaplan with her plucky attitude and infectious energy, especially on the campaign trail. (It’s a bit ironic that a communications professor is woefully behind on linking up with social media.) Still, a little more honesty and reason can’t hurt discourse. Honest discourse is exactly what Oakland needs.

Of course, the Brooklyn that Tuman refers to has itself succumbed to the allure of pro sports. Barclays Center will open this fall and the once-New Jersey Nets have already taken up the Brooklyn moniker replete with new colors and logos. Sometimes even Brooklyn can’t always be Brooklyn.

05.29.12
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A room with a view

One of the more lamentable facts about modern indoor arenas is that, unlike their outdoor brethren, most arenas do nothing to celebrate the environments and neighborhoods in which they reside. Cold and insular, arenas are all about focusing on the floor or action. Attempts to draw attention to the crowd such as the “Kiss Cam” are token distractions. Get in the crowd, get the show over with, and get everyone out ASAP. There’s no time to linger or savor an event.

It wasn’t always this way. Some of the postwar arenas attempted to bring in the outside. This was best executed at the old Portland Veterans Memorial Coliseum, which still stands next to its much larger successor, the Rose Garden. Memorial Coliseum was a simple, elegant square wrapped on all four sides by glass curtainwall. The round, undulating seating bowl inside the shell provided a clean visual line that gave the building its purpose and indicated where an observer was in relation to the seats.

Views of Portland were available on all four sides of Memorial Coliseum.

The pre-1997 Oakland Coliseum Arena also showed this kind of elegance. A larger arena than the one in Portland, the Coliseum Arena boldly used floor-to-ceiling glass, with a concrete exoskeleton to protect it. Like Portland, the rim of the upper seating bowl was clearly visible, though the Warriors and the arena operator chose to use dark curtains to prevent any clerestory effect. Both arenas were designed by Skidmore, Owings, and Merrill, a firm more known for skyscrapers (Sears/Willis Tower, WTC Freedom Tower) than sports properties.

Early cutaway drawing of the old Coliseum Arena

One of the key directives for the Coliseum Arena renovation was that the building needed to be stuffed with as many seats as possible, since the old 15,025 capacity was great for generating sellouts but poor for generating revenue. So they packed the place to the rafters with seats and redesigned the seating bowl to conform more to basketball instead of the neither-fish-nor-fowl multipurpose seating bowl of yesteryear. Over 4,500 seats were added in the process, an impressive feat of packaging and engineering. Lost in the transformation was the grace of the old design. New concrete entry lobbies were added to the exterior. The regular entrance from the plaza became a club entrance. The glass walls had to be retrofitted, cluttering the look.

In the Warriors’ unveiling of the Piers 30-32 site, the renderings ownership showed had an arena pictured, more as a placeholder than anything else. They were very clear to note that there were no detailed renderings or even a specific design at the moment. Considering the site’s pictureque waterfront locale, a great amount of effort may have to be undertaken to design the building so that patrons can appreciate views of downtown, the Bay Bridge, and the East Bay hills. If that doesn’t happen, the arena may be considered nothing more than a big concrete box. Nobody wants that. I don’t think the W’s will go back to the circular seating bowl, but there are still ways to open up the space to the outside. One way is to do what many new arenas have done – remove some cheap upper end seats, even entire sections.

North (left) upper tier removed, which should create an enviable Downtown-Bay Bridge panorama.

In addition, the concourses could be laid out to allow views of the action from concession stands. Mind you, implementing some of these ideas could prove costly because they may translate into greater amounts of costly square-footage being built to satisfy the vision. The W’s should know by now that they have a chance to build a truly iconic building, and to skimp would be wrong and practically indefensible. Arena architecture is not known for looking backward or in a retro manner. In this case there’s truly something to be learned from looking at the past, and it can only result in a better arena, one that celebrates everything happening outside its walls just as much as the events inside those walls.

05.27.12
by

A city’s predicament

I fear for Trib reporter Matt Artz’s email inbox, because it’s about to get pummeled.

In today’s edition, Artz tries to explain why Oakland’s three teams are varying shades of noncommittal with regards to staying at the Coliseum, or even in Oakland in general. For most of us who follow the situation closely, the information is pretty much old hat. Still, it’s good to read someone in the local media deal it as plainly as Artz did, even if the truth is unpleasant.

As Oakland fights to keep its teams, industry leaders say it’s hampered by the fact that its main lure was a site more attractive 40 years ago than it is today.

“I think that’s a real problem,” Smith College economics Professor Andrew Zimbalist said. “The times have passed it by.”

Exactly. No one questions how devoted or hardcore Oakland and East Bay fans are, they are among the best in the nation. Unfortunately, the business of pro sports has become such a high-stakes affair that economically, Oakland is practically a AAA market while San Francisco and San Jose/Silicon Valley are major league markets. Nowadays money trumps hardcore seven days a week.

Yesterday I was looking into how Orlando’s Amway Center was built, hoping to understand how it surpasses Oracle Arena in terms of amenities. Oracle does well in having four premium seating options: courtside seats, suites, and two different club options. Amway Center has an astounding seven options: courtside seats, founders suites, presidents suites, legends (party) suites, MVP tables, 4- and 6-person loges, and club seats. All seven options are priced specifically to target certain well-heeled demographics, whether they are big corporations, prominent small businesses, or rich people who simply want more elbow room. A future post will go into how all of this works. For now let me tell you that there’s no going back. All four North American pro sports leagues are multibillion dollar outfits. So are NASCAR and NCAA football.

Oakland Mayor Jean Quan talked Thursday about having a huge Cowboys Stadium-like facility in the Coliseum complex, to be co-anchored by a convention center. One thing she didn’t mention was the price tag for such a complex, or even just the stadium itself. Lest we forget, Santa Clara’s Stadium Authority is on the hook for $700 million of the 49ers stadium costs. Zygi Wilf and the Vikings will be paying 49% of the Metrodome’s $1 billion replacement, leaving the rest to public funding sources. Even if you buy the somewhat dubious argument that the 49ers are paying for the lion’s share of the cost (who runs the Authority, again?), Santa Clara had to put up $144 million in hard dollars initially. What price will Oakland/Alameda County have to pay to stay in the game? $200 million? $500 million? Quan cites the $200 million NFL G-4 fund, but that’s available to every team, every market. Any new stadium will cost at least $1 billion.

Also today, a sobering analysis by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution shows how cities struggle to make their money back even with glistening new stadia, characterizing these efforts as an “arms race”. Good thing that the leagues appear to be bedrock solid for the foreseeable future, because if they weren’t municipalities would be wading into their own “mutually assured destruction”. So dream big, people, because it’s not your money! Until there’s a price tag. Then it’s definitely your money.