I've been there. The ballpark is cool, but it's a ****ing hike to get to and from the game. Of course, most everything in Philadelphia sucks, so you aren't missing much other than a rub and tug.

The Giants and Devils play in a swamp.

The Cowboys and Rangers are 20 miles from downtown.

The Patriots play in the middle of nowhere.

No attendance issues.

The whole argument is retatrded

Power and Light is dead during most weeknights. It absolutely suffers from lack of attendance.

As far as attendance goes, that is only a small piece of my larger point. Someone earlier suggested an increase of only 3,000, which is probably about right, although I think it underestimates the number of corporate season ticket packages that would be sold.

The larger point is the economic impact on the surrounding area. What did Jackson get for the money?

I know what David Glass got. The value of his team increased, and he gets luxury suites to sell.

Meanwhile, nobody is going to shop at a store near the stadium while they kill time waiting for the game to start. Nobody is going to eat at a restaurant near the stadium before they go to the game. Nobody is meeting up for drinks afterwards, not near the stadium, anyway.

If I buy hamburgers and cook them in the parking lot, that makes no economic impact that wouldn't have been achieved by cooking them at home. Truth is, I probably bought those burgers from Hen House outside of Jackson County either way.

If I go to a concert on a Friday night at the Sprint Center, I probably go straight from work, eat at a restaurant near there, go to the concert, and maybe hit up P&L for some drinks afterwards if my old ass isn't too tired from arguing on the internet all day.

If I go to a Royals game on a Friday night, I go home for an hour or so (I work in OP) and either eat at home or grab something on the way. I spend zero dollars in Jackson County that aren't directly related to the game. How does that help recoup the investment?

This argument is unique to baseball, and only one team you listed plays baseball...and they have been to consecutive World Series.

did KCMO/Jackson Co get fleeced on teh Arrohead/K deal? Opinions (i don't have a dog in the figh, but lean towards they did)

They've only had 7 seasons where they've averaged under 30,000 a game for the 18 seasons that park has been open.

Only once under 25,000.

The Series has nothing to do with it.

You can whine and cry and stomp your feet all you want, but $250M was just spent on the K - you're looking at 10-15 years minimum before your dream of a downtown ballpark is even possible.

By then, you'll be an adult, and your priority likely won't be looking for somewhere to get ****ed up before or after the game.

You make some valid points Saul but P&L was built along with the Sprint Center because the thought was they were guaranteed a NHL or NBA team. Neither has happened and probably won't for the foreseeable future.

True. That is yet another black eye for our city planning. I don't get too caught up in that one for the reason Reaper mentioned earlier. The Sprint Center is more than pulling it's own weight even without a team. That said, it's not what the taxpayers were promised nor wanted.

It's a waste that all this money was dumped into these grandiose ventures, yet they do so little to complement one another.

The greater KC area has some of the best facilities in the country, but they are all over the place.

You have the renovated stadiums out at Raytown Road and the Blue Ridge Cutoff. You have the Sprint Center downtown, you have Livestrong and Community America in Wyandotte, you have the soccer complex in Overland Park, and you have the Hockey arena in Independence.

I look at what has been done on the west side of State Line, and I see a vision. I look east, and I'm not sure what I see.

It isn't that difficult to envision a scenario in which Kansas City would have the Sprint center where it currently sits, Kaufman Stadium where the new performing arts center is, Livestrong and the soccer complex where Bannister Mall was, the Independence Events Center where it currently sits, a renovated Arrowhead where it currently sits, and the NASCAR track right next to it along with the casinos, restaurants, shopping, etc. that went along with it.

Every one of those things were proposed, and every one of them got done. It's just that a lot of them got done at other locations to the detriment of Jackson County.

I'm not pissed about it. What's done is done, but I'm not going to bury my head in the sand and ignore it so that when the next great opportunity knocks we shit the bed again because we refuse to acknowledge past mistakes and learn from them.

It's OK, Saul has put enough stupidity in it for both of you



(and considering all of the ground the two of you normally cover in that aspect, that's really saying something)

How many times is your larger point going to change? Because attendance was most certainly your larger point at the beginning of all this.

Thats funny. I thought the first two comments I made on page one of this thread were that Kansas Citians are more concerned about parking lots than with finding a location where a developer would actually want to build something.

Kaufman opened in 1973. Nearly 40 years later, we've got a Taco Bell...so there's that. I'm sure the construction crew just took a wrong turn, though. There's going to be some serious revitalization going on there any second now. Then you'll show me.

Google "things to do near Kauffman Stadium" and click the first result.

It takes you to trip advisor where someone from Chicago asks what there is to do since he is booked at the Sheraton by the stadium. It pretty well captures it.

Your first couple of posts were just sarcastic remarks. This is your first post where you actually started to explain your reasoning. I see no mention of financially benefiting he community around he stadium.

They were sarcastic because the very notion of someone actually developing the area around the sports complex is absurd.

A baseball stadium is an anchor venue which hosts massive events 80 to 90 days per year. Instead of harnessing the economic potential of 2,000,000 people into an area where they might want to engage in revenue generating activities while enjoying a full entertainment experience, we point them towards the middle of nowhere where they park their cars, go directly into the stadium, immediately return to their cars after the game, and leave the area.

Here we are, your first mention of spending money in the local community. Post #126. Yeah, that has been your larger point since the beginning. :rolleyes:

No, we direct people to a place where they can throw one great big party.

And if you were really concerned about spending money in the community around the ballpark, you would be all for development of that area. What better way to bring money into the community than to create jobs?

Am I right to assume that Keitzman owns some property in downtown KCMO?

I know that when I think of Kaufman Stadium, I think of of one big party.

Why would I advocate spending tens of millions of dollars to create another entertainment district when the city just did that downtown? Nobody wants to go to that area, and nobody would if the stadiums weren't there.

If Kansas City never had a baseball or football team but were just granted an expansion team, nobody would suggest building the stadium on the Blue Ridge Cutoff.

When it was determined that a new and/or renovated stadium was needed, we should have said "it was a good run, but 40 years have passed, and the surrounding area is worse now than it was then, so it's time for a change".

This is the civil equivalent to deciding between re-upping Matt Cassel and trying to build more weapons around him and drafting a new QB.

Keitzman is on Facebook as I type this, furiously banging out friend requests to every "Saul" his search comes up with, hoping to find Saul Good.


Saul, your points are not without merit, but I think Reaper nailed it some time back - KC is a travelers city. Everyone here loves to drive. The Complex is literally no more than 30 minutes away for most everybody in the metro, and nobody thinks twice about taking the trip.

In your opinion, had the Royals built downtown and had been playing there the past, say, seven years, do you feel they would have had a significant bump in attendance numbers? Factor in how they've played in that time period before you answer that....

I'm looking at an aerial view of downtown KC, and I'd love to know what city blocks you're going to demolish to make room for a baseball stadium.

That's the other issue.

I assume they'd have to nuke some crackhouse neighborhoods off to the east of downtown to make it work.

I'm pretty sure that in 10-15 years there will be exactly zero use for the big, new Kansas City Star printing building. :D

But wait, it has to be close to P/L.

What, are you trying to get someone on I-670 murdered when Myers hits a homer onto the ****ing highway??/

This is Kansas City, sir. I regularly call up my clients after work and take them out to the east side for some choice crack rock. Wouldn't it be nice if I could pregame with them at the trap house and THEN go to the Royals game?

The downtown stadium will improve attendance to the point that driving during game times will be nothing more than sporadic.

I don't know that there would be a "significant" bump, but I think there would be a 10% increase. Of course, that's speculation.

LMAO

Well, there's about a 1/3 of the land necessary.

I'm sure looking forward to crossing the interstate to get to P/L.

About as much as fighting traffic and finding a place to park.

LMAO

Hell, at the rate it's going, in 10-15 years you can use the land currently occupied by P/L.

LMAO This discussion just got significantly funnier the past several posts. This one is the best of them.

But, but, WHERE will I be able to find a bar in KC that I can get a bottle of Grey Goose for $300? #blowmeMosaic

There were several proposals made. Barrett Sports group worked with the Downtown Development Council on a 40k seat stadium at 7th and Main.

I believe that the Kauffman foundation also offered to donate the land that has since been used for the performing arts center, but others may know more about that than me.

There were also plans to build it up against Union Station which was one of the locations proposed back before the stadium was originally built.

If Demonpenz and Snugga say we should move it downtown, then they need to get a committee together.

Snugga is out of town attending a fundraiser, unfortunately.

Tear down Kemper Arena. Build a new baseball stadium. Revitalize the West Bottoms. Boom.

Wait. What? Earlier in the thread you were practically guaranteeing an increase in attendance from all the white collar stiffs who walk across the street to catch a few innings. Now it's just speculation? I'm starting to think tk13 was right, you're just tolling us are't you? That, or you are a major moron.

that.

7th and Main. Great location, right next to nothing. That mile-long walk to P/L before/after the game sounds exciting.

Union Station? You're going the wrong way.

You're arguing for "things to do" other than the ballgame. Those locations don't exactly help the situation, IMO.

Great idea, other than Saul's arguing KC shouldn't develop any other areas because they already spent money on P/L.

If you're going to develop an area, develop the area around the K.

Here's an article from 2004


Kemper backs downtown ballpark

KEVIN COLLISON

Add another voice � a particularly prominent businessman this time � to those who believe a downtown ballpark would be a wise use of taxpayer dollars to keep the Royals here.

�Personally, I'd rather see a downtown ballpark than spend a lot of money refurbishing a ballpark at the Truman Sports Complex,� said R. Crosby Kemper III, CEO of UMB Bank.

�The ideal situation would be to do a smaller refurbishment of Kauffman (Stadium), extend the lease a little more and simultaneously land bank land in downtown and plan to build a new downtown stadium 10 years out. That makes sense to me rather than spend $177 million on a stadium renovation.�

Kemper, however, thinks a downtown ballpark idea probably will remain backstage while the Bistate II effort plays out. Bistate supporters continue to tweak their plan to make it more palatable to voters. Last week they proposed a quarter-cent sales tax that would last 12 to 15 years instead of 25 years. It would raise about $1 billion.

In the meantime, the estimated construction cost of renovating Arrowhead and Kauffman stadiums to meet the terms agreed to by the team owners and Jackson County officials to extend the leases has escalated to $180 million for each facility. Bistate is the chosen vehicle for financing those improvements.

While observing that it would have been better if the community had had an open debate before deciding how to respond to the needs of the Royals and Chiefs, Kemper said he understood why Jackson County Executive Katheryn Shields and county lawmakers took matters into their own hands.

�We've been playing with this a long time, and Katheryn Shields felt we needed to get off the dime,� he said. �The bistate thing is being run by people responding to the fact the county legislature has already made a deal. They've made the decision to go ahead and now are tweaking what's in or out.�

Meanwhile, Kemper said he and others have talked privately about their support for a downtown ballpark, and a quiet effort is under way to determine the feasibility of the idea.

�It is being looked at, but I don't know where (Royals owner) David Glass is,� he said. �Everyone agrees a ballpark should be downtown if we're going to spend that kind of money. The problem is, a process already is in place.

�Everybody is waiting to see what happens with bistate.�

In the past Kemper has said that Kansas City needs to be more focused on prioritizing its major endeavors. He strongly backs Julia Irene Kauffman's proposed performing arts center, which has yet to raise all of its estimated $300 million construction cost. He also was an early supporter of H&R Block Inc. coming downtown.

�We need a decision on what it is we want to support in the community,� Kemper said. �I think a downtown ballpark makes more sense than an arena for a lot of reasons.�

There are several locations where Kemper thinks a ballpark would be doable, including the north loop; the area east of Ilus W. Davis Park ; the Crossroads area; and the property being considered for an arena at 14th Street and Grand Boulevard, much of which is controlled by UMB.

Would UMB being willing to help with the 14th and Grand site?

�My position all along is we have a major piece of property there,� Kemper said. �If a good civic use is proposed, we'd be willing to work with developers.�

While Kemper likes the idea of a downtown ballpark, he takes with a grain of salt the spinoff benefits touted for any major sports facility.

�I don't believe that downtown stadiums or arenas, from a cultural and economic value, do much,� he said. �It's a symbolic value and a good one. ...If we need to spend a lot of money to keep a team here, we ought to do it downtown.�

On a related note, two weeks ago the idea of a smaller, �boutique� ballpark for downtown was suggested in this space by the architects at Heinlein Schrock Stearns. The firm said that for the roughly the same amount that is being proposed to renovate Kauffman Stadium, a 25,000- to 28,000 seat state-of-the-art ballpark could be built downtown.

They said the design would handle all but the largest crowds attending Royals games and for really big games temporary seating could accommodate 15,000 more fans. The ballpark would have all the revenue-generating amenities the Royals would need and offer an intimate setting unparalleled in major-league baseball.

A rough illustration of how their ballpark could be situated downtown, including where the temporary seating could be located, is included with today's column.

Heinlein Schrock is capable of some mega-ideas as well. The firm was selected last week by the New York Jets to be the sports design architect of its proposed $1.4 billion stadium in Manhattan. That is another feather in the cap of Kansas City's reputation as being the nation's sports architecture capital.

Yeah, think of all the white-collar walk-across-the-street stiffs they'd be getting if the park was next to Union Station.

Dude's all over the map.

Columbus Park with the Grand Slam Liquor Remy Martin mural as the backdrop.

Where would you put the haunted houses?

lmao. this place rules.

Wait, sorry, I meant "vitalize."

An eight year old article is irrelevant.

And the idea of knocking down Kemper Arena won't work. The plot of land isn't big enough, and you have potential flooding issues building in the West Bottoms. Plus highway access is a bitch.

That would be .6 miles from P&L. The walk to your car in the parking lot at Kauffman is every bit of that.

Just build it in sunny Olathe and be done with it.

It's amazing to watch. Typically I would be swearing like a sailor at him out of frustration from the lack of logic and common sense on display here. But this has me sitting here in a state of complete amusement.

Good call. Didn't realize the land was that tight until I looked at the map.

Highway access, parking and traffic would be a nightmare, and you're still nowhere near Saul's baby, P/L.

I say we build it in Minot, North Dakota, and just have one of those bullet trains take us back and forth. No more sweating your asses off in the summer heat! And yes, Saul, we'll build a Shark Bar there for somewhere to go. Maybe a Makers Mark for you fancy ****s.

It will happen eventually.

There really IS no open downtown location that is suitable. The Kauffman Center took the last big chunk of prime development. You could build down by the River Market, put the park next to the Missouri River, then watch it surf to New Orleans in the next big flood. But until that happens, think how entertaining it would be to see guys in canoes fish homers -and dead prostitutes- out of the muddy MO!

could tear down Children's Mercy hospital and put it there.

blow up the down town airport

Seriously?

Wyandotte County created the entire Legends shopping district around the race track. The very notion that you couldn't do that around the Truman Sports Complex is what's absurd.

Yeah. Nobody works at Hallmark across the street. The largest building in Kansas City is an excruciating 1.3 miles away. The Hyatt being right there would suck.

Yeah, .6 miles across BLUFFS. Sheesh, I thought you were trying to make this easier for people.....

Where the **** do you park?

It's .7 of a mile from the Home Plate entrance of the K to the goddamn Drury Inn and Suites across the ****ing highway.

Christ, it's only .8 of a mile from the Chiefs practice facility, and that's taking the street the entire way and not cutting across lots.

LMAO

Another problem with a lot of the land adjacent to the river is, a lot of it that is currently vacant are EPA superfund sites. There's a lot of seriously polluted property in the older part of the city. Cleaning it up to allow for new construction would be crazy expensive.

We could rename the Jones rooftop pool to Balboni's Cove.

P&L is 8 blocks north of Union Station, btw.

Hey now, don't be hating on good bourbon.

high speed rail from downtown to Truman!!

LMAO

1 mile exactly according to Google Maps.

I'm not walking a mile to get a beer after the game.

The point of having a downtown ballpark is that you don't have to walk that far to do so.

where do you park? You park wherever the 50,000 people who work there park every day.

I like it.

I always though 20th and Broadway would be a perfect spot for a ballpark. I know its mainly warehouses and other business, land acquistions would be high though. But you would have access off I-35 there, and the view of downtown would be perfect. Also I nice buffer between downtown, Union Station and the Crossroads.

But then again Kansas City is a very driving oriented city, its a smaller version of the Metroplex. (That will gall some douches like Laz who hate Texas) But its the truth, KC is spread out and Dallas is the major city that KC is the most like. Hell they built their ballpark out in the suburbs as well and all that is around it is Six Flags and Wal Mart Supercenter. Urban living with the sports venues is cool but it has to feel right for the city IMO. St. Louis has all the stadiums downtown and its nice for us outtowners, I don't know how I would feel about it if I lived out in Chesterfield and wanted to go to a Cardinals game alot of the time.

I've never parked more than 200 yards from the gate, Chiefs or Royals.

I don't think there's a parking spot on the property that's .6 of a mile from the K.

According to you, that type of walk is typical.

Which was his whole point earlier. Less walking because everything is across the street or with in a block. This is almost surreal.

It's a pain in the ass.

American Royal is already got a plan in place for it.
http://www.americanroyal.com/press_release.aspx?p=8

Like I said, he's all over the map.

That plan was prior to power and light being built. I'm pretty sure they would be shuttles going back and forth from the stadium to power and light.

He's getting really close to being off the map.

Hey, now we're talking about taking a shuttle to the bar.

Comical.

Figured for locals it would suck. When we go to St Louis we get a hotel and just roll from there. I always like the Drury by the Dome. Cheap price for free parking, food, and its right next to Lacelde's Landing and Casino. Normally get a cab to Scottrade or Busch for the game.