Texans Reliant Stadium beginning to spawn NFL copycats

That's one thing that always seemed weird to me. It was stange for one side to be like 76 degrees and the other 103. I guess its kind of cool...kind of...sort of.

I like Realiant Stadium. It seemed pretty cool and looks pretty cool. I remember seeing it a couple of times driving by. If the Cowboys had a similiar one, I'd be happy. (not that I would go to a game, though. I don't know how much they cost, but I want to say NFL tickets are pretty expensive, at least for my family.)

 

What's the point of having a retractable roof if your going to have a hole in the side?

 

I think the new Arizona stadium was designed with no sharp edges so none of the fans will hurt themselves.

 

Those renderings look like Frank Gehry models. Anyways, I've never been a fan of indoor football stadiums. Actually, I thought the New Orleans model was really cool with the downtown skyline views.

Football is meant to be played outdoors with open air. I was disappointed that Reliant is pretty closed in on all sides. If ya'll want to see a real football stadium, I suggest you check out Kyle Field on a Saturday afternoon in the fall.

Kyle Field


Royal Texas Memorial Stadium


Memorial Stadium, Lincoln, Nebraska

 

From what I've heard the original plan was for Texas Stadium to have a retractable roof. I'm not sure why they didn't finish it though. It's unique the way it is but man that stadium is a serious eye sore. The Cowboys definately need a new stadium.

Jones has said that he wants the new stadium to be part of an amusement park (not the State Fair or the Cotton Bowl). He wants his own stadium with his own amusement park. They been talking about an area close to the trinity or the area right behind where Texas Stadium is currently located in Los Colinas.

 

i've heard this talk for a while...honestly, at least 2 years now with no concrete steps moving forward..but with an economy like this...and the continuing war on terrorism..i'm willing to bet it will be a long time before you could get voter approval for that kind of project. not sure how much he would be floating with his own private funds.

 

I would have to say that the war obviously changes (or at least postpones) any stadium plans. As for where the money is going to come from. They (city of Dallas) have been talking about putting together some kind of sports authority similar to what the City of Houston has that will basically come up with an idea for funding of a new stadium without killing the locals with all kinds of taxes. The latest idea has them adding an extra tax to all hotel, and car rentals. They've estimated that the amount generated would be more than enough to fund a new stadium. It all has to pass in a vote though. I personally think it will pass because the majority of the people that it will effect are out of towners.

Also Jones will fund the building of the amusement park himself. The tax payers would only be paying for the stadium itself. I also agree that a 100,000 seat stadium would be a mistake unless a good 20,000 of those seats can be removed in case the stadium doesn't sell out. I have a feeling that Jones knows what he's doing though. He may suck as a football man but this is one area where he is one of the absolute best at. I also think that he wants the revenue from the amusment park which is why he won't do it at Six Flags over Texas.

If the new stadium were built in Irving or Arlington it wouldn't be a big deal to the people of Dallas because we wouldn't have to pay the taxes to fund the new stadium. I would perfer for the Cowboys to be back in Dallas though.

 

By the time the Vikes get a new stadium, there will probably be something else beyond retractable roofs that tickle owners' fancies. It isn't on the horizon anytime soon.

As for the Cowboys, they'll probably get their pleasure palace in one of the suburbs and not have to return to the Cotton Bowl (domed or not). I don't think 100,000 capacity for regular season games is smart, either, and expect to see that scaled down in the final building.

I actually drove by Reliant for the first time the other day since it was finished. Beautiful stadium.

 

When has Dallas ever cared about lessening the burden on taxpayers? We've been talking about spending half a billion dollars of taxpayer money to build a private tollroad between one Ross Perot property and another (of course, they sold it to the public as something else, but Dallas has gone to court to win the right to not be forced to follow their campaign promises).

Makes even us Plano people seem sensible.

 

That's one reason why going to Arlington makes so much sense because they can raise the sales tax again like they did to build the Ballpark. They are one municipality that hasn't tapped out their potential funding sources.

I also think it would be easier to get a vote passed in Arlington vs. Dallas. Fewer people to convince, for one. And also Arlington, despite having the Rangers already, has the typical suburb issues in that they tend to support getting new, high-profile projects in an effort to put them on the map.

Dallas likes expensive projects, as well, but they do have the anti-tax north side to deal with (and a Mayor who was staunchly against the AAC), which is why this regional sports authority went through county government, I suppose.

 

An article about the Cowboys stadium deal. For what it's worth, the State passed the legislation necessary to get that Sports Authority district formed.

My own comments are sprinkled throughout.

Proposed Cowboys complex must set itself apart to win, experts say


04/04/2003

By STEVE BROWN / The Dallas Morning News

The plan is for a state-of-the-art sports facility on the edge of downtown Dallas, surrounded by a development with entertainment, restaurants and retail.

Sound familiar? It should.

That's what the Victory project promised five years ago.

And now another sports team owner and developer – the Dallas Cowboys' Jerry Jones – is considering a similar complex and more for a site southwest of downtown.

The problem, developers and leasing agents say, could be finding enough tenants for both.

Heck, I'd be happy with ONE tenant for the Victory project. I'd have been happy with one tenant for the development that was supposed to happen around Reunion when it was sold to the public. Twenty years. Nothing.

"To try and do two similar projects at the same time would be very difficult," said veteran downtown retail broker Jill Tiernan of the Weitzman Group.

Doing one has been tough enough.

Dallas voters approved $125 million in public financing in January 1998 to help pay for American Airlines Center on Stemmons Freeway northwest of downtown.

In return for public-sector support, developers promised to create an urban village of shops, restaurants, hotels, offices and residential space on more than 50 surrounding acres.

Five years later, the arena has been built but little else – even with an additional $45 million in public incentives approved last summer.

Now the Dallas Cowboys Football Club is floating a proposal to build a Cowboys-themed development that includes a stadium surrounded by entertainment venues, restaurants, office buildings, a hotel and playing fields. One of the sites being considered is southwest of downtown on Industrial Boulevard near Corinth Street. The Cowboys stadium and surrounding complex would also require a public-private partnership.

News of this potential project comes just weeks after Victory's lead retail and residential developer, New York-based Related Urban Development Corp., pulled out of the deal because of the poor economy. The company also said it lacked local support.

Lacked local support? The bending over and coughing up an additional $45 million with no requirements that they build anything resembling what was promised five years ago was not local support?

Victory owner Hillwood is preparing to release a new plan for its development.

"A new Cowboys complex along the Trinity would be a huge positive for all of downtown Dallas, with an impact similar to the effect Victory has had on the downtown area, particularly the West End and Uptown," said Jonas Woods, president of Hillwood Capital, which oversees development of Victory.

I would hope the impact would be more than the parking lot that the American Airlines Center has so far spawned.

"We haven't seen the actual plans, but from what was in the newspaper, it appears that the Cowboys facility will be more of an athletic complex promoting sports participation, while Victory is a dynamic mixed-use urban district with unique entertainment, dining and shopping experiences, integrated with hotels and offices."

Victory is a parking lot. It's not a dynamic mixed-use urban district with unique entertainment, dining and shopping experiences. It's a parking lot surrounding an arena. You can't say it is something until it actually is that.

Think different

Real estate developers say that for two such developments to have a chance in central Dallas, they will have to be very different.

"The Cowboys project needs to be a sports-based theme park," said developer Ken Hughes, who built the award-winning Mockingbird Station project near Southern Methodist University. "They have to recognize that they wouldn't want to go down there and put up something where they have to go head-to-head with Victory for the same tenants."

Ms. Tiernan said the two projects could be designed to appeal to different tenants.

Well, so far, the Victory development doesn't appeal to any tenants.

"Maybe a Cowboys facility would draw some components like ESPN Sports Zone and very theme-oriented restaurants and retail," she said. "There are some retail and restaurant uses that won't go to Victory because there is not enough land."

There's plenty of land still available around Victory because no one's built anything there yet.

Preliminary plans call for the Cowboys development to be three or four times the size of Victory with more of a sports theme. For instance, a recreation complex planned to accompany the football stadium would have facilities for rock climbing, bowling, basketball, volleyball, inline skating and ice skating.

Public recreational fields for youth and adult leagues in football, soccer and other sports are also being discussed.

Like Victory, the project is also to include a "town square" with retail stores, dining, bars and entertainment.

Victory's developers are sticking to an urban mixed-use theme, with shopping, hotel rooms, office buildings and apartments that will complement the nearby Uptown and West End neighborhoods.

Dallas shopping center broker Mickey Ashmore said it's unlikely that both of the projects will be built at once.

I don't think Victory will be built at all.

"These types of projects – even the most successful of them – have to be built in phases," said Mr. Ashmore, who is chief executive of Dallas' UCR Cos. "These centers take an intense amount of time, thought and effort."

The Ballpark in Arlington has been open for almost 10 years, and developers have still not started the mixed-use development proposed to accompany it.[/i]

And it never will come. If it was going to come based on the Ballpark, it would've either come by now or would've been there before since the old ballpark was already on the site.

And both the retail and office components of the Victory project have been repeatedly delayed.

Repeatedly delayed while the developers ask for more money to do less than what they originally promised.

'Coming home'

Despite the challenges, leasing agents and developers say it's worth almost any effort to bring the Cowboys from Irving back to Dallas.

"Conceptually, I like the idea of the Cowboys coming home," said Robert Bagwell, one of the developers of the successful West Village retail and apartment complex in Uptown. "It would be great for the neighborhood.

"I would give it more of a theme-park orientation myself than specialty retail," he said. "If you want to attract people, you need an urban theme park."

That jibes with the Cowboys' early plans, said Rob Allyn, who has been hired as spokesman for the development.

"The key difference with Victory is it will all be sports-themed," he said. "It will be a totally different deal.

I hope it will be different because Victory is just a parking lot.

"The Cowboys have had the luxury of looking at all of these developments around the country and being able to pick and choose what they want to do," he said.

The Jones family is committed to the idea of doing the project in one phase, Mr. Allyn said. "The idea is to build the entire doughnut, not just the hole," he said.

Without multiple venues, the new Cowboys stadium would be more challenged than American Airlines Center to provide year-round, regular events that would attract visitors, retail leasing experts say.

"What most prospective tenants will ask me as an agent is how often that stadium will be used," Ms. Tiernan said. "There are only a certain number of home games.

"American Airlines Center has two professional sports teams plus dozens of other events," she said. "Also, Victory is already closely linked to the West End and Uptown."

And yet they still can't lure a single tenant. Even Tom Hicks' company pulled out and Tom Hicks is one of the developers of the Victory project. He isn't interested in being a tenant is his own "development."

 

Just for the record, though, the city's contribution to the AAC deal were still limited even though the cost of the arena skyrocketed. They were capped at $125 million. That's nothing to sneeze at, but it's not as if the city spent all $425 million that the arena cost (or whatever it did cost).

I assume the AAC is the reason Jones wants a regional sports commission/taxing authority. I assume there would be the ability to potentially raise taxes in cities within the district that are not in Dallas, or even just directing some of those city's or county's taxes toward the development without necessarily raising them (just as the Houston arena did not require the raising of taxes).

I assume that's how it will be sold to the public, though I'm not sure of that. And, as the Victory development has turned out to be a lie, there's no reason to believe the funding mechanism won't also be a lie.

 

I should've said the "Senate" passed the required legislation.