New Football Stadiums
Will Bowl Over the Fans

Football teams are kicking off plans for the next generation of stadiums -- and they're expensive and ambitious.

A number of National Football League teams are laying the groundwork for a slew of stadiums to be completed between 2006 and 2009. From the New York Jets' plan to create a $1.4 billion stadium and convention facility on Manhattan's West Side to the San Diego Chargers' proposed stadium and condominium complex, the dreamers are in hot pursuit of some big ideas and big developments.

But bigger facilities with even bigger price tags don't necessarily mean more seats for fans. The idea behind these projects is to create a destination spot for more than football -- from conventions and concerts to dining, shopping and even places to live -- that will generate revenue beyond the dozen or so weeks of each team's NFL home season.

"These structures will become bigger to hold new ideas in constant entertainment and retail [use], and to create flexibility for the future as ideas change," says Dennis Wellner, founding principal of HOK Sport + Venue + Event, a sports architecture and planning firm in Kansas City, Mo.

But the plans are still far from assured. Construction of some of these ambitious facilities depends on local government and voter approval, tax subsidies -- and finding the right location.

In the meantime, the league faces an unusual dry spell when it comes to new stadiums. This year, in fact, is the first in a decade without a new or renovated facility for any NFL team. Over the past 13 years of concrete pouring and turf laying, 25 of the league's 32 teams moved into new or gussied-up stadiums.

Because so many have already been done, "there aren't that many logical candidates," says Neil Glat, NFL vice president for strategic planning and business development. "The others are taking their time to evolve and consummate."

So what is driving these bigger-is-better schemes?

One reason is the growing demand for projects that offer a variety of uses. Instead of sales taxes or use taxes, communities more and more finance projects like stadiums through bonds backed by incremental taxes -- relying on increased tax revenue from activities around the stadium. That means more uses for the site are needed to generate enough revenue compared with, say, a county sales tax.

"When you put that much money behind that much infrastructure, it's hard to justify the investment for 10 Sunday afternoons a year," says Robert P. Dunn, partner at Hammes Co., a Milwaukee-based sports consulting firm. "So the trend we see is using stadiums as anchors to broaden entertainment districts."

Adds Mark Rosentraub, dean of the College of Urban Affairs at Cleveland State University, in Cleveland, and a frequent consultant on stadium planning to cities: "It's a lot easier to sell a stadium if it's part of an overall economic-development plan. So teams have an interest in seeing something larger than just a stadium."

Another reason bigger projects are required these days is that larger concourses, more concessions and ample bathrooms have all become hallmarks of football stadiums. Mr. Wellner says that 1.6 million to two million square feet is standard size now, compared with one million to 1.2 million square feet before, but seating capacities haven't changed.

Of course, the destiny of each project remains firmly in the grip of regional forces -- political, economic, and social. "Each deal is local in nature," says the NFL's Mr. Glat, "and the local economy will shape it and the local views will assess it at their own pace."

For its part, the NFL is helping things along with a program that has already committed $650 million to stadium projects. The program, called G-3, for third generation, diverts money from luxury-seat sales and local television contracts across the league to specific stadium projects.

Three cities -- Indianapolis, New Orleans and San Francisco -- have been in preliminary talks about new stadiums for their NFL teams. Here's a look at some projects elsewhere that are further along -- and the likelihood that they'll ever come to pass:

NEW YORK JETS

Plans for the New York Sports and Convention Center, the official name of the Jets' would-be home, are more complicated -- and perhaps more controversial -- than any in the history of football. The stadium, priced at $1.4 billion, would be one of the most ambitious construction projects in the country.

Proponents tout it as the linchpin of a mammoth project that will drive the economic revival of the last underutilized neighborhood near midtown Manhattan. In addition to its role as a convention center for 20 to 30 events a year, the building also would be the main venue for the 2012 summer Olympic Games, for which New York is a finalist.

Proposed stadium for the New York Jets

The current design, by New York architects Kohn Pedersen Fox, envisions a retractable-dome building that can morph overnight from football stadium to convention center to banquet facility. It would be built atop a functioning rail yard, and the project would involve a city-financed extension of a subway line to the neighborhood. The state and city would each contribute $300 million to the project, with the Jets footing the rest of the bill, including cost overruns, team officials say.

But for the Jets, it's not all economics. The burden of 20 years of playing at its crosstown rival's house, Giants Stadium, spurred them to go for a new domicile. "There's a pretty good financial argument to stay at Giants Stadium," says Jay Cross, team president. "But that's not the heart and soul of professional sports. The home field is a sacred place for your team and fans and the public at large."

The Jets and the Olympics boosters want to get construction going by next year. NYC2012, the local group pursuing the Olympics, says it needs to show the International Olympic Committee New York's seriousness. The Jets want to start tossing the pigskin there in 2009.

While city and state leaders have gotten behind the massive undertaking, it has also stirred opposition. After much deliberation, the region's most respected civic-planning group, the Regional Plan Association, voted to oppose the project. "It's still out of scale with the rest of the district, creates congestion on event days, and isn't a nice place when there aren't events there," which according to the city would be 229 days a year, says Jeremy Soffin, a spokesman for the group. Another opponent, James Dolan, president of Cablevision Inc. and owner of the nearby Madison Square Garden, has funded television ads condemning the financing plan.

Among the hurdles that remain for the stadium: city-council approvals for zoning changes and financing from the state legislature. The team also still needs to negotiate with the semi-autonomous state Metropolitan Transportation Authority to build above its railroad tracks. And the environmental-review process won't wrap up until the end of the year.

PROGNOSIS: With New York Gov. George E. Pataki and New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg on board, the project has a decent chance of happening.

DALLAS COWBOYS

Big plans have gotten pared down as suitable sites for America's Team keep falling through.

The Cowboys' original proposal was for a retractable-roof stadium and retail and entertainment complex near the Trinity River in downtown Dallas. But the site was too complicated and expensive to build on, team officials say. It was a "brownfield" site, requiring environmental cleanup. And infrastructure costs were high because of the cost of moving a water-pumping station and bringing in light rail.

A second proposal, to place a stadium in Fair Park, a more spread-out area that is home to the Cotton Bowl, fell apart in June when the team ended negotiations with the county over the $425 million in public financing it wanted.

Now, the Cowboys, anxious to get a new home by 2009 when its lease expires at Texas Stadium in Irving, have signed a tentative deal with the nearby community of Arlington. The city council there voted unanimously last month to send the plan to a November ballot. Voter approval would trigger increases in sales, hotel and car-rental taxes, in addition to a $3 stadium parking fee and a 10% Cowboys' ticket tax. The levies would finance $325 million of the $650 million project.

The 75,000-seat stadium would be air-conditioned and have a retractable roof. The site is next door to Ameriquest Field, home of baseball's Texas Rangers, and near two amusement parks. Although the number of seats wouldn't increase much from the team's current home, a new facility would have more space for fans to spend money on souvenirs and beer, and would house the Cowboys Hall of Fame. It would also be expandable to 90,000 seats for special events such as the Super Bowl.

"This is an opportunity to construct a facility that can get Arlington and the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex back in the picture for these mega-type events," says Brett Daniels, a team spokesman.

PROGNOSIS: It's hard to imagine the Cowboys losing in the stadium game, especially since the team is again a playoff contender.

SAN DIEGO CHARGERS

After fears that the team would leave for Los Angeles, the Chargers and the city of San Diego came to an agreement in which the club won't bolt right away but the issue of a new stadium is open to negotiation.

The Chargers' have proposed to build a $400 million, 70,000-seat open-air stadium on the current Qualcomm Stadium site. The plan also calls for converting part of the current parking lot into thousands of condominium units, retail and office space and a 30-acre park. Public financing for the stadium would be backed with taxes earned from the condo development, something that team counsel Mark Fabiani acknowledges depends on California's red-hot real-estate climate. "All that changes if the housing market changes," he says. The team and the league would together kick in $200 million.

PROGNOSIS: Chances of the plan coming to fruition are much improved since the team agreed to stay in San Diego. But at this point, a public vote hasn't been set, nor has the plan been accepted by the city council.

LOS ANGELES

What this NFL-deficient megalopolis lacks in teams, it makes up for in ideas about where one could play.

There are four proposed options for an Angeleno NFL squad, which the league wants placed by the 2008 season. Two proposals, which a league official prices at "north of $450 million," involve fixing existing football stadiums, the Los Angeles Coliseum or the Rose Bowl. To reclaim these classic venues for 21st-century NFL standards, the plans would shrink the number of seats, add luxury boxes, improve fan sight lines and augment concessions.

The third option is a new stadium on a reclaimed municipal dump in Carson, a city between Los Angeles International Airport and Long Beach. A fourth idea would place a new stadium in Anaheim, south of Los Angeles.

NFL officials have met with representatives of all four spots in recent months and have set a spring 2005 deadline to make a decision.

PROGNOSIS: Believe it when you see it. Los Angeles has been waiting a decade for a team.

MINNESOTA VIKINGS

Proposed stadium of the Vikings

The team has a stadium concept in the shape of a Viking ship by Crawford Architects of Kansas City and a preferred site in Anoka County north of Minneapolis. It would include a practice facility, offices, a Vikings Hall of Fame, two hotels, a conference facility and a medical center.

What they don't have is the state financing the project needs. The legislature failed to pass a stadium bill this year, and time is running out, team officials say.

The Viking's lease at the Metrodome expires in 2011, which means a decision on a new stadium would have to be finalized by next summer.

PROGNOSIS: Gov. Tim Pawlenty is pushing to make it happen. But locals have been skeptical in the past of public financing. The state legislature adjourned without resolving the issue. And rumors about the sale of the team add to the uncertainty.

ARIZONA CARDINALS

Future stadium of the Arizona Cardinals

The $355 million indoor-outdoor, cactus-inspired venue is the only NFL stadium currently under construction. It's set to debut in the 2006 season.

The basic form, designed by Peter Eisenman, a New York architect, references the local barrel cactus and is topped with a retractable translucent fabric roof. But the signature feature isn't the retractable roof -- it's the retractable field. More than two acres of real grass will sit on a 12-million-pound tray that can be rolled into the parking lot to get sun exposure and to protect it when other events, like concerts and conventions, are being held inside. The stadium in Glendale will have 63,000 seats (expandable to 73,000 for the 2008 Super Bowl), 16,000 on-site parking spaces and 88 luxury suites.

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