Don't forget Prince William County on the VA side as well as both Montgomery and Frederick counties on the Maryland side. There's a good bit of wealth in those suburbs. They could try to tap into the regional nickname of DMV for the team name.
No one has pounced on Fauquier County FC? [pronounced FAW-kyer ] Lived in Sterling and Fairfax, area is rolling in money that even earning near US GDP per capita is poor. Oh, and https://twitter.com/SoccerInsider/status/238326293643534336
I think Northern Virginia would be a better territorial association than Loudoun. To me and lot of other people I know in McLean, Loudoun seems like a further away place than it is in reality. In reality, from my house in McLean to where the Loudoun stadium would be is only a few minutes longer than a drive to RFK. Distance wise it's a lot further away, but without the city traffic it's pretty similar time-wise. In a lot of people's lifetimes, before the massive development, Loudoun County was considered the boonies. In 1990 it had a population of 86,129, but in 2010 it was 312,311, a 462% increase, and I'm sure its gone up a few thousand more in the last couple years. I know a few people who still have the boonies perception of Loudoun, as comically out-of-date as it is. Even if they go with Loudoun as the territorial name I'd doubt they'd limit the marketing to Loudoun, not with the money in the area as others have mentioned. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_highestincome_counties_in_the_United_States#cite_note-0 Feel free to jump in if you're from the area and you've experienced differently, but in my experience there aren't many people that identify where they live in the area by the county it's in. If it's with someone else from the area the city/CDP name is given (e.g. McLean, Sterling, Reston, etc.), and if it's with someone outside the area usually it's "Northern Virginia" or "DC area". I really can't think of anybody I know that identifies themselves as being from Fairfax County, or Loudoun, etc. The Northern Virginia community would be better represented with a team calling itself "Northern Virginia ____". If they do go with Loudoun County that won't stop me from checking them out once or twice, but given the clamoring the areas of NoVa bordering on The District have had for a sports team of its own, with all the DC area teams that go the suburbs going to suburban Maryland, Northern Virginia would probably resonate better.
Virginia is different in the County/City structure anyways, so the identity issue is just strange compared to other places. Add Montgomery (13th) and Frederick counties, both of which would have areas that are within easy driving distance of the stadium, and that makes the above list even more ridiculous. One thing though, avoid calling it NoVa anything. The community college system has an even more comically outdated reputation (Nova - Where the N stands for knowledge) than Loudoun County does. I agree on the reputation that Loudoun has. I played a HS football game at Loudoun Valley in either 92 or 93 and it felt the same as a trip to Culpepper does today.
Seriously? Ashburn Virginia is easy driving distance from Gaitherburg or Germantown or Bethesda? When is the last time you have done that drive? Even Frederick is a stretch to make that claim - 45 minutes with no traffic. Try getting through Leesburg with no traffic for a Saturday evening game.
I drive that area quite often. If you know your back roads/shortcuts well enough, it's not a bad drive.
This bit of news might interest NoVa watchers. http://www.ballparkdigest.com/20121...loudoun-hounds-we-have-deal-for-2014-ballpark Again, though, no shovels in the ground up there yet, and one wrong turn in the economy might leave that whole project looking like Echelon Place in Vegas. Also, no word on whether the Hounds agreed to share that stadium with an NASL club, though it does seem that would have to be part of the deal, yes?
"This is an exciting time for HoundsNation and the entire community," said someone unaware of irony but well-versed in hyperbole. Is there any crossover between ownership groups?
Also, they hire and pay professionals to design their web sites. That's more than we can say for some rumored NASL clubs.
Bonus for conversion between games. Bogus for play quality for both sports. In fact wouldn't this make it the only artificially turfed field in MiLB?
I don't know if Syracuse is still turf or not. (And Loudoun wouldn't actually be in MiLB, which is the official designation reserved for affiliated minor league baseball. They're going to be in the Atlantic League, which is an independent circuit outside MiLB, but I know you were referring to it generically.)
Pretty sad that all of affliated MiLB now has real grass but two MLB teams are still forced to play on a glorified carpet.
Two? TWO? Dear Lord, do you not remember when half of the Major League teams were on turf? I don't know quite what the option would be in St. Pete, and Toronto is multipurpose. Also, it's not completely true about affiliated MiLB (redundant). PK Park in Eugene is turf and Coveleski Stadium in South Bend is turf. Ottawa's ballpark will be getting turf when it gets a team. The reasons are pretty simple: the turf era is almost over for baseball, and most teams (at all levels) are playing in recently-built and single-tenant facilities. No need for turf.
Well if the Rays and Jays have their way we'll be down to 0 before long. The Rays are working on yet another iteration of their new ballpark and the Jays are still considering ending the Skydome's multipurpose days by kicking the Argos out and locking the stands permanently in the baseball configuration. As for MiLB I was unaware of Eugene (which frankly is sad since I'm a Padres fan but I've also never been there). I thought we'd lost the last turf stadium in affiliated ball with PGE Park. Guess I was wrong, unfortunately.
I fear it will be quite a while before the Rays are playing elsewhere. Unfortunately. Hadn't heard that. Would like to read more about that. Then you still have the whole fact it's in Toronto thing. Here, our retractable roof stadium can have grass, but they can keep the roof open quite a bit more here than in Toronto.
I'll see if I can dig up the Toronto article. It was from a few months ago. And while their roof is almost as bad as Chase Field's when it comes to suitability for growing grass, they feel they can do it with the heat lamps like the Euro soccer stadiums do at similar latitudes.
Chase Field's roof is not bad for growing grass, as it turns out. That was my point. Toronto is hampered by far less sunlight and far more cold weather than we have here.
From what I've read from the groundskeepers, Chase is bad in the corners due to the high "sides" of the stadium. But overall you're right it's not bad, particularly for the first stadium designed to have real grass indoors part time.