Is the running track at Icahn in exactly the same place as the running track at Downing Stadium was? There was not a lot of room between the east side of Downing and the elevated highway. If the track is now closer to the highway, it gets pretty tight. Or would a refurbishment of Icahn mean building around the other sides and leaving the existing side of Icahn as is? Of course, all this still begs the question of how are you going to get a 20,000 crowd off Randall's Island before 3 a.m.
No idea about the track or the stadium set up However; Completely agree with that - basically 1 road in and 1 road out (or there abouts) and it would be a nightmare So a major infrastructure project would also be required In addition, the soccer fields seem to be in fairly heavy use at the weekends, so where would all those teams go to?
Huge project and recently there was a walkway project that was to connect the bronx to Randals and extend to a greenway to Astoria - i think that hit a snag too. http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york...eal-article-1.1010521?localLinksEnabled=false
I don't think those walkways would do a thing to fix the problem of gettin 20-25K off the island in a reasonable amount of time. You are still looking at a Mile+ walk to the nearest subway in the Bronx and a 3+ mile walk to the nearest train in Queens. Unless the 2nd Ave Subway were to extend to Randall's Island it will never be a reasonable location for an MLS stadium IMHO.
Yeah you can say that again. It's sad that Randall's Island wasn't worked into the 2nd Ave subway construction. Wouldn't they have wanted to connect it to the MTA:
Ed NYC told me that they already have ferries. I'm all for it. I really enjoyed the East River Ferries this summer. But it would need to expand access points and it would be a bigger hurdle than, say, taking the PATH which many blamed alienated New Yorkers.
You would still be looking at a several block walk to the nearest subway from where ever you dock the ferries at.
Just out of curiosity, what's that railroad that runs across Randall's Island? Is it Freight or Transit?
Took a ferry to the Electronic Zoo last summer. It did a decent job, but as I said there is still the issue of a relatively long walk to a subway no matter were you dock the ferry on the other end.
Being that the 2nd ave subway will be in effect by the time this stadium is built (probably), the walk won't be THAT bad.
I think it's part of the Amtrak line that runs from Penn Station to Boston. No commuter trains on it, but there are some freight trains. No station at Randall's Island. Don't know how difficult it would be to build one just to service shuttles from Penn Station 15-20 days a year. Several gazillion dollars less difficult than digging a subway extension under the East River, however.
Well not sure where the stadium would be and where these walkways would be. I can only think the only way a walkway to really effectively help is by putting the stadium on the south part of an island and having a walk way to connect the southern part to Astoria park - still a walk but i dont think its 3 miles to the nearest train but yeaI think its a good 20 minute walk though - which in the blistering sun kind of sucks ass.
It cost 215 Million to build the new rail station at the Meadowlands. While I don't believe as much would would need to be done, You're still looking at a major pricetag for a station to be used 15-20 days a year.
Maybe by the time Cosmos get its act together and gets into the MLS, you will be able to get "beamed" onto Randalls' Island In all seriousness though, I cant see how Randalls' Island could cope, especially in terms of the infrastructure required Even ferries - not sure they would really have the capacity - say they held 300 (even 500)................you would be trying to move 15-20000 people quickly? Either need a lot of ferries or speed boats!!
I mean, the lack of knowledge of the PATH train was enough to deter people to use public transit to Harrison, NJ. Only now are people understanding what it is...thus the attendance increases. Imagine that with ferries and walkways and such. If the trend holds true, attendance definitely wouldn't be that high...especially when we consider bad weather which always plagues NYC during soccer matches (hurricanes, snow storms, etc). Even with Henry and Marquez, attendances still were low.
I know its all private boats but how many people take the boat to Husky Stadium? Do they run public ferries over to those games? Just curious - i mean i know it holds a large amount (prior to the recent work) - how does that work.
I mean, now they average close to 18-19K tickets sold. But in terms of in-game attendance, it was well below expected, will probably average 20K sold in 2012.
Not enough to matter. There aren't any public ferries, but there are a couple of beer cruises that will take you to games, but other than that, you're looking at some dude and his friends that are pulling up in their boat. Out of the 40k-60k that attend UW games, you're probably only looking at a couple hundred to a thousand that are showing up by boat. Most are students walking across campus, non-students that are driving themselves, or driving part of the way, then taking a bus to the stadium. They are currently building a light rail line from downtown that will dead head in the stadium's parking lot, but that won't be done until 2016.