Houston's MLS dream alive, but clock's ticking

[truthandlife]

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/sports/3378558

Houston's MLS dream alive, but clock's ticking

The Anschutz Entertainment Group and Mexico's Club América (or a combination of the two) are the players in the current scenario. AEG would like to move the Earthquakes from San Jose, Calif., and recently has explored the possibility of having the team move to Robertson Stadium on the University of Houston campus.

As for now, the potential of MLS at Robertson Stadium seems a stretch....

But if Robertson is out, other possibilities exist besides cost-prohibitive Reliant Stadium and outdated Rice Stadium.

One is the Richard Berry Complex on Barker Cypress and West Road in west Houston. In the middle of youth soccer country, the Cy-Fair ISD facility could make sense.

The complex's priority is to serve the students' needs, but it also has concerts and theater productions on the agenda. Its playing surface is FieldTurf, and its dimensions comply with those required for soccer. Seating capacity is about 18,000.

This is not your typical high school facility.

A recent Harris County-Houston Sports Authority bid to host next year's NCAA Men's College Cup listed the complex as the playing site (St. Louis was chosen to host the competition).

The North Shore/Galena Park Stadium in the Galena Park ISD is another possibility for a temporary home south of downtown.

SEE ALL OF THE ARTICLE AT THE LINK ABOVE

[anderson]

One is the Richard Berry Complex on Barker Cypress and West Road in west Houston. In the middle of youth soccer country, the Cy-Fair ISD facility could make sense.

The complex's priority is to serve the students' needs, but it also has concerts and theater productions on the agenda. Its playing surface is FieldTurf, and its dimensions comply with those required for soccer. Seating capacity is about 18,000.

This is not your typical high school facility.Interesting. Cy-Fair is the third-largest school district in Texas and has a rapidly growing Hispanic population (like most of the suburban ISDs here). Geographically, it's still pretty good and reasonably convenient for folks in the Inner Loop. CFISD sits just to the Northwest of HISD - the Delmar complex is actually almost on the border of HISD and CFISD.

[truthandlife]

http://www.cfisd.net/bond/esc/ESC%20site%20plan.jpg


http://www.cfisd.net/bond/esc/esc1.jpg
General Information, Description, and Amenities

The Richard E. Berry Educational Support Center ( Berry Center) is funded by the 2001 Bond Referendum. This project was one of the nine schools and five support facilities, included in this bond referendum. Voters demonstrated their significant endorsement of the bond package that the community-led bond steering committee recommended by passing the bond election in December 2001.

The Berry Center will relieve the demands for facilities for district-wide staff development for teachers; graduation exercises; extra and co-curricular activities, performances and competitions (choir, band, drama, UIL competitions, athletic events); and catering and banquets for honors, awards, and celebrations, as well as address community needs for meetings, events, and receptions. The Berry Center is available for non-district events, subject to policies and guidelines for use of this facility.

Amenities include a 16,000 square-foot staff development/conference center, which can be partitioned into 17 rooms; 456-seat auditorium; multi-purpose arena designed for 9,500 maximum capacity with 8,300 fixed seats; floor banquet seating and catering facilities to accommodate the preparation and serving of 1,000 meals; complete loading dock, backstage marshalry, star and support dressing areas; 4,000 space parking area, and administrative office space.



Location

The 65-acre site that is also home to the district’s second athletic stadium is located at Barker Cypress and West Road. As a result of combining both facilities on the same site, the district realized approximately $3.2 million net savings by sharing the parking lots.



Construction Status

These facilities, with a projected cost of $72.9 million, are currently in the construction phase. PBK Architects, Inc. along with their design consultant, HOK Sport Venue presented the final design to the Board in June 2003. The district received construction proposals for the facilities in February 2004, and groundbreaking ceremonies were conducted in June of 2004. The project is scheduled to be completed in March 2006 in time to hold commencement exercises in May for the graduating Class of 2006.



General Manager

Beth Wade assumed responsibilities as the general manager in May 2005. If you are interested in scheduling an event, please contact Beth Wade at 281-807-8948.

[jlasoon]

Don't touch the Quakes, this would be a travesty for the league if they moved the Quakes. I'm all for a team in Houston but not at the expense of the Quakes. MOVE KC.

[ElJefe]

Don't touch the Quakes, this would be a travesty for the league if they moved the Quakes. I'm all for a team in Houston but not at the expense of the Quakes. MOVE KC.
The funny thing is that people were saying the exact opposite two years ago.

[ThreeApples]

The funny thing is that people were saying the exact opposite two years ago.Not really. The noise from the Move San Jose idiots had pretty much died down two years ago, until they were given new life a few months later by the news of Club America's interest. And the Move Kansas City idiots have never really gone away.

[ElJefe]

Not really. The noise from the Move San Jose idiots had pretty much died down two years ago, until they were given new life a few months later by the news of Club America's interest. And the Move Kansas City idiots have never really gone away.
When the Wizards were averaging 14,000 and 15,000 a game in 2003 and 2004, there was a noticeable decline in the "MOVE KANSAS CITY!!!111oneone" posts and threads. Simultaneously, the Quakes were drawing pretty poorly on a semi-regular basis, so there was a lot more negative fan attention in their direction.

My point, however, is that the BigSoccer cognescenti have very short memories. People act like Kansas City is fundamentally incapable of drawing decent crowds even though they were pulling good crowds on Saturday nights last season. Similarly, I could state the easily verifiable fact that Dallas drew crowds of at least 15,000 and 16,000 on most Saturday nights in 2002 and those same people would act like I suggested that dragons used to roam the skies.

Honestly, the BigSoccer readership has a very short attention span. A team puts up a couple of good attendances and suddenly, that market is the greatest thing since sliced bread. Conversely, a couple of crap attendances and that market is the worst in the history of the league.

[Calexico77]

Not really. The noise from the Move San Jose idiots had pretty much died down two years ago, until they were given new life a few months later by the news of Club America's interest. And the Move Kansas City idiots have never really gone away.

two years ago? It was in full swing at the beginning of this season. . .

[scaryice]

When the Wizards were averaging 14,000 and 15,000 a game in 2003 and 2004, there was a noticeable decline in the "MOVE KANSAS CITY!!!111oneone" posts and threads. Simultaneously, the Quakes were drawing pretty poorly on a semi-regular basis, so there was a lot more negative fan attention in their direction.

My point, however, is that the BigSoccer cognescenti have very short memories. People act like Kansas City is fundamentally incapable of drawing decent crowds even though they were pulling good crowds on Saturday nights last season. Similarly, I could state the easily verifiable fact that Dallas drew crowds of at least 15,000 and 16,000 on most Saturday nights in 2002 and those same people would act like I suggested that dragons used to roam the skies.

Honestly, the BigSoccer readership has a very short attention span. A team puts up a couple of good attendances and suddenly, that market is the greatest thing since sliced bread. Conversely, a couple of crap attendances and that market is the worst in the history of the league.

For the 50th time, KC has a history of NOT drawing good crowds, not the opposite as you state. So you're the one with the short memory, since you keep bringing up their 2003-4 seasons and ignoring the entire history.

[ElJefe]

For the 50th time, KC has a history of NOT drawing good crowds, not the opposite as you state. So you're the one with the short memory, since you keep bringing up their 2003-4 seasons and ignoring the entire history.
You act as if we should ignore the 2003 and 2004 seasons. To me, a team that averages 16,216 on 12 Saturday nights, with five different games drawing more than 20,000 fans and a sixth drawing more than 18,000 shows that that market can support professional soccer, given an ownership group and front office that are working hard to sell tickets.

Meanwhile, while you're running around, acting as if Kansas City has always been a lost cause and that the 2003 and 2004 seasons were a fluke, attendance-wise, it's pretty obvious that they were the culmination of a steadily building fanbase:

1999: 8,183
2000: 9,112
2001: 10,954
2002: 12,255
2003: 15,573
2004: 14,816

[Earthshaker]

You act as if we should ignore the 2003 and 2004 seasons. To me, a team that averages 16,216 on 12 Saturday nights, with five different games drawing more than 20,000 fans and a sixth drawing more than 18,000 shows that that market can support professional soccer, given an ownership group and front office that are working hard to sell tickets.



El Jefe,

Kind of like what we are saying here in San Jose, the market can support professional soccer, just give us an ownership group and front office that work hard to sell tickets.

[anderson]

Don't touch the Quakes, this would be a travesty for the league if they moved the Quakes. I'm all for a team in Houston but not at the expense of the Quakes. MOVE KC.Well, travesty or not, resolution of the issue may now be down to whether AEG can get comfortable with prospective investors:

Thoughts about I/Os from another thread. (http://www.bigsoccer.com/forum/showpost.php?p=6289243&postcount=80)

[cristoforo7]

MLS as a whole must be comfortable with prospective investors-- the Board of Governors must approve a "sale" of a franchise ... or a move of a franchise to another city by an exising investor.

I believe there is one Governor from each franchise, and thus AEG has 5 of 12 Governors. After the DC sale closes, it will have 4. So although AEG's wishes certainly will be given great deference, it still has to persuade at least two other Governors (which means two votes, which could be as simple as getting Hunt on its side).

I think it does mean that if the prospective investor(s) look great on paper and he/she/it/they have the cash, but AEG doesn't want to sell to them because of some intangible, it will have some 'splainin' to do.

[cristoforo7]

I would think it risky to plan on playing home games at a new facility which isn't scheduled to be finished until March 2006, especially when the real deadline is May 2006. (The school district seems primarily concerned with having it ready by then for graduation.) We all know that major construction projects like this can be delayed-- especially non-private projects where the owner is not necessarily concerned about starting that revenue stream. Also factor in whatever delay the hurricane situation and other storm weather may have caused.

Of course, a 2006 Houston team could play all its games on the road until, say, June 2006, but how might that affect marketing, ticket sales, etc.?

[anderson]

cristoforo, I agree that experience running pro sports teams and multi-use venues is an intangible, but it's valuable. We know that intangibles like goodwill have acutal balance sheet value. I don't know exactly how highly AEG and the other members of MLS LLC value experience developing and operating multi-use venues and pro sports teams, but it's the common thread among the last four new investors. I think that experience and expertise may be part of what makes a prospective investor look great on paper.

Also, I agree that the Cy-Fair complex would certainly be cutting it a little too close for comfort, but they could also use the Dome for at least part, and probably all, of the 2006 season. We've discussed that possibility before and Glenn's column linked above also had this bit at the end of the venue discussion:

As for Club América, its representatives continue to have talks with Harris County Sports and Convention Corporation, which controls the Astrodome. Redevelopment of the Dome is a long way off, so it could serve as a temporary facility.

[pc4th]

Did some yahoo search (they're still MLS sponsors right?) and found some more info about the Richard E. Berry Educational Support Center.
http://www.pbkarchitects.com/Projects/projects_ath_2.htm#richard

The scope of this project includes
three major components

Staff Development Center

Arena - The arena is being designed with a maximum capacity of 9,500 spectators. The seating, which has been designed as a two-level bowl, will include 8,000 fixed seats (including retractable seats at Arena level). Support spaces such as concessions, ticket booths and restrooms have been included throughout.


Stadium - The new stadium will have a capacity of 11,000 seats, with 5,500 seats on each side of the stadium. The seating will be designed in two decks - lower and upper - similar to the successful design of Pridgeon Stadium. Ticket booths, restrooms and concessions will be provided throughout

In the article, 18,000 was mentioned. Here's it is only 11,000 seats (perfect for FC Dallas..:)
However, I guess a few thousands in temporary bleachers can be added.

No pic for the stadium though. But found one for the arena. http://www.pbkarchitects.com/Projects/assets/Ath/Berry1.jpg

[truthandlife]

I went by the complex yesterday and it is impressive. Across the street they have 4 full size grass soccer fields at Cy-Fair College that I could see as being turned into a practice facility.

It does look like an 11,000 seat stadium. I was saying there is no way they could make it 18,000 unless they built bleachers in the South end zone.

I really don't think this would work unless Cy-Fair ISD is open to it. Cy-Fair has already made this facility for its own use and it will be used for a lot more things than football and basketball. I think there would be way too many conflicts in schedulling.

[pc4th]

I went by the complex yesterday and it is impressive. Across the street they have 4 full size grass soccer fields at Cy-Fair College that I could see as being turned into a practice facility.

It does look like an 11,000 seat stadium. I was saying there is no way they could make it 18,000 unless they built bleachers in the South end zone.

I really don't think this would work unless Cy-Fair ISD is open to it. Cy-Fair has already made this facility for its own use and it will be used for a lot more things than football and basketball. I think there would be way too many conflicts in schedulling.

MLS plays on Saturday (when it is very likely that no one will be using the stadium). And HS Football will not play until late August/September. Basketball? Basketball is play in the arena, not the stadium.

As for wearing out the facility, it's field turf. If Cy-Fair ISD wants some $600,000 (20 games at $30,000 rent) extra in revenue, they will make it happen.

11,000 seats + 5000 bleachers = perfect size for a MLS team.

[CeltTexan]

It's Robertson or the Dome amigos. If Team Houston is going to be at a High School facility than at least our favorite old Oiler QB will get that deal passed in order for the San Jose move to be legit in the eyes of sceptical soccer haters both here in South Texas and nationwide.

We don't have the negativity surrounding the beautiful game like our brothers in San Antonio do....but moving a several time MLS Cup Champion from Northern California under the leadership of the most liked/disliked Mexican franchise to Houston and a H.S. stadium gives whomever a shot at MLS as a loaded weapon. What a joke for Team Houston and the league is what the ignorant media types will spew out!

[anderson]

I think Glenn suggested Cy-Fair as a temporary venue.