Couple of quick things: The plan for a stadium will not include building out for more parking space, it will include building up. 80,000 seat stadium on the west side of manhattan and 25,000 - 30,000 in Willets Point is apples and oranges. Metros could have gotten something done if they were so inclined, but I suspect the Harrison deal made more sense for them.
just like a shea stadium deal makes sence for us.... chau drink i'm done with ya.................................
Yes it is. But the question was the distance from the Newark Arena to the new Red Bull Arena. That is a shade over a mile.
Getting a SSS built within 'city' limits of any MLS team is a very daunting challenge. How many teams are actually playing in their said city? Look at the stadiums built/being built. Pizza Hut Park is @1hr outside of Dallas. Toyota Park is @30 minutes outside of Chicago. Dicks is @ 30 minutes outside of Denver RSL, I think this is the closest one (@15 minutes outside of SL) Phila stadium will be in Chester @ 25 minutes south of downtown. DC is having problems getting new digs within the District. MLS doesn't have the clout yet to really be in control when dealing with said citys and the burbs are more willing to play ball.
Is it still within the CITY limits? I mean this stadium will not be in Downtown or Midtown - but its in City Limits of NY
I think that many people forget that soccer/football/futbol is basically a CITY sport. It's not a suburban sport. That's some of the reason for the success of TFC and DCU. It's also the reason why RB and the Metros before them tried to get out of Giants. It's also the reason for the push for NYC/Mets, etc etc
No, it's not even with in the STATE limits. The shaded green area is Missouri. Then the Mississippi River. And the White is Illinois.
Maybe it's not that hard. Maybe MLS has never taken the inner city ethnic market seriously, and is mostly interested in the soccer mom set. MAybe that's why these teams havent' made a great effort to have an in town stadium.
Like Foxboro...me brian and a few others wanted to go up to Foxboro to watch the US play a few years back..game was on memorial day weekend..none of us wanted to drive..so we said lets just take the chinatown bus..then bus or train to Foxboro...looked into it...and NO TRAIN or BUS goes to foxboro..WTF ??? is that about...Stupid move
I am. I certainly witnessed the dwindling of the latino fans at metrostars games over the years, and saw the increase in the family set. I think at the inception of the league, our founding fathers so gold in the suburbs, and discounted the inner city population. But as many have said before me, there's gold in the ghetto.
Actually the dwindling you saw was not the involvement of the league, it was caused by Nick Sackiewicz. Did it greatly diminish the current fan base? Absolutely.
What did Nick do? Not arguing the point, I'm curious about him and his actions. I've heard many negative things about him but no one pinpoints anything specific. I'm really curious.
He had his sales team focus on group sales to teams and families, as well as corporate entities, as opposed to going after real soccer fans. He allowed the sale and use of those stupid annoying horns, so for years we had kids running around with those things pi$$ing everyone off. He distanced himself and the FO from the ESC. He dissolved La Doce. He just didn't care about the fans. His bottom line was to bring in as many people as possible right away, no matter if they were real fans who would come back for more, or mere attendees who got free tickets and never returned. He was the one that inflated attendance based on tickets sold or given away, and not the actual fans in the seats. By doing that he alienated most of the fan base, including hard core support.
How could he dissolve La Doce? Was it a FO sponsored supporter group? Does this mean that Philly will experience much of the same?
I don't know, it all depends whether he learns from previous experience. Philly fans are currently on cloud nine, so they don't respond well to anything that could effect their team in a negative manner. When Metro fans first commented on Nick joining Philly, their fans pointed fingers at our fans as a reason for our bad attendance. No one looked at the fact that when MetroStars began play in 1996 they had almost 9,000 season tickets and that attendance really started plunging after the 2001 season. But... it is what it is. If they face the same bu11sh!t, I'd hate to say but 'we told you so'.
Plus they never had to put up with the gimmicks...that turned off more people then the bad play or Front Office put together
That depends on what you consider 'gimmicks'. If you're talking about the '60 to 90 days' quote, then I'm a true believer that something similar awaits Philadelphia.