Should the league relocate San Jose Earthquake to another city?

If they were to move, I would hope it would be to a city close by, such as San Francisco. Than at least most of the people who already follow the team could still be fans.

That is, if there is land available to build a SSS.

 

Oh my god........havent we had this discussion enough times? Most recently a couple of weeks ago.

I mean really, lets move on.

 

Yeh, I started a thread called "San Jose Attendance, sucking," but I'm going to add an interesting twist. You are all going to think its a dumb idea but here we go.

Move San Jose to Los Angeles. Ahhhhh.........

Let me explain. After LA won MLS Cup 02 I started a thread about how I saw the city of Los Angeles as Soccertown USA since they have been competitive since the start of the league, have always had strong attendance, and the new stadium was going to put them ahead of everyone else. I suggested it would be good for the league to put a second team in LA just like all the other great soccer cities in the world such as Rome, London, Madrid, Buenos Aires etc.

I would first say that San Jose needs to stay in San Jose. If they can work out their attendance problems, great. The league needs stability. But I would also say if it gets to the point where the team is going to fold because they are loosing too much money, move them to LA where it could become a great city rivalry. They would immediately have a SSS and there could be people in LA that for some reason don't like the Galaxy and would begin to follow the Earthquakes and adopt them as their own.

Not being from California and understanding fully the situation with these teams I could be totally wrong and I'm sure many will tell me I am.

But thats my suggestion, the Los Angeles Earthquakes, the name makes sense

 

I'm kind of surprised at how often "move San Jose" threads come up, but I'll bite...

Short answer: No, don't relocate the Earthquakes to another city.

Long answer: I think that if San Jose moves, it should only be to a soccer-specific stadium elsewhere in the Bay Area, maybe to somewhere a little more central/accessible- maybe in Oakland, near the Coliseum (or whatever it's now called)/airport?

I don't think there should be another team (be it the Earthquakes or some Chivas or America franchise, as some people are talking about) in LA (at least not for a loooong time...), as it could take some of the wind out of the Galaxy's/Home Depot Center's sails. I see the Galaxy/HDC situation as pretty promising but delicate... Why split the difference at this point?

 

I love the idea of cross town derby's and it would be awesome to have them in MLS. But I think the key is that one market would have to be saturated with fans, and not enough seats to hold them. Then theres the matter of convincing fans from one side of town to root for a new team, when they've been die hards for the other team for so long. I dont see this happening for many years.

 

Exactly.

 

Ahh, another move San Jose thread.

Wait a sec - I thought attendance is up in San Jose. Silly me.

 

tchmahoney, are you trying to say that this is a troll, or are you saying that the location of the troll (Under the Aurora Bridge in Seattle) would be a good place for the Earthquakes?

 

Earthquakes

After the next earthquake San Jose might well move to Los Angeles.

 

boooo-ring.

 

I've heard the problem is the location of Spartan in San Jose, not San Jose itself. If the Quakes were to have a stadium more centrally located in the city, or at least more accessible by car, how would that effect attendance? Do the Quakes get a fair number of fans from San Fran and Oakland? Would a stadium somewhere between the city limits of all three cities work, if land was available?

 

The majority of fans attending Quakes games are from the South Bay. A large percentage of A's fans are from the South Bay which is why the off-on-off rumors about the A's trying to move to Santa Clara County. A stadium in a centrally located Santa Clara County location with ease of parking and access from major thoroughfares as well as a Bart drop off would be great. Anyone wanna pass the hat??

 

Spartan Stadium is pretty centrally located in San Jose, barely more than a mile from downtown. It is close to three major freeways. I honestly don't understand why people complain about its accessablity by car. Distance is an issue if you are far away, but that's true for any location. I never have any trouble getting from the freeway to the stadium, even when I'm arriving within a half-hour of game time and the crowd is larger than normal. It's slow going getting out of the lots if you hop in your car 5 minutes after the final whistle, but I've never been to a sports venue where that wasn't true. A stadium on the north side of downtown rather than the south side would probably be a bit easier to access, but that's never going to happen.

Access is a problem for public transportation, because the transit schedules simply do not take into account games at Spartan. The bus line that runs right by the stadium stops running at 8 pm. Caltrain, a rail line between SF and San Jose, is currently undergoing renovations that have it shut down on weekends. Even when Caltrain is running, the last northbound train from the station closest to Spartan leaves before 9 pm, so people have to find their way to the downtown station that has a train leaving at 10:30, but the bus that takes you there stops running at 8.

 

Re: Re: Re: Should the league relocate San Jose Earthquake to another city?

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45 minutes? Whoa! That's how long it takes me...you should talk to the guy from Davis who uses public transportation to travel 200 miles (one way) to each Earthquakes home game.

Relocation has been touted by people here at Bigsoccer for years and has been shot down everyime. If this situation exists five years from now, maybe bring up relocation; but the team (and the league) have barely been around eight years. Now is not the time to move the team, especially with the team finally beginning to advertise.

All the talk about transportation doesn't have to do with accessibility. One, it has to do with Parking, which I'm sure you'll admit, is hardly suitable for large crowds (as demonstrated by the LA sellout last fall.) Two, the other major problem (as you brought up), is public transportation with no caltrain running on the weekend. In addition, BART doesn't run very near to the stadium, and buses drop passengers off a couple of blocks away, which is okay, but it's far from ideal.

 

Re: Re: Re: Should the league relocate San Jose Earthquake to another city?

Then send a passionate letter to sports@sjmercury.com, so they can print it in the paper, and spare us this tired crapola. With very little exception, the SJ fans here on BigSoccer that are from the Bay Area go to all the Quakes' home matches.