I’m probably more for the stadium and public funding than against it at this point but I’m not telling myself it’s anything more than what it is, basically Millionaire Socialism. The City/County will take on most of the burden of the risk while private parties will realize the vast majority of the benefits. That’s pretty much the way the world works today. I would like to see a lot of strings attached to the money and ways for the city/county to share in the benefits more than nebulous “growth” or “increased tax revenue” which might be due to completely different forces or due to cannibalization of spending from other areas of the city/county.
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The difference is one of scale not substance. One will cost more but then you will get more.
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Well this stadium will have a myriad of public and private uses also because they have clearly stated that it will not be only for soccer. So the real difference is really the price and that makes the comparison to an apple to a bushel of apples… which is still apple to apples.
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So, this is where the whole topic is a no win situation for anyone looking for any funding for such an amenity. It goes something like this.
1.) we don’t want public money to fund a for profit entity.
2.) okay, let’s make the amenity city owned and then leased to a variety of entities who might want to use it, including a major entity or two.
3.) NO! we don’t want to own it and be liable for it.
4.) rinse and repeat.
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Why is private funding not an option?
If it’s such a great deal surely people would invest.
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Well, private funding is an option if the city was awash with billionaires with huge egos. Raleigh is unfortunately void of such people.
So, if that’s the only mechanism that’s acceptable, then we theoretically will never move forward and only the major cities will ever get nice things.
I am just of the opinion that city sometimes need to step up and take risks to move itself to the next level.
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I still believe (although I have no evidence at this point in time) that if Raleigh owned this stadium that it would ultimately lead to the closure of Walnut Creek. There would be no point in having two facilities for concerts that both hold about 20,000 people and are so close to one another. Raleigh would then sell the land at Walnut Creek (or make a park).
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Although how many concerts can you have on a field during soccer season without destroying the grass?
It seems like there are alot of events at WC… I’d still like to see an indoor/outdoor venue like Pittsburgh has on the North Side and soon to have another one downtown.
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Like I said I’m mostly for it but it’s a lot of money for what could be ultimately a minor league soccer stadium.
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Colleges, recreational facilities and even some professional leagues increasingly choose synthetic turf fields over natural grass pitches for soccer.
I believe it would be the only soccer-specific MLS stadium with turf. Maybe they could get a big moveable tray like Arizona has and roll the grass out of the way for concerts. 
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UNC football now has artificial turf… I am pretty because of that we will go undefeated at home this year…
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You know, I’d be inclined to look at this issue differently if Raleigh held more cards, and developers were clamoring and competing with each other because the city center was in such high demand, but that’s not Raleigh’s context.
For example, imagine if this land assemblage was at a future stop of a rail transit system that was already funded? That would be a game changer. Imagine if Raleigh actually had a huge (not state) employer downtown with tens of thousands of employees that created a lot of demand for RE? We don’t. Imagine if DT was running out of land to develop downtown; this topic would unfold in a much different way.
IMO, Raleigh needs a reality check that it’s falling behind other cities in its cohort and it needs a plan to create the experiences in its core that that start-up culture seeks and demands. We aren’t so special that we can sit back, tell everyone what to do on our terms but with their money. We just aren’t that kind of city yet. We have an opportunity to get something for the city center, while both expanding its footprint and its revenue stream. There’s a mechanism to make it happen in place, and we can choose to take the risk to make our city better, or we can just wait for the unicorn that never seems to come to the city. Would have the promise of this development made a difference to HQ2 or Apple’s decisions to NOT come to Raleigh? I don’t know, but I know that continuing to do nothing, and not taking risks or making big bets isn’t going to entice a big investment the next time around.
I’ve been personally invested in DT Raleigh for the last quarter century, and its movement forward has been painfully slow until just recently. If we look back at just the 2000s decade, we all but wasted the city’s fastest growth decade. I fear that we will continue to see DT under-perform vis-a-vis the city, county and metro if we are not bold.
I appreciate that a good number of people won’t agree with me, and that’s okay. I don’t expect uniformity of opinion here and enjoy the different viewpoints. That said, my viewpoint won’t be fundamentally changing based on everything that I’ve read on this topic.
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This escalated quickly.
There’s a lot here that’s not backed up by hard evidence, though. First off, the “national marketing tool” aspect. MLS is not particularly widely followed; its games get TV ratings on par with the WNBA. Also, the team brands itself as “North Carolina” rather than “Raleigh.” But even if the league were more popular and the team changed its name, that really wouldn’t make much difference. The NFL is extremely popular, and has a franchise in Cleveland that is branded as such, but there’s zero evidence that the team’s presence has had any benefit for the city as a national marketing tool. (This would be true of any team, but I picked the Cleveland example because the team left town for a few years, creating an interesting natural experiment. There’s no evidence that the city was in any way economically harmed by losing the team for a few years.) With MLS, the situation is obviously even worse because the vast majority of Americans don’t even know, much less care, which cities do or do not have MLS franchises.
During my long conversation with the communications director for NCFC, he mentioned to me that the comparable soccer-specific stadium in Columbus hosts about six non-soccer related events per year, and this is seen as something of a success. Add six to the limited number of soccer games per year, and the stadium would be lying fallow for about 90 percent of the days of the year. As such, it wouldn’t be a tourist draw–pro sports teams don’t draw much in the way of tourism because the overwhelming majority of attendees are local fans who drive in for the game and drive right back out. And “rethinking transportation” based on the presence of a stadium that would draw maybe 20,000 people maybe 25 times a year is completely backwards–a stadium should go where the public transportation is, not the other way around.
I can’t stress enough that this idea that this stadium would host a ton of non-soccer related events is complete fantasy. There are a bunch of soccer-specific MLS stadiums already in existence, and every single one of them rarely hosts non-soccer events. In particular, they very rarely host concerts because a 20,000-seat stadium with a soccer pitch in the middle is a terrible concert venue.
Please, please, please, I’m begging people: Please find me an example of a soccer-specific MLS stadium, of which there are plenty, anywhere in America that hosts lots of non-soccer related events. Somebody please, please accept this challenge and report back to the group and tell us what you find.
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@dtraleigh Can we break this thread into a Downtown South project thread and a stadium project thread? I am over the constant back and forth about the stadium (and betting I’m not the only one), but have a genuine interest in other discussion about this potential project.
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You really can’t. Without the stadium, you don’t have a Downtown South.
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You frame it as if you are questioning the very idea of it as a marketing tool and tourist draw, but you are actually questioning the extent. That’s a subtle but important difference.
I think there is a benefit to drawing people to Raleigh and more importantly downtown, yes even if only from Apex or Rolesville. Certainly it would be awesome for them to come from further afield, but I’m practical. I don’t need hotel nights counted to consider it a (perhaps minor) plus.
As for marketing, it’s a gamble on the upside but it will certainly get Raleigh more press and will look good on all those brochures the Chamber of Commerce sends out to the next HQ2. I’m obviously hoping it can turn out like a mini-Hurricanes kind of thing, where every 7 years or so we get a little buzz in the sports world going for something outside March.
Certainly all the upsides and downsides are debatable. But I think the argument must be on these and similar terms rather than on a bookkeeper’s terms.
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Between this thread and the other, I’m sure it’s all covered. I’m not following this thread too closely. What 3rd aspect needs a dedicated thread?
It is an ideological, political issue. Saying it’s a “terrible idea” isn’t going to convince anyone of anything, just like someone saying it’s a great idea isn’t going to move the needle.
You have those who believe the stadium isn’t an integral part of the DTS development, that it won’t contribute to the culture of the city, they have complete buy in on studies that say there is no return on public sports facilities, and that public money shouldn’t be used to fund them.
On the other hand, you have those who think the cultural benefit, the amenity of having a publicly owned stadium with a local pro team, that believe the developers when they say this scale of development won’t happen without the stadium, and think that the tax that was created for facilities like this should be used to fund this site.
When you say the DBAP isn’t a good comparison site, or you try to say that the MLS stadium isn’t integral to the development of Downtown South it’s just not credible. I think it’s probably possible to do a study on virtually every public stadium that’s ever been built and show how it’s been a loss for the City. You could probably do a study on most public expenditures, including public transit, public parks, public art, public schools etc and show that the private sector can do it better. You can work the studies however you want, but most of the time these issues are not about the dollars and cents return. There are benefits to a stadium that you can’t put a dollar figure on because you can’t really even buy them if you wanted to. They are opportunities that you take advantage of when they present themselves. The real return on a stadium would be the experiences that people have and adding to the cultural identity of the region and state.
An MLS soccer stadium isn’t like an indoor arena. You can’t use it for concerts on a whim. The playing surface should generally be reserved for sport, and when there is a concert it would need to be limited to the biggest shows and include a field surface replacement in the cost. The uses beyond NCFC women and men should probably be the local colleges and special high level sporting events. Just look at WakeMed soccer park and you’ll see how a field should be used. They do an excellent job of managing and maintenance at that facility.
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I think it’s the idea of being able to discuss this area but not have 95% of it back and forth about the stadium.
You can still have a discussion without the stadium banter. I think we most agree actually developing this area without a stadium is likely not happening. We’re talking about discussion without it, not development without it.
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