Vegas A's Stadium

[Bluenoser]

$1.5 Billion - unreal - https://www.sportsnet.ca/mlb/article...domed-stadium/
_

[Ty Cobb]

THIS should be a challenge for our 3d modelers. I know one somewhat along these lines was done.

I'll bet Vegas taxpayers plant the City Council somewhere in the desert...

[rudel.dietrich]

I will admit, that is a really cool design

[dsvitak]

Originally Posted by rudel.dietrich

I will admit, that is a really cool design

With the Sphere, the Luxor, and several other buildings, Las Vegas is looking pretty cool.

[Amazin69]

Even assuming this actually gets funded and built (don't hold your breath), it wouldn't be ready until 2028.

Oh, and it seats a whopping 33,000. Pretty certain that actual baseball teams draw more than that.

(Including the Athletics, pre-Fisher.)

I'll be rather surprised if Nevada ponies up for such a giant Fisher-Price.

[Cobra Mgr]

Refresh my memory. But wasn't the complex Oakland trying to build larger, more extravagant, over a larger area & had more funding already lined up?

[Westheim]

Actually looks revolting, but then again that fits right in with Vegas. Although at this rate it would probably be cheaper if they actually played *inside* that garish sphere thing.

[kq76]

I think it looks cool (and it fits right in with Vegas copying other iconic structures from around the world), but I don't buy for a second that that is what the final product would look like.

1) I'm pretty sure their plans wouldn't fit on 9 acres. Target Field is said to have the smallest MLB stadium footprint and it's pretty crammed in at 8.5 acres. The As say they have plans for "2,500 parking spots on location, with a 3-acre plaza leading up to the stadium". And you still plan on it looking like that second image?

2) The estimate is it will cost 1.5B (which is of course low), but only 380M is being paid by Nevada taxpayers. Who's paying for the rest? We all know Fisher isn't going to pay for anything more than the bare necessities. Fisher wouldn't pay for the "18,000 square foot Jumbotron, making it the BIGGEST Jumbotron in the entire MLB", not alone the rest of it, including " the world's LARGEST cable-net glass windows showing the view of the Las Vegas Strip".

3) Their business plan to Vegas included them selling out every home game, but when it was pointed out that even with selling out every home game that they still wouldn't get to their 2.5M, then the stadium gained 3000 more seats. They can't even be bothered to do some basic math and we're supposed to believe they can pull this off? I'm supremely confident they couldn't sell out even the original 30K. There's no way the As can put together a good team overnight and there's also certainly no way Fisher's going to all of a sudden spend money like the Rangers did recently. You might come close to selling out in the first year given the novelty, but that wears off fast if you're not winning.

I don't know what they're up to, but I don't buy it. Who exactly is buying what he's selling and willing to pony up the rest of the cash?

[Le Grande Orange]

Originally Posted by Amazin69

Oh, and it seats a whopping 33,000. Pretty certain that actual baseball teams draw more than that.

The trend has been toward lower seating capacity as a means to achieve artificial scarcity and thus higher ticket prices.

[pilight]

Originally Posted by Amazin69

Oh, and it seats a whopping 33,000. Pretty certain that actual baseball teams draw more than that.

10 teams averaged over 33k in attendance last season, all in much larger cities than Vegas.

[mytreds]

Looks horrendous. Once again my American brothers have no taste in architecture.

[Amazin69]

Originally Posted by pilight

10 teams averaged over 33k in attendance last season, all in much larger cities than Vegas.

You don't need to draw 40,000 every game to make more money off of a 40,000 capacity stadium than off a 33,000 capacity. The unsold seats are a once-off construction cost, but the seats that only sell for high-demand games (Yankees, promotions, holidays, when you have a good team) keep bringing in the cash.

The only true detriment to capacity is when the team is so poor that the acres and acres of vacant seats depress morale and civic interest. And if the Athletics go back to drawing 5000/game once the lookie-loos have had a look, it won't matter so much that there are "only" 28,000 vacancies rather than 35,000, IMO.

(Big Shea: 55,007. Glorious.)

[low]

Opera house or sports complex. You choose.

[dsvitak]

33k isn't a huge capacity. What Vegas has going for them is a MASSIVE number of tourists, from all over the world. If you're coming in from Billings, Montana, the nearest MLB park is a ten hour drive away. Why not see a ball game?

Edit to add..I got the state right. Turner, Montana is 207 miles north of Billings. THAT'S the town the greatest distance away from an MLB stadium.

[Amazin69]

Any stadium plan depending on tourists is pretty much DOA. Especially tourists from Billings, ffs.

(Billings isn't exactly over-populated, you might notice. There's a reason they only have a Pioneer League club.

I grant you that you can currently fly round-trip from Billings to LV for $200 round-trip. [2.5 hour change in Salt Lake City, however.] But still. The few hardy souls who make the trip are probably more interested in gambling and fancy buffets, and shows, and…er…professional ladies than they are about going to wherever to watch that crappy Oakland team still losing games.)

A team needs fans. People who are emotionally invested in it, who come out rain or shine, who still use "1641" as their passcode, even though Doc's been off the Mets for 30 years. Once-off curiosity visits from people flying in from scattered minor-league cities ain't gonna cut it.

(It's not even working out for the Traitors, and they only have 8 home games per season, not 81.)

[rudel.dietrich]

38,000 falls in line on the lower end of modern stadiums built after 2000.

In the 70s, there was a move towards massive 70,000 seat concrete monoliths with zero creature comforts.

Then the trend became smaller stadiums with better sight lines, a more premium experience and great views of the surrounding area.


But I would not get too hung up on the capacity anyways, I am sure the plans will change 15 more times anyways.

[monkeyman576]

The golden knights draw well and that is for hockey, the fourth most popular sport in the us. If the a’s make an attempt to be competitive I think attendance will be good if not sold out. Of course they are not competitive now if the a’s are pulling vegases leg that would be unfortunate.

[Syd Thrift]

Yeah and Fenway only seats around 33k itself. It's not really all that small.

The thing that I don't get is that it appears to be an open-air stadium that's going to be sitting in Las Vegas and playing ballgames in the middle of the summer. That's a terrible combination, even if they start games at like midnight and they won't be starting games at midnight. Chase Field in Phoenix might look ugly compared to this but that retractable roof is used a lot... according to this page:

https://www.nowhitting.com/index.php...-facts-figures

...the criteria they use is "temperature below 100 at game time with the sun setting" for keeping the roof open. That essentially means the roof stays closed for all of July and August. There are stretches during that time where the temperature never drops below 100 even in the middle of the night.

Vegas is cooler than Phoenix but only slightly. I think I've heard people insist that the large open looking expanse is actually a giant window, which... ask people who went to see games in the Astrodome in the first year it was there to watch games how glass roofs worked out. The glare refracted through a window is actually worse than direct sunlight and I suspect it would still do crazy things to the AC in a place like that. Also that would be an awful lot of glass, like I'm no engineer but would that be structurally sound?

[monkeyman576]

Won’t the stadium have air conditioning or misters?

Edit: you mentioned that. I’m sure a super ac system will be a part of the building.

[Syd Thrift]

Originally Posted by monkeyman576

Won’t the stadium have air conditioning or misters?

Edit: you mentioned that. I’m sure a super ac system will be a part of the building.

It can have all the AC in the world but if it's open air, I mean... that's not actually going to do anything. Chase has some wonderful AC but that only works when the roof is shut.