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[Seattle Times] 15 years after moving Sonics, now it’s the Thunder asking for publicly funded arena
(www.seattletimes.com)
this post was submitted on 20 Oct 2023
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When done right it can benefit the surrounding areas. The bucks did this perfectly, and the area around the stadium went from a ghost town to one of the fastest growing areas in the city. The public is getting a great ROI before even considering team success.
Switching to baseball (I only know milwaukee, sorry) the brewers have brought virtually no economic boost whatsoever and the owner continues to put together middling teams just good enough to drain money from locals.
Taxpayers kinda get their money back through the taxes that the team/stadium generate anyways, but imo if it’s not EXTREMELY well thought out and planned and the team refuses to invest their own resources on the field/court it feels like a fucking DRAG.
Can you elaborate? Wasn't the Fiserv Forum built next door to the old arena? What was stopping the Bucks from revitalizing the surrounding area before?
Ofc, so all 3 bucks stadiums were built right next door to one another. The street that it’s on is one street over from a major bar area, and the square couple miles around the stadium was pretty dead it was literally JUST the stadium. When they built their new stadium, they implemented the “deer district”. You could probably read more about that but to put it quickly, it’s a place that features bars of its own, gathering places, and upscale hotels. It’s also spurred other developments like a brand new live-nation concert hall right next door as well as massive renovations to a nearby convention center. Even the major bar area nearby has seen an uptick in foot traffic since it’s construction i believe(can’t confirm that though I can’t remember where I saw that).
Not totally sure I articulated that well so if it doesn’t make sense I’m really sorry lmao.
You're getting at the point I was getting at - the Deer District is what revitalized the area and conceivably it would've done the same thing combined with the previous arena. You can see a similar effect with how LA Live revitalized the area around the Staples Center despite being built separately several years later.