Time to look ahead at a massive sports' facility?

The new Oklahoma City Convention Center will be the centerpiece for launching new development as the convention industry will bring new money into our economy and spur development of badly needed hotels if we are to begin hosting major events.

Houston is hosting the mens' final four; San Antonio hosted a regional and Dallas hosted an NCAA women's regional.

Oklahoma City needs a facility capable of hosting the final four.

Get the convention center built first so as the hotel industry will follow--this will allow the influx of new money into our economy and the building of new hotels capable of allowing us to bid on a final four.

Build a riverfront football-soccer specific stadium with a retractable roof. Something beginning in the neighborhood of 50,000-60,000 with flexible seating yet capable of being expanded in the future to 80k-90k.

Texas has major facilities in Houston, Dallas and San Antonio--all capable of hosting the big event.

Our next MAPS will come up in 2017 when the current tax is sheduled to expire.

We need to be look ahead.

What are your thoughts?

We will never have a final four. They do those in indoor football stadiums, which Oklahoma will never have. The new convention center is only for conventions, not for sports. It will have no arena. I like the vision and optimism, but you also have to be realistic. OKC can draw the NCAA tournament and the Big 12 tourney like in the past. We're not getting anything bigger in the next quarter century...

Also, why would we build a football/soccer venue that large? For a final 4 every 20 years. We're not getting a soccer or pro football team any time soon. Heck, we can't even support an Arena League team or the Barons. We're a one trick pony (the Thunder), but that's okay. An arena like you are talking about would be a huge waste of money.

Laramie, let's be realistic. Even if all of this happenned, who would be around on the other nights to fill those thousands of hotel rooms? None of what you said will be feasible in Oklahoma for at least ten years, but more likely twenty. And that is being optimistic. We in Oklahoma really need to stop comparing ouselves to Texas. OKC and Tulsa metros put together are not even close to those of Texas. Like Kilgore said, we need about a quarter century of growing before we start seriously thinking about this.

The consultants are correct. The convention center should not be among the first projects. The first projects should be those that have a direct and immediate impact on the citizens' quality of life, such as the sidewalks, bike trails, park, and streetcar. These projects will be immensely popular and will provide insurance when they have to come back to the voters to ask for more money (and they will). If all we have to show for it is a convention center, the citizens will not be pleased to extend the tax and something will end up getting screwed, like the streetcar. This will doom MAPS forever with the voters.

Please keep in mind the convention center was by far the least popular of the MAPS projects, which doesn't mean it's not important. But PR is important here and the odds are we're going to have to extend the tax to build everything right, as we have before.

I'd agree that the other projects needs to come first, it's just depressing to look at the timelines and think, damn it's going to be another 10 years before that thing it built. In fact, that whole timeline for Maps3 is pretty depressing alltogether just because it's stuff we all want now (isntant gratification and all that). But you have to look back at Maps1 and remember how long it took for that to be completed. We just got spoiled by Maps for Kids and the arena work where we could see an immediate purchase of something that showed for it.

Also, why would we build a football/soccer venue that large? For a final 4 every 20 years. We're not getting a soccer or pro football team any time soon. Heck, we can't even support an Arena League team or the Barons. We're a one trick pony (the Thunder), but that's okay. An arena like you are talking about would be a huge waste of money.

Kilgore, we are not going to be just a one tick pony, eventually a another major league franchise will come here, may not be now but in about another 5 years, when the city grows a little bit more.

We will never have a final four. They do those in indoor football stadiums, which Oklahoma will never have. The new convention center is only for conventions, not for sports. It will have no arena. I like the vision and optimism, but you also have to be realistic. OKC can draw the NCAA tournament and the Big 12 tourney like in the past. We're not getting anything bigger in the next quarter century...

KilgoreTrout:

I don't know if you looked at what I wrote:

"Build a riverfront football-soccer specific stadium with a retractable roof. Something beginning in the neighborhood of 50,000-60,000 with flexible seating yet capable of being expanded in the future to 80k-90k."

This would be proposed in MAPS IV (2017); meanwhile, we will need hotels coming along. The convention center would complement the eventual building of a Riverfront Stadium with retractable roof for indoor events. The Convention Center would only be the catalyst for getting the hotels started.

Who knows? When the 2020 census rolls around; Oklahoma City could be in a position to lure an existing NFL franchise.

This sounds like the same "can't do" attitude we had before building of the Oklahoma City Arena. Remember, we...

1. can't support NHL caliber hockey
2. can't support NBA caliber basketball.
3. after building the OKC arena, many thought it wouldn't be big enough to handle any
type of major league franchise.

We need to start thinking big and preparing to put ourselves in a position to acquire NFL football.

There are a number of things a large Riverfront Stadium with retractable roof could support:

College Bowl Game.
Oklahoma State could play some non conference games in Oklahoma City.
An annual "Langston-Grambling" contest in Oklahoma City.
NCAA final four or regional prior to final four.
Oklahoma City Thunder could play some major indoor games (Lakers, Celtics, Bulls).
High School Football playoffs.
Major high school football games.
Major League Soccer franchise.

I'm sure you could think of others.

Let's not sell ourselves short and start thinking big and bring some big times events to Oklahoma City in the future which would be 7 to 15 years down the road.

I think a 25,000 to 30,000 seat stadium would be a big plus for OKC. OKC will never host a Final 4 but it could certainly host a regional final with a large enough venue. I would like to see something like the Kibbie Dome at the University of Idaho or the Northern Arizona Skydome. These facilities are rather inexpensive to build but could host multiple events. They could even be made where the top slides back like a retractble rood dome stadium.

Here are just a few events that could be held that wouldn't be possible in the Ford Center:

NCAA Regional Finals
Monster Truck Shows
Soccer (MLS/Big XII/NCAA Tournament Championship)
Olympic Training
NFL Combine
College Football Bowl Game (Heartland Bowl wih proceeds going to the Oklahoma National Memorial)
High School Football Championships


http://www.govandals.com//pdf4/414253.pdf?DB_OEM_ID=17100

http://www.nauathletics.com/information/facilities/skydome_renovation

I'd agree that the other projects needs to come first, it's just depressing to look at the timelines and think, damn it's going to be another 10 years before that thing it built. In fact, that whole timeline for Maps3 is pretty depressing alltogether just because it's stuff we all want now (isntant gratification and all that). But you have to look back at Maps1 and remember how long it took for that to be completed. We just got spoiled by Maps for Kids and the arena work where we could see an immediate purchase of something that showed for it.

While the Ford improvements started before one penny of the tax was collected (a multi-million "line of credit") was taken out so some work could begin immediately (primarily restroom renovations), looks like the completion of improvements a year/season behind schedule?
Oklahoman July 3, 2008

Renovations to make Oklahoma City 's Ford Center ready for the new NBA basketball team will begin this summer and are scheduled to be completed by the fall of 2010.


With MAPS for Kids, think a similar year(s) long time lag existed with it too. There may have been some of the minor renovations that got done earlier. It is behind schedule as well.

This isn't a criticism of the time lag but it is a reality of the primarily pay-as-you-go revenue structure of the sales tax. While a similar structure exists with bond issues (they don't sell all of the bonds at once, but are sold yearly as previous bonds are retired). The sales tax method is better than long term bond debt.

Right, i totally understand it....it's just depressing to remind yourself , "oh yeah these things are going to take a long time to get moving".

Oh and hey, on the stadiumfront....all we have to do is look at UCO. Right now, that's OKC's equivelant to Tulsa's Skelly (post reduction). It does host events right now that would not have been able to be in OKC in the past. One that comes to mind right off are the marching band contests every fall. A few MLS exhibition games, etc. The place has plenty room for expansion and improvement from all directions...so it's not land-locked or anything.

So we could look at this from a few ways. OKC could build their own and see what comes of it (but it's going to remain empty MOST of the year...see Shreveport, LA and the Independence Bowl....and both Mobile and Birmingham, AL). Both have good sized stadiums in thw 50K range that sit and rust most of the year with nothing in them. It's tough to make those facilities make money in comparison to the ongoing maintenance costs.

OR, the METRO could get behind UCO and help continue to improve their facility. It's never going to be competition to OU, and you aren't going to get a LOT of things at OU because of the grass. So, we could help UCO take a facility that is currently doing a great job and help a local school make an extra buck in the process. I'm not suggesting an OKC tax to pay for something in Edmond, but we could work to encourage private donors to keep pushing some funding that way rather than try to build something that's doomed from the beginning.

But I have digressed from the topic. So since land aquisition is supposed to be started soon, we don't really know what the site will look like. I'm guessing that will be completed before a real decision on a design in done. We've seen interesting things like the Rose Rock Center (my favorite), but they're just conceptual.