MLS in Tulsa, Part Deux: World Cup Edition

[USRufnex]

Hmmmm..........



Back in late 2005, Tulsa had a couple of aces-in-the-hole:  Winnercomm and Lamar Hunt.

Lamar Hunt died and Winnercomm is no longer locally owned.

Back in 2005, Tulsa's bid was only 2 years removed from this MLS exhibition game at Skelly....



The game attracted 14,000 fans and 25% of this crowd signed up for season tickets... not just a signup, these folks gave out credit card and checking info... a couple of months later, the season ticket drive had around 5,000 but the MLS stadium didn't make the list of projects for Vision 2025, and MLS placed a team in Salt Lake City in 2005...

http://www.sltrib.com/news/ci_12934438

Tulsa also had a 2002 feasibility study done by Convention, Sports & Leisure, who did a telephone survey concluding a Tulsa MLS team would have a projected average of  14,600 fans per game... CS&L's feasibility study for the Kansas City Wizards projected an average of 12,000 fans per game.

I was happy to see former Mayor LaFortune show some due diligence in trying to get a team here-- MLS officials proactively contacted Tulsa within weeks of LaFortune taking office..... and I think the proposed site for a TIF district that included condos, retail, entertainment and a 20k-capacity stadium off 6th and Frankfort was a good idea and a good location... it still is... I like "walkable urbanity" as much as anyone, but that area is not the place for simple "gut-rehabs".... the buildings in question are unremarkable and likely would cost more to rehab than rebuild....

In 1976 and 1977, the idea of a successful high level pro soccer team in Tulsa was far-fetched... 1994- Tulsa was $1.8mil in Skelly Stadium renovations from getting a league owned MLS team... 2002- MLS demands a stadium because Skelly is too big--field is too narrow--press box doesn't have luxury suites/seating... 2005- city partners with DC United's new owners for TIF district in "East Village"... 2007- over $20mil spent to renovate Skelly Stadium- press box now has the same number of luxury suites as Pizza Hut Park in Dallas/Frisco, fixed seating reduced to 26,000, but the field is still too narrow and the turf has permanent markings.....

1996-no expansion fee... 2002, $10mil MLS expansion fee.... 2005, $15mil MLS expansion fee.... 2008-- MLS asked for $40mil but rumored fees paid were $35mil for both Vancouver and Portland, who will start play in 2011....

And so it goes......

[USRufnex]

On the amphitheater, it's not a matter of "if" it's "when".  My source is pretty solid.  Also look for the lagoon to get filled back in.  (Lagoon in, lagoon out.  Main Mall in, Main Mall out).

If that concrete plant is worth developing and could be profitable as something else, let a private investor pay the plant owners their exhorbitant ransom.  Meanwhile, there's a city M & E facility I believe we were promised would be consolidated out with the OneTech purchase and moving maintenance ops to the old downtown airpark or was this just another iffy promise made by proponents of the 2007 river tax scam?

I'd be all for putting a multi-use stadium on the west bank, just so long as it goes on land we already own, or is part of a privately-funded MUD.

Would those ideas really add up to finding the public and private funds necessary to get this kind of project off the ground and provide any sort of incentive to build a stadium?... in this economy?.. and I didn't even realize Tulsa had Metro Utilities Districts?   Or does "privately-funded MUD" mean something else?  Because of the bad economy, I understand the lack of interest in TIF districts at this point in time.  But wouldn't a TIF and other incentives be a "must" to construct any sort of high profile project, even without a stadium?

Just so you know, alot of my venom in previous "MLS in Tulsa" posts dating back to 2005/2006 (including this thread when I originally started it)...... was due to the insistence that there was some sort of acceptable political compromise that could allow for a multi-use stadium to house both the Drillers and an MLS team.  There were links and pictures posted of those multi-use stadiums... and one example that was often used to advance that argument was PG&E park in Portland.....

MLS to Portland: Yes, the Beavers Gotta Move!
11:24 AM May 29th, 2009
http://blogs.wweek.com/news/2009/05/29/mls-to-portland-yes-the-beavers-gotta-move/

Portland City Council OK's Remodel of PGE Park For Major League Soccer
5:59 PM July 23rd, 2009
http://blogs.wweek.com/news/2009/07/23/portland-city-council-oks-remodel-of-pge-park-for-major-league-soccer/

When you watch webforum threads veer off into politically correct or politically popular groupthink territory..... yet you know.... FOR A FACT.... that a new soccer stadium/ballpark to be shared with the Drillers, will NOT get Tulsa an MLS team.... you let people know about it, in no uncertain terms.

So, then the argument starts to evolve from calling it a "soccer-specific stadium" (the term preferred by MLS and coined by Lamar Hunt).... into calling it a "soccer-only" facility.  Advancing that debate to its logical conclusion, guess what?  

We are now building a "baseball-only" facility downtown.

And if you haven't noticed, most new NFL stadiums are being built with wider sidelines to accommodate soccer-- (i.e. international exhibitions, national team games, possible future World Cup games, and in Seattle's case, an MLS team).... hard to find dependable stats, but Skelly Field at Chapman Stadium is about 64 yards wide, when pro standards (MLS, USL, FIFA) call for playing fields of at least 70 yards and no more than 80 yards wide....  

Which brings us to this:  Voting down the River Tax had its consequences.  IMO, this west bank project was one of them.  And those Branson people can just as easily build this kind of stuff in Jixby/South Tulsa or BA or Owasso..... And what is there for infrastructure?  One bridge that would connect the west bank to the city?

But hey, if a USL-1 team that attracts 5 or 6 or 7 or 8,000 fans per game needs to move away from the fairgrounds at some undetermined date and the Branson people want to build a stadium to house them as part of their proposal.... then sure, why not?

[Conan71]

The "MUD" I referred to meant mixed use development.  Might not be an appropriate acronym...oops.

Fast-forward two years, and even with the river tax, it's possible this Branson Landing still would not happen since it was proposed as private/public.  If the BL folks lost their source of funding or couldn't secure something, we'd still have the same river bank on the west side only the county would be collecting their extra regressive tax.

No, the wheels weren't coming off the national economy at that point, but there were signs the lug nuts were loose.  The city, to date, has still not made good on promises to vacate the M & E facility which leads me to believe there was a whole lot of lily-guilding going on between the river tax, the move to OneTech, and the seemingly continual stream of plan renderings coming from the river tax propagandists.  I still have a picture of Randi Miller in her office with her toadies trying to come up with all sorts of hooks on a daily basis to get people to vote for that sh!t burger of a package.

Don't get me wrong.  I've been on record as saying I'd love a stadium on the west bank, I truly would.  I simply think any measure or idea to date that's gone in that direction has been either corrupt or very ripe for it.  The county had no business jumping in the middle of the river tax package.  It took a lot of audacity to think that the successful V-2025 vote would translate to success for pretty much a Tulsa-only project.  All the Sand Springs, Jenks, and BA/Bixby parts of the project were obvious afterthoughts and those people saw through it.

[BierGarten]

Well, I don' think you can blame the county for proceeding forward with a county wide river package/vote.  Blame those at the City that didn't have the courage to roll it out as a City package.  I still can't figure out why we can't take what we learned from the failed County wide vote (which is that a City package would have passed) and re-launch the package as City only...