(Glenn Davis provides the details via the Chron)
Let me borrow a real estate phrase: Location, location, location is what this is about, and a downtown stadium will be an unparalleled vehicle for promoting soccer. Stadiums out in the hinterlands in MLS are still trying to prove them-selves as a magnet for fans.
Fans migrating to stadiums located in the inner city can become a part of a ritual.
When I was growing up in New Jersey, my father used to take me to sporting events at Madison Square Garden in the heart of New York. The ritual began as we left the house.
Take the train from the suburbs to Hoboken, N.J., then jump on the Path train (subway) under the Hudson River. As we exited the Path and scrambled up the steps to the street, a whole new world opened up.
The streets of Manhattan were alive with vendors, scalpers hawking tickets, and fans of the New York Rangers or Knicks. The air crackled with competition and excitement.
I can't medically prove this, but chronic New York envy seems to be spreading in Houston at pandemic rates.
The sad thing is, the very scenerio Glenn is trying to paint in his column is the exact reason that a downtown Minor League Soccer stadium in Houston won't work.
Let's review:
There IS no current viable Metro solution that allows people to come in from the suburbs to downtown on the weekends. You can't "hop the train" from Fairfield, stop off at the "downtown terminus" and go grab a hot dog from a vendor. You can't do it now, and there are no Metro plans for you to be able to do that. Not now, and not in the long term. The "Master Plan" that Metro is devising doesn't go out that far. It doesn't go out to a majority of the exburbs, so you would have to drive into the downtown stadium, pay to park, and then walk up in an environment where there are NO street vendros, unless you want to include the homeless and ticket scalpers you run into on the way to the game.
The fact is Mr. Davis is selling the downtown location on a set of false pretenses. The scenerio that he is describing just doesn't exist. Nor will it ever exist in Houston. There have been repeated attempts to "revitalize" Downtown. None of them have worked in the long run. Maybe one day the City leaders will realize this and quit throwing good money after bad. Maybe, but I doubt it.
The main problem that the Dynamo face is not one of racism as hyper-sensitive Chron Columnist John Lopez ludicrously theorizes. The main problem is lack of vision.
Not having a Soccer stadium downtown isn't a matter of race, it's a matter of simple demographics. The audience for minor league Soccer in America is largely centered in the suburbs. So I say build the thing in the suburbs, surround it with a complex dedicated to youth soccer and its growth, and then work with Metro to shuttle people to the games that need the rides.
To do that you'd have to have a vision that's more forward thinking than what currently passes as "vision" in Houston. Modern thinking in this City roughly translates to "all downtown all the time" with little thought being given to other population centers in the City. Because of this there is a glut of development in a few areas, while other parts of the City fall into decline.
My idea is to put the stadium in the center of the community that it serves. Put it on the NorthEast side, build a youth soccer complex around it, and watch the sport grow.
Or isolate it from the community and put it Downtown. Let the youth soccer leagues play their games at locations far away from the stadium on game day, and alienate over 90% of your audience. While you're playing games in a 1/2 empty downtown stadium, thousands of potential customers will be in Bear Creek and other areas of the City playing youth league games, ignoring the Dynamo because playing a game, travelling downtown, and then driving back home, is too cost and time prohibitive for most families.
Meanwhile, I'll be at home watching the Permiership on Fox Soccer Channel.
The MLS games are too slow.
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1 comments:
MLS games are too slow....?
That was the perception of the Mexican league teams last summer when they were facing MLS but after a few azz whoops they went home rethinking that statement
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