David Rubin critical of stadium building as a form economic development

[CousCuse]

Why can't the new facility be designed for baseball as well. Modern architects and engineers can do things that are amazingly innovative? Why can't one and part of each side seating be retractable to allow for a ballfield with high outfield walls to be set up inside of it? Lemoyne , Cornell and maybe Syracuse if then field a baseball team in the ACC could use as their homefield during the winter as now these teams have to travel every weekend to play warm climate teams. That would generate a huge amount of additional usage days and make an even more regional facility.

 

[Millhouse]

Rubin is correct when he points out that Syracuse is getting the shaft relative to the type and scale of investment going into Buffalo and Albany. Albany has the advantage of being where the purse strings are held, and Buffalo is a larger city with greater capacity to benefit from a resurgence in American manufacturing that is slowing taking shape. People should be upset that Syracuse I taking it in the no 2.

That said, to presume that stadiums don't encourage related development and provide a solid ROI is to focus on the failures and ignoring the successes. Stadiums work when they are knitted into the fabric of a downtown with stuff to do - the stadium and the surrounding area feed off one another. They work when they are the only show in town as is the case with SU sports. They work when they can be monetized as venues for non-sporting events because there are limited alternative venues in the area. All of these things are true for Syracuse. It was true of Baltimore which is the city that got the stadium financing boom started. Compare that to what they did in Philly - they built 3 new stadiums right next to each other in an area that is filled with lower middle class blue collar housing and just about nothing else. yeah those didn't do much for development. Specifics matter when it comes to any investment. Generalizations are fodder for internet controversy and herding the sheep.

Since you're against generalizations, lets hear your specific examples of successes. there are plenty of examples of downtown stadiums

the best people can come up with is the staples center as if there is going to be that much demand for event space in syracuse.

someone said the dome is used 300 times a year. sure, as long as you count box lunches for twenty people for some random meeting

 

[Millhouse]

and can we please stop with the mill town garbage?

if you think this is a good idea, fine, but there are lots of smart people who think stadiums are bad for economic development who've never set foot in syracuse much less develop a mill town mentality, whatever the is

it's just as easy and lazy for me to paint proponents as hopeless depressed idiots who will jump on any harebrained billion dollar shoot for the moon lottery ticket scheme

 

[Millhouse]

White elephant? He is making an awful lot of assumptions about the nature and use of the facility.

Are these the friends in LA?

About AEG
AEG is one of the leading sports and entertainment presenters in the world. AEG, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Anschutz Company, owns, controls or is affiliated with a collection of companies including over 100 of the world's preeminent facilities such as STAPLES Center (Los Angeles, CA), Sprint Center (Kansas City, MO), Citizen's Business Bank Arena (Ontario, CA), O.co Coliseum (Oakland, CA), Oracle Arena (Oakland, CA), Valley View Casino Center (San Diego, CA), American Airlines Arena (Miami), Best Buy Theater (Times Square, NY), Verizon Theatre (Grand Prairie, TX), Colosseum at Caesars Palace (Las Vegas, NV), Target Center (Minneapolis, MN), BBVA Compass Stadium (Houston, TX), Allphones Arena (Sydney, AU), MasterCard Center (Beijing, China), Ahoy Arena (Rotterdam), Ericsson Globe Arenas (Stockholm), Qatar National Convention Centre (Doha), O2 World Hamburg, O2 World (Berlin) and The O2, a 28-acre development located in the eastern part of London along the Thames River which includes a 20,000-seat arena and over 650,000sf of leisure and entertainment use which are all part of the portfolio of AEG Facilities; AEG Merchandising, a full service merchandising company; and AEG Global Partnerships, responsible for worldwide sales and servicing of sponsorships naming rights and other strategic partnerships.

In addition, AEG developed and operates StubHub Center, a $150 million national training center located on the campus of California State University, Dominguez Hills in Carson, CA which is an Official U.S. Olympic Training Site and features elite facilities for soccer, tennis, track & field, track cycling, boxing, lacrosse, rugby, football and other sports, as well as concerts and family shows, and is home to back to back MLS Champion LA Galaxy and Chivas USA MLS franchises. The company is also spearheading the development of Farmers Field, a 72,000-seat stadium and Event Center in downtown Los Angeles designed to host an NFL franchise, conventions and special events as well as a sports and entertainment arena in Las Vegas in partnership with MGM Resorts Intl.

Teams including the 2012 Stanley Cup Champion LA Kings (NHL), Manchester Monarchs (AHL), Ontario Reign (ECHL), Houston Dynamo & MLS Champion LA Galaxy (MLS), three hockey franchises in Europe as well as the Hammarby (Sweden) Futbol Club, management of privately held shares of the Los Angeles Lakers, events such as the Amgen Tour of California cycling race and a schedule of soccer exhibitions in the United States featuring the most popular international teams are part of AEG Sports.

AEG Live, the live-entertainment division of Los Angeles-based AEG, is dedicated to all aspects of live contemporary music performance. AEG Live is comprised of touring, festival, exhibition, broadcast, merchandise and special event divisions, fifteen regional offices and owns, operates or exclusively books thirty five state-of-the-art venues. The current and recent concert tour roster includes artists such as Taylor Swift, The Black Eyed Peas, Bon Jovi, Usher, Carrie Underwood, Daughtry, Justin Bieber, Leonard Cohen, Wisin & Yandel, Kenny Chesney, P!nk and Paul McCartney. The company is also currently producing productions including Shania Twain at The Colosseum at Caesars Palace, Supernatural Santana: A Trip Through the Hits at The Joint at Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas. The division's exhibition portfolio boasts the most successful exhibition of all time, Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs, which has attracted more than seven million visitors since 2005. AEG Live is also the largest producer of music festivals in North America from the critically acclaimed Coachella Music & Arts Festival to Stagecoach and New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival.

AEG directed the overall creation and development of L.A. LIVE, the 4 million square foot / $2.5 billion downtown Los Angeles sports, residential & entertainment district featuring venues such as Nokia Theatre L.A. LIVE, Club Nokia and The Conga Room; the GRAMMY Museum, saluting the history of music and the genre's best know awards show; a 54-story, 1001-room convention "headquarters" destination (featuring The Ritz-Carlton and JW Marriott hotels and 224 luxury condominiums - The Residences at The Ritz-Carlton L.A. LIVE - all in a single tower), Regal Cinemas L.A. LIVE Stadium 14 movie theatre, "broadcast" facilities for ESPN, along with entertainment, restaurant and office space making it the region's most active 'live content and event campus.'

In 2012, AEG Facilities launched its Turf Pro sports turf management program designed to provide and maintain company managed stadiums and teams with the highest quality playing surface. An annual Turf Pro Conference will be launched in 2013 for venue operators from around the globe to convene and discuss techniques and technologies to advance the management of professional sports playing surfaces.

In 2010, AEG launched its AEG 1EARTH environmental program with the announcement of 2020 environmental goals and the release of the industry's first sustainability report while in 2011, AEG introduced axs Ticketing, the first phase of its new entertainment platform serving as the company's primary consumer brand which will also feature a mobile service as well as a video content service now in development. In summer 2012, in partnership with HDNet, Ryan Seacrest Productions and Creative Artists Agency, AEG launched AXS TV, a new linear cable channel focusing on live entertainment and lifestyle programming available in nearly 40 million homes.

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If they would be the owner operator of the new facility they could tie into an association with the Falk school and Newhouse and you could instantly create a tremendous synergy there.

why does a company worth 8 billion dollars need so much public funding to run something that would be profitable?

AEG is good at privatizing profits and socializing costs.

 

[cuseinchina]

Since you're against generalizations, lets hear your specific examples of successes. there are plenty of examples of downtown stadiums

the best people can come up with is the staples center as if there is going to be that much demand for event space in syracuse.

someone said the dome is used 300 times a year. sure, as long as you count box lunches for twenty people for some random meeting

Well I said Baltimore and the inner harbor development - so already covered that. There are others.

Whoever is operating this stadium is not going to schedule like the Dome schedules - this will not be an SU facility, it will just have SU as its primary tenant. I am sure there will be a focus on revenue generating events and there is really no other place to have such an event aside from the war memorial which as I recall from the DMB concert fall of 1995, is a complete dump.

 

[Crusty]

I just read the Rubin article and I must say he appears to be a bit of an opinionated crank. The article is full of his opinion as if he knows anything more than anybody else about economic development. First time I ever heard anyone say that retail was a zero sum game that depended solely on population growth. Really now. I guess it has nothing to do with changes in personal disposable income, demographics, student body, tourism or a host of other elements.

He thinks it is a good idea to have the state subsidize the operating budget of the city - that make sense - not.

A new stadium for the biggest attraction in town is a waste but a renovated War Memorial is a good investment. Really? Great vision there. I suppose it is just the size that upsets Rubin.

China has kicked our butt by investing public money to support industry. Japan has done the same but I guess those lessons have just been wasted on Dr Rubin.

This guy is a classic example of the type of thinking that has kept CNY in the doldrums for the past 30 years.

 

[cuseinchina]

why does a company worth 8 billion dollars need so much public funding to run something that would be profitable?

AEG is good at privatizing profits and socializing costs.

It's called pooled risk. This is how the rest of the worlds is catching up with us and surpassing us in terms of infrastructure build. You pool public and private capital and then put up a toll booth. it kind of sucks but you need to do this in today's world in order to get things built.

 

[Millhouse]

I just read the Rubin article and I must say he appears to be a bit of an opinionated crank. The article is full of his opinion as if he knows anything more than anybody else about economic development. First time I ever heard anyone say that retail was a zero sum game that depended solely on population growth. Really now. I guess it has nothing to do with changes in personal disposable income, demographics, student body, tourism or a host of other elements.

He thinks it is a good idea to have the state subsidize the operating budget of the city - that make sense - not.

A new stadium for the biggest attraction in town is a waste but a renovated War Memorial is a good investment. Really? Great vision there. I suppose it is just the size that upsets Rubin.

China has kicked our butt by investing public money to support industry. Japan has done the same but I guess those lessons have just been wasted on Dr Rubin.

This guy is a classic example of the type of thinking that has kept CNY in the doldrums for the past 30 years.

it's helpful to know that you favor chinese style investment to support industry

 

[Millhouse]

It's called pooled risk. This is how the rest of the worlds is catching up with us and surpassing us in terms of infrastructure build. You pool public and private capital and then put up a toll booth. it kind of sucks but you need to do this in today's world in order to get things built.

no thanks.

i hope more visible proponents of stadiums as economic development tout china as the model. it'll make it much easier to kill.

 

[cuseinchina]

no thanks.

i hope more visible proponents of stadiums as economic development tout china as the model. it'll make it much easier to kill.

It's not china dude - it's Germany (most successful modern developed economy), it's Singapore (most successful developed Asian economy). don't write stuff off with a broad brush because it's easy to do so. Again, specifics matter.

PPP financing aligns public and private interests and taps private investors (often insurance companies or private equity funds which run money for the wealthy) to get stuff built for the public sector and then is supported by what is essentially a use tax - so if you use whatever they build you help support it, if you don't go to cuse games or other events don't sweat it. Or if you live in Chicago go head and bypass the skyway - I always did.

 

[cuseinchina]

it's helpful to know that you favor chinese style investment to support industry

this is an idiotic statement. see my other response for a couple of other countries using this style of investment

I love how when conservatives don't like something, and don't have a well though out reason for not liking the specifics, they respond by labeling it something scary. So, yeah a new stadium for our football team - communist for sure.

 

[Crusty]

It's not china dude - it's Germany (most successful modern developed economy), it's Singapore (most successful developed Asian economy). don't write stuff off with a broad brush because it's easy to do so. Again, specifics matter.

PPP financing aligns public and private interests and taps private investors (often insurance companies or private equity funds which run money for the wealthy) to get stuff built for the public sector and then is supported by what is essentially a use tax - so if you use whatever they build you help support it, if you don't go to cuse games or other events don't sweat it. Or if you live in Chicago go head and bypass the skyway - I always did.

I beg your pardon but China has done more of it than any other nation. They have been doing it since the 1980's. I have no idea what you mean by "don't write stuff off with a broad brush because it's easy to do so. Again, specifics matter." I wasn't aware that I was "writing anything off". You must have inferred because I did not imply.

 

[CousCuse]

The " hopeless depressed idiots" that were alluded to are the ones who want kill any new and hopeful thing that is proposed of any kind. Creating a new and different future challenges their comfort zone. Sorry to use psychology but I believe that's called projection.

 

[Millhouse]

The " hopeless depressed idiots" that were alluded to are the ones who want kill any new and hopeful thing that is proposed of any kind. Creating a new and different future challenges their comfort zone. Sorry to use psychology but I believe that's called projection.

I'm all for new things. Like not stealing money. That would be really new

Chinese style risk pooling, on the other hand, is a very old idea

 

[cuseinchina]

I beg your pardon but China has done more of it than any other nation. They have been doing it since the 1980's. I have no idea what you mean by "don't write stuff off with a broad brush because it's easy to do so. Again, specifics matter." I wasn't aware that I was "writing anything off". You must have inferred because I did not imply.

Pretty sure I was replying to Millhouse on that one man ..

 

[CousCuse]

I'm all for new things. Like not stealing money. That would be really new

Chinese style risk pooling, on the other hand, is a very old idea

Of course , risk pooling goes back to cave man times when they all rushed the mastodon at the same time.

 

[Millhouse]

Of course , risk pooling goes back to cave man times when they all rushed the mastodon at the same time.

This isn't voluntary. You want to force people to take on downside risk who get no benefit from upside. It stinks. But at least you guys consider that it's possible this is a terrible investment.

If you have to force people to take on risk, the return isn't there

Plenty of people facing liquidity constraints go in together when the investment makes sense.

 

[CousCuse]

This isn't voluntary. You want to force people to take on downside risk who get no benefit from upside. It stinks. But at least you guys consider that it's possible this is a terrible investment.

If you have to force people to take on risk, the return isn't there

Plenty of people facing liquidity constraints go in together when the investment makes sense.

The government imposes its will with the barrel of a gun in everything they do. Is this your pet project to save us from government tyranny in regards to a new sports facility for the sports crown jewels of our region, Syracuse basketball and football. You've already said that it doesn't matter if the financials support the project , you represent an intransigent faction who wants it dead for political reasons.

 

[cuseinchina]

This isn't voluntary. You want to force people to take on downside risk who get no benefit from upside. It stinks. But at least you guys consider that it's possible this is a terrible investment.

If you have to force people to take on risk, the return isn't there

Plenty of people facing liquidity constraints go in together when the investment makes sense.

Wrong. Liquidity needs and Time horizon are precisely why large projects tend to have a public component or are fully government funded. If investors can take four smaller projects with shorter time horizons and similar estimated return characteristics instead of one large project with a longer time horizon--the decision is simple. In order to coax private capital into public projects you need to either subsidize or give some sort of guaranteed minimum return. Better to risk private capital in addition to taxpayer capital in large projects. Are you saying you prefer government run stuff to private sector? Or are you changing your narrative to fit a circumstance you don't like. If you have to be ideological at least do it with some degree of consistency.

 

[Millhouse]

Wrong. Liquidity needs and Time horizon are precisely why large projects tend to have a public component or are fully government funded. If investors can take four smaller projects with shorter time horizons and similar estimated return characteristics instead of one large project with a longer time horizon--the decision is simple. In order to coax private capital into public projects you need to either subsidize or give some sort of guaranteed minimum return. Better to risk private capital in addition to taxpayer capital in large projects. Are you saying you prefer government run stuff to private sector? Or are you changing your narrative to fit a circumstance you don't like. If you have to be ideological at least do it with some degree of consistency.

You're putting really stupid words in my mouth. No one but you would read any of my posts and think I'm arguing for a government stadium

We agree this is a bad investment compared to alternatives. I don't think this is a public good and I don't think it's right to make people pay for it who get nothing from it.

 

[cuseinchina]

You're putting really stupid words in my mouth. No one but you would read any of my posts and think I'm arguing for a government stadium

We agree this is a bad investment compared to alternatives. I don't think this is a public good and I don't think it's right to make people pay for it who get nothing from it.

I am pointing out your hypocrisy.

I don't get anything out of money losing mass transit because I drive a car. Doesn't mean I don't think it's a good investment of my tax dollars. My kid goes to a private school and i don't complain about taxes going to educate the neighbors kid. Civilization depends on caring for something beyond your own personal benefit.

I do agree that there are better investments. But since those aren't forthcoming better take what you can get for the city, try todo it in the most economically additive way possible and as cuse fans be thankful it benefits us.

 

[Millhouse]

I am pointing out your hypocrisy. I don't get anything out of money losing mass transit because I drive a car. Doesn't mean I don't think it's a good investment of my tax dollars. My kid goes to a private school and i don't complain about taxes going to educate the neighbors kid. Civilization depends on caring for something beyond your own personal benefit. I do agree that there are better investments. But since those aren't forthcoming better take what you can get for the city, try todo it in the most economically additive way possible and as cuse fans be thankful it benefits us.

I hope you get a loud microphone to argue that civilization requires stadium subsidies as much as transportation for the poor and schools for kids

 

[Millhouse]

The government imposes its will with the barrel of a gun in everything they do. Is this your pet project to save us from government tyranny in regards to a new sports facility for the sports crown jewels of our region, Syracuse basketball and football. You've already said that it doesn't matter if the financials support the project , you represent an intransigent faction who wants it dead for political reasons.

Ok Mao

 

[CousCuse]

Ok Mao

It figures that a sophic apologists would know Mao chapter and verse.

 

[cuseinchina]

I hope you get a loud microphone to argue that civilization requires stadium subsidies as much as transportation for the poor and schools for kids

So I thoroughly support your right to think the stadium is a waste of money and even your belief that its better yo let the state money get allocated outside of Stracuse rather than get stuck investing in a stadium. All of that is valid opinion. I just wish you wouldn't then degrade the quality of your argument by calling people Mao and labeling private public partnerships as communist. Private capital is necessarily more efficient than public, and its inclusion in large projects is anything but leftist. What ppp/bot really does is to shift the costs of projects closer to the beneficiaries on the form of usage fees to provide the necessary roi to the private capital. It is also derisks projects from a taxpayer perspective because it replaces public debt with private equity capital.