December 9th, 2008 By Justin Williams
What’s in Your Driveway? a Stadium
From the Courier & Press:
A group of consulting companies has recommended that the city build a new arena at the D-Patrick Ford site that would cost between $117 million and $127 million.
HOK Sport of Kansas City recommended the site for its proximity to Main Street, access to parking and opportunities for additional economic development.
The arena would have a 12,000-seat capacity. Cost and funding plans have not yet been presented.
Sounds like a good location to me, but from the artist rendering it looks like they also want to take out Just Renne’s, Vision and the new Regent Communications offices and studios.
What say you?
photo courtesy of HOK via C&P
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i don’t want to be first.. but here goes.
..a few random thoughts..
i know there’s enough office space for regent, but i’m not sure what type of structure the other facilities need. but it shouldn’t be a problem, as long as the city helps them relocate.
i had to leave before the whole presentation was given, but i’m assuming that the executive inn will be gone, and a new hotel from the previously mentioned indianapolis developers will take the place of a ‘convention center hotel. the indy folks proposing the ‘hotel if stadium’ are quality. no need to worry about them.
while UE will be on board, i don’t see a reason why USI wouldn’t want to play there as well.
a new arena connected to the centre will give SMG the ability to market and arena + convention center, giving evansville the chance at many new conventions. a convention center alone can only do so much.
i need to see HOK’s presentation. does anyone have a copy yet?
I am a big fan of this idea. Evansville needs a revitalization. We need something like this to bring more money into the area and hopefully more industry.
it’s quite funny, and disheartening to read the comments on c&p.com. i find it hard to believe that there are really that great number of people who do not support this arena.
did anyone go to the meeting and see if there was much opposition?
to have the courage to build a stadium without a football team was one of the events that began the revitalization of indianapolis. but, as the advisory board chairman says, this is part of a complete package. it can not succeed without other supporting facilities such as a hotel, nearby restaurants and the like.
people of our generation.. x & y’ers.. this impacts us most of all.
and by the way.. if the arena gets built, does that mean that we get shiny streets?
The people in the C&P comments section are from another world. Also keep in mind that its usually the same 10 people on there bitching and moaning.
Jesus I’m for anything that will help revitalize downtown and for that matter, Evansville in general. I’ve lived here my whole life :( and I would have never believed years ago that in 2008 this city would still be so stuck in it’s ways and so overly conservative and seemingly, scared of change and diversity! This is a large enough city that our downtown should be an interesting, funky, metropolitan area…I know new things are slowly starting to happen but wow it sure is taking a long time and I know that the recession is going to slow it down even more. It just seems sad that so many of the openminded, creative people from this area seem to leave and sometimes you can’t blame them. We just don’t have enough here (job and otherwise) to lure people from more metropolitan cities to want to call eville home. I’m stil always hopeful that this will someday change.
Forgot to add that I luv our mayor Jonny! He is the first mayor of Eville that I have seen that realizes the importance of revitalization of the downtown area and it’s importance for the city as a whole! He seems to always be working hard to improve things IMHO
saw the whole study in a form that would kill a forest. and i must say that, after seeing how they vision it transforming the immediate area i am very encouraged. the arena seems to be designed specifically for multiple uses. and being one block off main street.. well yay.
i am a big fan of all the glass. yeah, that’s all glass surrounding the building giving you the ability to see outside while on the main concourse.
I might have to see a copy of the presentation because I’m having a hard time picturing where they’re going to get the room to build this. What’s going away? Where will parking be? Will there be another parking garage? Can I throw a rock at all of that glass without it breaking? ;-)
Other than that, I love the design and idea.
I don’t know if you are aware Rod, but you can park on the street. They won’t ticket you for that if you are not parked illeagally.
on the west side of this site is a city garage, the east side is the old downtown hospital surface lot and on the north side is the executive inn garage. i don’t think parking will be a problem! :)
They’ll need to drop a bomb on downtown and completely rebuild before too many people go down there. The area is a horrible mess in the way it’s set up, the confusing one way streets that start out of nowhere, the fact that all the streets are so narrow, the narrow sidewalks, the list of worndown buildings that make it all look so horrible.
I don’t think adding a stadium will fix all of these problems that only a complete overhaul would resolve.
I just wonder if revitalizing downtown areas at all is the best idea. Downtown tends to be the most dangerous part of any city, it’s usually the dirtiest, it’s the area with the highest crime, etc. I don’t blame people for wanting to stay away from the traffic, the crime, and the filfth. I wonder if the trend of the working class moving to the suburbs is one that can be reversed without transformation that is so massive no one would support it?
Forgot to ask- is there anywhere downtown to shop for groceries? You’ll never make too big a change if there aren’t a number of places to buy your basic supplies…the point of revitilzation is, in some aspect, not to have to constantly LEAVE downtown to get the stuff you must have if you live down there or want to spent a lot of time there.
For any change to stick, we’ll need a mall or mall-like center, a movie theater, some restaurants that people have actually heard of (for purposes of knowing these places are there to begin with), some grocery stores, etc.
there is no ‘grocery store’ or ’supermarket’ but there is a small co-op and rumors of a store of sorts on main street. a big center with a large grocery store is still decades off. indianapolis, which has had a major influx of residents to downtown and has had no hint of a major grocer. if you live downtown, you have to drive a minimum of 15 minutes to get to a major ‘big-box’ retailer.
a commerce center will come only after the demographics turn around.
As a new homeowner(akin park area), I am all for this as long as my taxes don’t go up. I think this is going to happen no matter what anyone wants though. Did everyone else get the slick mailer the day after this picture was in the paper?
I am curious about the shiny streets also.
I got a mailer 2 days ago with information, and the various sketches.
Brady – As a former and soon to be again resident of downtown Indianapolis, I can tell you that there is a grocery store downtown. It used to be an O’malia’s, it is now a Marsh. Of course, if you just have to get your Target fix, you do have to drive away from downtown, for now..
Josh Bozeman – If you think Evansville’s downtown is confusing, go to any city that is bigger than Evansville. I would imagine your head would explode with confusion and fright. City’s nationwide are experiencing downtown rebirths. Downtown Evansville is neither dirty nor scary. The arena, when built, will be accompanied by a new hotel that an Indianapolis developer has pledged to build pending the approval of the arena. People are already starting to move to downtown Evansville. In addition, Haynie’s Corner and Goosetown is starting to see new residents.
i know there is a grocery downtown indianapolis.. but there is no large store (target/wal-mart). a previous post had said that people who live downtown evansville need to stay downtown for their purchases.. and how there was no mall/strip mall.. i assumed he was implying that downtown needed a big box so that you could get everything in one place. indianapolis has no such place downtown.
Not enough seat capacity to bring in the bigger events/concerts/etc. Another waste of tax payer money, if they are going to do it, I wish they would do it right and produce capacity for at least 15,000.
Brady – fair enough
To be fair who doesn’t drive a few miles to Target type places? IF you live at Lynch and Green River, you are driving a few miles. If you live in downtown Evansville, you are driving close to the same distance. Unless you live a block over from Target or Wal-Mart or something, you have to drive a bit. I think one’s logic is terribly flawed if commuting to Target, Wal-Mart, movie theaters, etc. is a disadvantage to living in downtown Evansville. At least 70% of Evansville has to drive a few miles for that stuff.
I was talking more about the mall downtown Indianapolis (as an example), movie theaters downtown, etc. I’ve always been able to get everything I could imagine downtown Indy in walking distance from movie theaters, clubs, plays, the dome, tons of restaurants, etc.
Evansville isn’t that big, so maybe we won’t see any of that sort of thing here. Will that hinder any progress? I’ve no idea. Nothing has seemed to work so far.
What’s more- my main point was the obsession with making sure downtown is the place to be. People don’t go downtown now, so there’s a reason they don’t. Will a new arena, a hotel, and a restaurant or two change that? I doubt it. People will still stay clear of downtown in large measure…they MIGHT see an event every now and then (but heck, Roberts stadium’s lot is packed whenever an avent takes place, so they’re clearly already going to see events to begin with). The argument that an arena would bring people downtown for anything more than an event in the arena- I’m just not buying it.
As for the downtown layout– it doesn’t fit the traditional grid of most cities…and that’s because downtown is a merging of two different cities that weren’t created to connect to begin with. So, one half of facing one way and the other is butting into it at an angle, which makes it sort of a mess.
Speaking of which- this looks interesting…a plan for the development of a system of major streets in Evansville (pdf book from 1925).
http://dns2.evpl.org/ebooks/PDFs/lowresolution/book0039.pdf
The size of the city of Evansville is not something that should hinder downtown with proper leadership (see Chattanooga for example).
The difference between DT Indy and DT Evansville is not the size of the cities; it is that there are enough people who LIVE in downtown Indianapolis to support the stuff that is down there. People are moving to downtown Evansville right now; this is much more important than the arena. My point is that as people continue moving to Downtown Evansville; added with the arena and development that is planned with it, will only accelerate the development of downtown Evansville.
As far as the layout of Downtown Evansville; yes it is connected weird at points. However, there are ample roads surrounding it to make entry to DT Evansville relatively easy if you bother to go down there. Fulton down to Riverside, easy. MLK down to any street, easy. The blocks in the core of DT Evansville; incredibly easy. I don’t buy the layout argument for a second. The worst thing to happen to DT Evansville is the Lloyd cutting it off from the neighborhoods to the north of it. Aside from that, there is no reason any person would not be able to navigate their way into DT Evansville.
Glad someone brought up Regent on here. Unfortunately our city leaders haven’t given much thought to the company. Regent is comprised locally of 5 radio stations (WKDQ, WGBF-FM, WGBF-AM, WDKS, WJLT) all of which are licensed by the FCC. This past May they moved in to the building on the corner of 5th and Walnut.
Should the company have to move again, they have to get FCC approval. There are Satellite dishes that sit on the roof, that cannot be moved without FCC approval. So no matter how much the mayor wants to build his stadium…it could get a lengthy delay if the FCC drags its feet.
On a side note. Its funny that in each of the site analysis before Wednesday, the block with Regent wasn’t included. It was all a block North with the Executive Inn being torn down. I don’t know what happened with that…but I believe the Exec should be torn down.
The hotel is obsolete and run down, and I’m embarrased that is the image that most visitors have when coming in to our town. Let the developers from Indy construct their new hotel and implode the Exec. It was a great hotel…30 years ago.
rumor.. well, not rumor.. the executive inn is behind on innskeepers tax payments..
and yeah.. something that should go away before the executive inn is the HOLE on the MLK side of the garage. it’s been there for months.. and hasn’t been touched. does anyone know why it’s there. it looks to have fallen or been crashed into.
I have always been a supporter of a new stadium…BUT if the city isn’t willing to make an arena bigger than Roberts Stadium, then why do it at all? The main reason Evansville does not get bigger entertainment acts is because the building is too SMALL! The city needs to think big…I think no less than 17-18,000 capacity and 20,000 would be perfect. A 12,000 capacity arena is going to give us the same old stuff we always get. Why not build a huge place where we can get the biggest acts?…and I don’t mean country singers because that is the one thing we get plenty of!