Quote:
Originally Posted by bob rulz
If a use can't be found for the stadium, and quickly, it should be demolished. It is beautiful, and in a great location, but an empty, unused stadium is one of the biggest eyesores I can imagine.
If the U of U bought it and renovated it, and made a mini-campus there, that would be awesome. Obviously, I have no idea if the U has any interest in that. And wouldn't that stadium be way too big for a college baseball team? I don't know much about baseball, especially college baseball, which isn't nearly as big or lucrative as college basketball and football.
Comrade is right about the Millers though. They have done next to nothing to actually invest in this community. They rented the stadium for cheap cheap cheap, and didn't invest any of that extra money into improving the surrounding neighborhood. Some of that is surely on Salt Lake City, but Salt Lake City actually made the effort to develop the Ballpark Master Plan, and worked with the Millers on that, only for the Millers to bail on us anyway. Aside from keeping the Jazz in Utah back in the 80s, when it was no guarantee they would stay, what have the Millers really done for Salt Lake City? Some car dealerships and a mediocre movie theater chain?
Moving the team to the suburbs is a slap in the face to the city, and the Millers know it. Obviously, I would rather see that stadium utilized, and with a baseball team that can spur at least some development around it (I'm not sure, realistically, how much development a minor league team could procure), but to the Millers I say good riddance, personally.
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My hope is that the city exhausts every measure at finding a tenant for the stadium. My concern is that some in the city don't appear to be interested in even that and instead are frothing at the mouth to develop the land. That is a terrible starting point and something that forces me to question the current mayor and city council.
I'm sure the mayor knew before an official announcement that the Millers were going to relocate to Daybreak (and it's not a shock, as it's been rumored ever since Larry Miller bought the team that they were interested in bailing for the suburbs - and finally got what they needed by acquiring Daybreak themselves) but within the hour of the Bees announcement, she was already using language to suggest a post-ballpark plan and that I don't like. I can't get on board with so quickly abandoning any potential to make tt work with the ballpark - even if it's to renovate the ballpark into, say, an amphitheater. Hartford did that with their minor league ballpark and I think it turned out great:
As for the Millers, I am grateful for what they've done in the past. I do respect Gail Miller and her focus on homelessness. But bob is right here - the Millers have owned the Bees for almost 20 years now. There has not been any attempt to invest in that neighborhood. Sure, that's their right to just be a tenant of the neighborhood and nothing more. I can't say I respect that, especially when we hear how great stewards to the community they are, but it is their right.
The thing is, the Millers, even Larry, have never been proactive in developing the community. Not the Salt Lake community.
Look at what Steve Ballmer did in Inglewood - he invested $100 million into the city and that's not to build the arena - that's to build the community around the arena.
There was never any investment by the Millers in the area around the Delta Center during the years they owned the franchise. And again, that's their right. But I think it shows the Millers never viewed Salt Lake City as the home of their franchises - rather just the location.
The area around the Delta Center, for ten years, mostly sat rundown and crime-filled throughout the 90s. If you weren't going to a Jazz game or a concert, you rarely ventured over to that area because it was filled with abandoned warehouses, homelessness, prostitutes, crime, drugs and a railyard (ironically, the same thing people are critical about the Ballpark Neighborhood right now).
Was there any investment from the Millers to push for affordable housing or retail development there?
No. Instead, the Millers went to the suburbs, where they built Jordan Commons and moved the day-to-day operations of their company to an office mid-rise there.
The development we did see was built out of the Gateway, a project that began with federal help cleaning up the Brownfield area west of the arena and then moving the tracks around there.
I'll credit Miller that he was able to partner with Boyer to put his theater chain in there (though, if not Megaplex, it would have been another theater chain lol).
Woohoo!
I have no doubt that if the Millers hadn't sold the Jazz, they would be looking to move them out that way too. Maybe they don't like Salt Lake - maybe they feel it's too big city-ish and they don't want to deal with the issues that a big city often faces. Regardless, the Millers never committed to the Ballpark neighborhood and while I don't think they owe anything to the area, it's a shame they never felt the need to invest in it. I always said the Ballpark area could be Salt Lake's mini-Wrigleyville and it finally looked like we were getting there with the new development popping up over the last ten or so years.
Really, I could see this move back in 2005 only because I do think the Ballpark area was underutilized. But today? It's extra sucky because how much the city has actually invested in the area.
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