Location Location Location
I was in Indianapolis this week. I arrived on Sunday afternoon and grabbed a cab to my hotel downtown. I managed to get into downtown as the Colts game was letting out and it took forever to get to the hotel because they had several of the cross streets cordoned off. As I sat there in the cab watching the thousands of people streaming out of the stadium into downtown, I couldn’t help but think… man, they should have built Miller Park in downtown Milwaukee.
Yes, yes they should have. But then beer-swilling Milwaukeeans would not have been able to pay $7 to sit in a parking lot all day and get fat and hammered before setting foot in the stadium. They would’ve had to park their car in a ramp and buy their food and drink inside the park, you know, things that would make money for the club.
Yet another reason the Brewers will always be losers at heart.
Posted by Recess Supervisor on October 07, 2009 at 1850 hrs
If they had built Miller Park downtown, I would never have attended a game. Do not want the hassles. 1) No parking, giving them a bogus reason to shove light rail down our throats. 2) No parking, screwing the Brewers out of all that parking revenue. 3) No parking, flooding downtown streets with gridlock for hours after the games. All of this adds up to very late nights on weeknight games, which, in case you’ve forgotten, is the vast majority of games. The occasional Sunday afternoon game is not a good reason to cause a pain in the ass for the majority of the fan base. I currently attend between 15 and 20 games per year, and weeknights get plenty late by the time I get back to West Bend. Thanks but no thanks.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 07, 2009 at 2011 hrs
“All that parking revenue?” Their parking revenue is a drop in the bucket, when you consider that their own estimates peg them at about one car for every three people in the stadium, and their parking fees are a pittance. A smart businessman would gladly trade three people taking one car for three people taking one bus if it meant that the three people would have to buy their food and beverage in the park.
Besides, the reality is that Milwaukee never would’ve built light rail anyway and everyone would’ve been driving.
Give the Brewers a cut on 60% of the brats eaten and beer swilled in that parking lot and they could buy a halfway decent starter. But hey, Milwaukee’s so used to being mediocre that it wouldn’t know what to do with a winner anyway.
Posted by Recess Supervisor on October 07, 2009 at 2047 hrs
Totally agree. I still went to 20 or 25 home games (and 6 away games) this season, but t’s such a hassle to get all the way out to the stadium after work with the rush hour traffic. I’d love it to just be downtown. Plus it’d draw some of the suburbanites to downtown businesses for boozin and eatin pre and post game. What a mistake.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 07, 2009 at 2257 hrs
“A smart businessman would gladly trade three people taking one car for three people taking one bus if it meant that the three people would have to buy their food and beverage in the park.”
You aren’t thinking this through at all. Bud Selig opposed the downtown location because he would have lost all the parking revenue and would have lost revenue to all the downtown restaurants and fast food locations which would have benefited from 30-40,000 people being dropped into the neighborhood 81 times a season.
Selig’s gain was downtown Milwaukee’s loss, however. Unfortunately, there is little to draw people to downtown Milwaukee, in sharp contrast to cities like Indy, Philly, Boston, Baltimore, even Washington. Just one more reason why poor Milwaukee remains a dump.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 08, 2009 at 0651 hrs
From the get-go I thought it should’ve been downtown…which seems to always be teetering on the brink of being a ghost town at certain times of the year. Just imagine all the people living in this densely populated area who might have had nothing to do on Sunday afternoon and could have easily picked up and attended a Brewers’ game rather than spending a similar amount on a movie.
Posted by David Casper on October 08, 2009 at 0843 hrs
I couldn’t help but think… man, they should have built Miller Park without taxpayer money.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 08, 2009 at 0856 hrs
I agree with you there.
Posted by Owen on October 08, 2009 at 0926 hrs
The Miller Park tax is by far my favorite tax I ever paid. I know where it goes, and it went to something I use all the time, unlike all the other taxes I have to pay.
But yeah, downtown would have been the smart move. Rational Observer is correct up until the point he called downtown a dump.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 08, 2009 at 0932 hrs
It’s a banner day. Owen and I completely agree.
The Verizon Center in downtown DC was the best decision they made in that city in a while. That area was a pit that I never visited before they put that in. After it came, it became a hot spot full of restaurants, bars and shops.
Downtown Milwaukee could have used a similiar catalyst.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 08, 2009 at 0956 hrs
Not building Miller Park downtown was one of the biggest mistakes Milwaukee has ever made. Urban ballyards are far superior to stadiums standing alone in a sea of parking.
If I designed Miller Park I would have taken two regional traditions and morphed them into something that would have made Miller Park really special. If you take Milwaukee’s tailgating tradition and move it to the top deck of an urban parking structure, then slide that parking structure up tight to the outfield bleachers like the buildings across Waveland Ave at Wrigley you would create a baseball experience like nothing else in the major leagues. The top deck would be a raucous party every game filled with tailgaters looking down into the stadium.
UWM placing their engineering campus out in Wauwatosa might be the second biggest mistake this city will ever make.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 08, 2009 at 1020 hrs
Damn, that’s a great idea 3rd Way. What could have been…
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 08, 2009 at 1235 hrs
Yes, because 3,000,000 fans are not enough, and screw all those businesses on Bluemound and the sudden growth along Miller Park Way. Right? And all of us in the suburbs paying for the stadium just loooove coming downtown.
The problem with the current location is that nobody has thought to develop East of the stadium in the Valley.
Of course, if they shluld have built it near downtown, they should have built it at the lakefront with a giant casino/hotel complex next door.
Posted by James Wigderson on October 08, 2009 at 1316 hrs
The problem with the current location is that nobody has thought to develop East of the stadium in the Valley.
Yeah, I am sure the thought of developing the valley never occurred to any of the dozens of developers in SE WI that poured billions of dollars into downtown since Miller Park has been built. They haven’t developed there because it doesn’t make economic sense to try and put anything in a former flood plain between a parking lot the size of a small lake and crumbling manufacturing facilities.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 08, 2009 at 1409 hrs
I mostly agree with Tom. I like Miller Park where it is. Not everyone lives or works in downtown Milwaukee. Since all the surrounding counties are also paying for it with the sales tax, it makes some sense for it to be located where those residents will have an easier time getting there and parking. I would like to see a more convincing argument offered why people think the attendance would have been higher over these years with the stadium located downtown.
I liked the idea of letting the tribes pay for it and having a combination stadium/casino. Now that would have brought people in!Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 08, 2009 at 1722 hrs
Let’s hear it for UW-Madison, which re-built historic Camp Randall for $110 million and did it without asking the state for a handout and without saddling local taxpayers with a sales tax increase to pay for it. The total cost of the renovation was borne by contributions from donors, revenue from skyboxes, and seat license fees imposed on season ticket holders with the best seats. Yes, state tax-exempt bonds were sold to pay up front for the project, but the bonds are being retired solely from the revenue sources listed above.
You can call Lambeau Field “historic,” and it is as historic as a 52-year old stadium can be. Consider Camp Randall, where football has been played in the current stadium since 1917 and where football as played at the old location from 1890 through the 1916 season. Prior to that, it served as a military encampment, where most of the 80,000 Wisconsin men who went off to fight the Civil War spent their last nights on Wisconsin soil. If it is history you seek, this is the place.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 08, 2009 at 1932 hrs
I agree with Charlie- and Owen.
a sign that we are coming together on the board in a spirit of brotherly love
or the beginning of the End of Days
MHM
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 09, 2009 at 0756 hrs
I think it should be proposed properly to the officials there, to minimized traffic when there’s games.
Townsville Accommodation.Posted by Townsville Accommodation on October 23, 2009 at 2048 hrs
Total Entries: 20000
Total Comments: 134044
Most Recent Entry: 05/25/2012 06:26 am
Most Recent Comment on: 05/25/2012 07:57 am
Total Members: 9751
Total Logged in members: 0
Total guests: 120
Total anonymous users: 2
Most Recent Visitor on: 05/25/2012 08:06 am
The most visitors ever was 538 on 12/01/2007 02:11 pm
Protected and licensed under a Creative Commons License (some rights reserved).