Sioux Falls Event Center

[filbert]

Re: Sioux Falls Event Center

Shorter SF Sports Authority: Just build the damn thing, we really don't care where!

SF Sports Authority On Board With Events Center Site

http://www.keloland.com/NewsDetail6162.cfm?Id=116749

[SUPERBUNNY]

Re: Sioux Falls Event Center

Okay, so I've read some on the thread and need to know a little more information about the Arena site. What is the plan there? Build a new Events Center and then tear the current arena down or have two existing "arenas" that are connected to the convention center?

All I can tell you is I am having Swiftel Center flashbacks all over again!

SUPERBUNNY

[UWMandSDSU]

Re: Sioux Falls Event Center

Just logged in again. Wow, I may have created a monster.

KUlawJack- Would you be in favor of moving the Baseball stadium downtown? Do you think a compromise like this would be sufficient enough for the BID people?

[UWMandSDSU]

Re: Sioux Falls Event Center

Okay, so I've read some on the thread and need to know a little more information about the Arena site. What is the plan there? Build a new Events Center and then tear the current arena down or have two existing "arenas" that are connected to the convention center?

All I can tell you is I am having Swiftel Center flashbacks all over again!

SUPERBUNNY

Keep existing Arena. They just approved putting in a new scoreboard and new lighting for the Arena.

[KUlawJack]

Re: Sioux Falls Event Center

KUlawJack- Would you be in favor of moving the Baseball stadium downtown? Do you think a compromise like this would be sufficient enough for the BID people?

If the vote passes and the Arena site does in fact become the location where a new events center would be built, I would not be opposed to building the baseball stadium downtown. I can't speak for BID as I am not associated with them, although I support their efforts. However, Zimmer's recent articles point toward the dying industry that is minor league baseball in SF. Could it be revived by building it downtown? In short, I don't know, there are a lot of variables at play there. It would require extensive research. I do know that if the baseball stadium was downtown, I would attend more than 1 Pheasant game per year.

As an aside, I lived in downtown Denver and we made it a frequent weekend night attending baseball games. Heck, we made it a weekday night. Go out to eat at a good restaurant, catch the game, have a few beers afterward, all in walking distance...but I guess that is the benefit of building downtown rather than at some remote location with only a Buffalo Wild Wings within walking distance.

[SUPERBUNNY]

Re: Sioux Falls Event Center

Keep existing Arena. They just approved putting in a new scoreboard and new lighting for the Arena.

Hmmmmm? I need to do more research because my first thought is where is everyone going to park? It's bad enoough now when the Summitt League and Home Show are the same time. Just think how it would be with the Summitt League in the new building, an event in the Arena, and an event in the Convention Center? Yikes. There are probably not ideal situations for parking at either location.

I better do more research because at first blush a locationout by the interstate would make a lot of sense!

SUPERBUNNY

[91jack]

Re: Sioux Falls Event Center

I'm one of the out of towners so you might get what side I'm on. I guess I'm actually on the side of just getting it built but I'd prefer the arena site.
Before I get too much into this I was wondering if some of you could answer a few questions.
1) What year was the arena built? I think it's been 50 years but just making sure.
2) How much did they spend on it?
3) How much money has it brought to the city in that time frame?
I know the last one is just a guess and that could differ greatly depending on who you talk to. I think the old arena has more than paid for itself so the city should get a new one built. It's great to take money for the old one but to invest in a new one, isn't acceptable.

You can bring up a Shania Twain concert but the Summit League tourney could be another example. How about somebody that comes to town for 3 days and gets a hotel room for 2 or 3 nights? How do we know what the people from the concert will do? If they live close, they could come early and go to a Red Lobster, Outback, Texas Roadhouse or some place like that. If they live far away, they might need to fill up with gas. If they live even farther away, they might get a hotel room anyway. I know that isn't a lot of money but it's more than BK or Arby's. If you don't get out for a good meal very often, why not splurge as long as you're in SF? At least you threw a few beers in there and didn't go as cheap as possible.

I don't know much about the parking situation. I would think that the 12,000 downtown workers would already be at work before people showed up for something like the Summit League tourney. They would take all the free-close parking. The games start before 6PM so you'd get there before the free parking. At least for the night games, all the workers would be gone so there should be more spots. Do they have meters? Do those go for 6 hours? A session at the tourney will be at least 5 hours. I suppose is would be about $5 for a session. I think somebody wrote something about expensive parking solutions. Do you mean a ramp like the one they will need downtown? I don't know much about the site downtown but I would think you either need a ramp or you'd have to walk a lot further because of the river, buildings and other stuff. I guess I ate a Wild Sage and if that's where this is going, you have the river on one side.

I feel for you about getting lost. I asked a friend from SF how to get somewhere 2 years ago after the first night games of the tourney. They told me to take a left on 12th(?) off Minnesota. I got in the turning lane and I saw that it was a 1 way street. The Keloland van pulled up next to me. They were going to let me go but since there wasn't much traffic, I let them go and then got behind them. I gave him a lot of crap.

[KUlawJack]

Re: Sioux Falls Event Center

If you're worried about parking downtown keep this in mind. They have to create a bunch of new parking at the Arena site as well. Its not like one is better than the other in that way. In fact, the AECOM study gerrymandered the hell out of downtown to avoid some of the parking areas while using a radial analysis from a center point for the Arena location. Its was asinine. If they'd used a radial distance for both, there would have been a whole lot more spots included for downtown.

[bigticket1]

Re: Sioux Falls Event Center

It's somewhat amusing to me that the downtown group seems to believe that all of us "hicks from the sticks" out-of-towners (sorry,couldn't resist ) would spend hours before and after events at a downtown events center strolling downtown streets,buying things at stores and dining at downtown restaurants. Let me tell you a secret - most of us have been to Falls Park,the Washington Pavilion and attended other downtown events. We know the businesses located there,and if we don't patronize them now,we aren't likely to start just because an events center is downtown. And the residents of Sioux Falls who don't currently shop and eat downtown aren't likely to start because the arena is downtown either.

[KUlawJack]

Re: Sioux Falls Event Center

So you're saying that even if you attended an event at an event center located downtown, you'd always drive to another location to grab a beer or eat after or before said event? I find that hard to believe, and if true, you're missing out on some awesome places to eat and have a beer downtown. Furthermore, if you don't think new restaurants, bars, and shops would open downtown that might attract said event goers, I have some oceanfront property in Kansas I bought before I left Lawrence that I'd like to sell you.

The point of building this downtown was to continue developing a vibrant downtown, a cultural center of the city. It will help combat a feeling that has existed about Sioux Falls for some time: a small city that feels like an overgrown suburb, lacking a city center. Building at the Arena perpetuates that view.

As an aside, all the replies from out-of-towners seem to be against downtown. Those for downtown seem to be Zooropa (who lives downtown) and myself (I live close to it). I guess that says something, not sure exactly what though. Maybe that he and I are simply idiots. I'm not ruling it out, people have called me an idiot (and worse) on many occasions. Can't vouch for him.

[joeboo22]

Re: Sioux Falls Event Center

I think this issue is going to be one of those where if you live downtown, work downtown or like downtown you will before it, as you should. If you live out of town you should before the current site.

Personally I think they should work on developing a complex something that can attract large events, whether that be the large convention like Fargo has that they won't give up to bid on the SL tournament or a stock show like Denver or Rapid City that is huge. If there was no current arena, no current convention center then I'd be more for downtown then I am. But after seeing the Rapid City Civic Center I think Sioux Falls would be dumb not to follow. I've been there for one large event, or 4 small events. Parking isn't great but its not bad either.

[poppa1]

Re: Sioux Falls Event Center

There is alot of talk about development downtown if the EC was built there, they said the same thing when the arena was built and it didn't take place, so there is no guarantee it would happen downtown. It seem to be all speculation.

[MikeHenriksen]

Re: Sioux Falls Event Center

One thing about the "no development" argument. Are we not counting the Sheraton, the Ramada, the other 2 or 3 motels, the 4 eating joints, and all of the office buildings as "development" around the current Arena? It might not be the type or the extent that some would like to see, but it is not like the thing is sitting in Sherman!

As for the baseball stadium downtown, I have been in favor of that for 2 years. And it is not like the city has ignored downtown. Anyone that compares what it is today compared to what it was 10 years ago will know that it is worlds better! The downtown businesses, if they are smart (and I believe most of them are) will benefit from the very things that are lacking at the current Arena site by offering trolly or shuttle services. I think they have missed out on doing that the last few years when there are major events at the current Arena, but perhaps this will offer them a fresh perspective.

[zooropa]

Re: Sioux Falls Event Center

One thing about the "no development" argument. Are we not counting the Sheraton, the Ramada, the other 2 or 3 motels, the 4 eating joints, and all of the office buildings as "development" around the current Arena? It might not be the type or the extent that some would like to see, but it is not like the thing is sitting in Sherman!

The Sheraton is there thanks to a sweetheart deal between J.Q. Hammons & the city of Sioux Falls.

The Ramada (ex Holiday Inn) dates to the 60s, the Super 8 across the highway is of similar vintage, the ex Excel Inn/EconoLodge/Rodeway Inn/Sioux Falls Inn is 70s vintage, and the Arena is early 60s.

The office buildings on the E. side of the Arena and N. of Russell date primarily to the 60s and early 70s.

BWW does steady business (although I can't for the life of me figure out why), the place that was Homers, then Nutty's North and is now Boonies should give you some idea of the viability of restaurants in the neighborhood. The ex-Travelodge S. of Boonies is now apartments, and was converted from a motel to apartments after the convention center.

----

Since the convention center, there has been no significant new private construction in the Arena area that can be connected causally to the Arena/Convention Center complex (there have been additions to the CCL label facility and the Dow-Rummell Village, but it's pretty hard to connect those to the presence of the Arena/Convention Center).

The extensive development around the Arena in the 60s was due to dirt cheap land with extensive and preexisting infrastructure that became available in the 50s with the closure of the air corps base. If you want to see development at the Arena site concomitant with a new events center, that development will have to be subsidized, just as it was indirectly subsidized in the 60s---even more so, due to the need to rehabilitate, redevelop, and repurpose structures in the West Sioux neighborhood.

[zooropa]

Re: Sioux Falls Event Center

Also consider this:

The Convention Center did not provide enough additional business to prevent the closure of the 200 room Howard Johnson/Oaks motel that was within a five minute drive of the Russell/West intersection.

Granted, the Howard Johnson was probably 'a bridge too far' when it was built, but it was not helped much by the Convention Center.

In fact, the demolition of the Oaks and the conversion of the Travelodge to apartments means room inventory in the vicinity of the convention center has fallen ~20% since the convention center was built.