Virginia Beach Arena (Cancelled)

[BFG]

It's understandable that they would play it cool. Not saying a team is coming here, but how silly would they look if they promised a team, then (God forbid) something falls through? Egg on everyone's face.

Reminds me a lot of the Ikea situation. As far as the general public knows, nothing is going on, but there was definitely something brewing behind closed doors these last couple years. Mum's the word until something official happens.

[HRVT]

2 hours ago, BFG said:

It's understandable that they would play it cool. Not saying a team is coming here, but how silly would they look if they promised a team, then (God forbid) something falls through? Egg on everyone's face.

Reminds me a lot of the Ikea situation. As far as the general public knows, nothing is going on, but there was definitely something brewing behind closed doors these last couple years. Mum's the word until something official happens.

After what happened with the Rhinos, they'll definitely play it cool, even if things are looking good about getting a team. Frankly, from what it looks like, there just isn't going to be a 32nd team for now. As a hockey fan, I haven't read any speculation anywhere of late about Virginia Beach being a contender for a team. 

Also to say Hampton Roads (a metro area) is bigger than Raleigh (a city by itself) is dishonest when trying to compare areas. Raleigh and Virginia Beach are of almost identical size (estimates put them each around 450K). But the NC Triangle in general has 2.2 million people vs about 1.7 million in Hampton Roads. Perhaps it has been forgotten here how fast the Triangle has grown. In the last 35 years, they have added approximately as many people to their population as CURRENTLY live in Hampton Roads. 

Not to mention that PNC Arena is within a half hour of the vast majority of the Triangle (26 minutes between Wallace Wade Stadium at Duke and PNC Arena). In Hampton Roads, a large chunk of the smaller overall population is well outside of that half hour away from where the arena will be. It's 30 minutes (assuming the HRBT traffic is flowing smoothly) from Hampton Convocation Center on HU's campus to the arena site. The NHL isn't going to leave Raleigh for another location that doesn't support their minor league hockey. Coming to the area, there would be an attendance bump for 3-8 years (depending on the early success of that new team) and that's it.

The Virginia Beach arena will be good for concerts, monster truck shows, and maybe even the ACC Basketball Tournament. But IMO, that's the best we can realistically hope for, should the arena get built (I still have serious doubts). Hampton Roads missed its window IMO in the 90s. The area has been surpasses by other metros (Raleigh included... which was substantially smaller than Hampton Roads 15 years ago).

Edited August 20, 2016 by HRVT

[tallguy81"]

Raleigh metro has  1million compared to 1700000 Hampton roads.  Including the triangle is like combining Hampton roads and Richmond.

 

[HRVT]

12 minutes ago, tallguy81" said:

Raleigh metro has  1million compared to 1700000 Hampton roads.  Including the triangle is like combining Hampton roads and Richmond.

 

That's not true as Richmond is not part of the same metro as Hampton Roads under any definition. The Triangle splits Raleigh/Cary and Durham/Chapel Hill as MSAs, but there are all included together as a CSA. Durham/Chapel Hill are actually closer to Raleigh than Hampton/Newport News is the Virginia Beach. Ultimately, the labels don't really mean much. There is a way larger population within a half hour of PNC Arena than there is from the Convention Center in Va Beach. 

Including Richmond with Va Beach would be more equivalent to including the NC Triad (Greensboro, Winston-Salem, High Point) with the Triangle.

[baobabs727]

2 hours ago, HRVT said:

After what happened with the Rhinos, they'll definitely play it cool, even if things are looking good about getting a team. Frankly, from what it looks like, there just isn't going to be a 32nd team for now. As a hockey fan, I haven't read any speculation anywhere of late about Virginia Beach being a contender for a team. 

Also to say Hampton Roads (a metro area) is bigger than Raleigh (a city by itself) is dishonest when trying to compare areas. Raleigh and Virginia Beach are of almost identical size (estimates put them each around 450K). But the NC Triangle in general has 2.2 million people vs about 1.7 million in Hampton Roads. Perhaps it has been forgotten here how fast the Triangle has grown. In the last 35 years, they have added approximately as many people to their population as CURRENTLY live in Hampton Roads. 

Not to mention that PNC Arena is within a half hour of the vast majority of the Triangle (26 minutes between Wallace Wade Stadium at Duke and PNC Arena). In Hampton Roads, a large chunk of the smaller overall population is well outside of that half hour away from where the arena will be. It's 30 minutes (assuming the HRBT traffic is flowing smoothly) from Hampton Convocation Center on HU's campus to the arena site. The NHL isn't going to leave Raleigh for another location that doesn't support their minor league hockey. Coming to the area, there would be an attendance bump for 3-8 years (depending on the early success of that new team) and that's it.

The Virginia Beach arena will be good for concerts, monster truck shows, and maybe even the ACC Basketball Tournament. But IMO, that's the best we can realistically hope for, should the arena get built (I still have serious doubts). Hampton Roads missed its window IMO in the 90s. The area has been surpasses by other metros (Raleigh included... which was substantially smaller than Hampton Roads 15 years ago).

According to the 2015 census, the Hampton Roads MSA is approximately 1.725M, ranked #37.  Raleigh MSA is 1.273M, ranked #44.

[HRVT]

18 minutes ago, baobabs727 said:

According to the 2015 census, the Hampton Roads MSA is approximately 1.725M, ranked #37.  Raleigh MSA is 1.273M, ranked #44.

The Carolina Hurricanes market includes the entire Triangle as a CSA. Not just the Raleigh MSA. Whatever pro team comes to Hampton Roads would get the Hampton Roads CSA, which is substantially smaller than the Raleigh/Durham CSA. Take a look at what is within 30-40 minutes of PNC Arena vs what is within 30-40 minutes of the Convention Center. The WHOLE Raleigh area is a larger market. 2.2 million to 1.8 million. Not to mention the fact that the Hampton Roads community is largely built up of people who don't stick around.

[baobabs727]

39 minutes ago, HRVT said:

The Carolina Hurricanes market includes the entire Triangle as a CSA. Not just the Raleigh MSA. Whatever pro team comes to Hampton Roads would get the Hampton Roads CSA, which is substantially smaller than the Raleigh/Durham CSA. Take a look at what is within 30-40 minutes of PNC Arena vs what is within 30-40 minutes of the Convention Center. The WHOLE Raleigh area is a larger market. 2.2 million to 1.8 million. Not to mention the fact that the Hampton Roads community is largely built up of people who don't stick around.

The MSA is the gold standard for most true statisticians when comparing markets. Any market can claim just about any territory for a CSA.  Purely a marketing tool, Raleigh promotes its CSA all over the Internet versus its MSA, while Hampton Roads never mentions its CSA. Hampton Roads CSA is never even mentioned in the local marketing literature, is very difficult to locate on the Internet, and, in fact is only about 100,000 greater in population vs the MSA.  By some miracle of virtual land grabbing, the Raleigh CSA adds a whopping 900,000 people to its MSA!  That should get one's cynical juices flowing. 

But the real absurdity of this apples to oranges comparison is revealed in the relative land masses of the two regions. Hampton roads MSA comprises only about 528 mi.²   Raleigh MSA is almost  2400 mi.²!  

The two CSAs' relative measurements are even more laughable, with Raleigh coming in at  5500 mi.² , while Hampton Roads CSA registers a puny 1400 mi.²! 

On another note, you would have to combine the Richmond MSA (4500 sq mis) with the HR MSA to equal the land size of the Raleigh CSA!  

 

Edited August 20, 2016 by baobabs727

[tallguy81"]

According to Wikipedia the Hampton Roads Metro is over 1,400 square miles

 

[urbanlover568]

Anyone know when construction is starting BTW? 

Edited August 21, 2016 by mpretori

[baobabs727]

7 hours ago, tallguy81" said:

According to Wikipedia the Hampton Roads Metro is over 1,400 square miles

 

Right, as I reported it. That number is for the CSA.  The MSA is only 528 mi.²  Note that the CSA adds a few scattered counties in northeastern North Carolina, for an additional 900 mi.²  ...yet yielding only 100,000 new bodies. 

For giggles, the Atlanta CSA is over 10,000 mi.². Now how far will someone actually drive to attend one event or another?   I have friends in literally all flung corners of that metro, and most of them never go anywhere near downtown. 

[Unifour]

3 hours ago, baobabs727 said:

Right, as I reported it. That number is for the CSA.  The MSA is only 528 mi.²  Note that the CSA adds a few scattered counties in northeastern North Carolina, for an additional 900 mi.²  ...yet yielding only 100,000 new bodies. 

For giggles, the Atlanta CSA is over 10,000 mi.². Now how far will someone actually drive to attend one event or another?   I have friends in literally all flung corners of that metro, and most of them never go anywhere near downtown. 

That 528 square miles number cannot possibly be correct. Virginia Beach alone has almost 250 square miles of land. The city of Chesapeake contains 341 square miles of land. Those two alone would exceed that number. That doesn't even include Norfolk, Hampton, Newport News, Portsmouth, Suffolk, the other cities, and the 7 counties that are part of the MSA. The only explanation is that is the developed land area (built up area). The MSA total area is WAY larger than 528 square miles.

Edited August 21, 2016 by Unifour

[urbanlover568]

Honestly guys it's not the size of population size of the MSA that counts, it's the growth of the MSA that lures companies and teams. But lets get back to the Arena talk. 

[vdogg]

Surprised this isn't in the pilot. Final deal for arena goes before council Sept 20th. Looks like this is moving forward.

http://arenadigest.com/2016/09/07/virginia-beach-confident-in-arena-funding-model/

Here's a better article.

http://southsidedaily.com/2016/09/07/arena-finance-plan-on-track-for-council-approval-according-to-city-official

[BFG]

First article still mentions this as opening in 2018. Unless there's a quick turnaround between expected approval and groundbreaking, I'm thinking this gets pushed back to '19, no?

[vdogg]

32 minutes ago, BFG said:

First article still mentions this as opening in 2018. Unless there's a quick turnaround between expected approval and groundbreaking, I'm thinking this gets pushed back to '19, no?

They have always stated they anticipate groundbreaking at the end of this year. They're still on schedule up until that point.  If for some reason they miss the groundbreaking date then it will most certainly slip into 2019.

[tallguy81"]

lbasketball-tournament/article_43e68173-03ac-520b-9e3f-635febb2cf7f.html

Big news for the arena!

http://pilotonline.com/inside-business/news/economic-development/virginia-beach-arena-team-pursuing-acc-men-s-basketball-tournament/article_43e68173-03ac-520b-9e3f-635febb2cf7f.html

 

[tallguy81"]

More arena news.

http://pilotonline.com/news/closed-session-meeting-planned-to-discuss-complications-with-virginia-beach/article_17c68efe-a4f9-58c7-983d-05725f00a25a.html

[BFG]

Developers want permission to take on more debt. This is getting ridiculous.

http://pilotonline.com/news/government/local/developer-of-planned-oceanfront-arena-seeks-permission-from-virginia-beach/article_d646b1a5-6fa0-5ccc-8872-0a77eb5a0ea2.html

[vdogg]

Sigh...We just can't catch a break with these big projects. Time and time again, it seems like every major change falls through at the oceanfront...

So many other developments are depending on this coming through too.

[HRVT]

Ugh. I hate to say that I had a feeling this was going to happen, but it has. With so much uncertainty, I think it would very irresponsible to approve the deal in its current setup. That said, I actually thought the initial deal stunk too (seriously, giving away a percentage, even a small one, of ALL hotel tax revenue was bad... and reimbursing these folks well over double what they paid is again, irresponsible). Now the deal is about to get even more expensive, and suddenly these private developers want to cut their own (paltry) contribution in half to under 10% of the total investment. 

It was a bad deal, but perhaps a necessary deal with the devil before. But at this point, it looks like it's time for council to vote no. And reading between the lines, I think that's exactly what will happen barring any changes in a positive direction.

[tallguy81"]

If the developers want to take on more debt then I say go for it.  Especially since they said they have one major investor and other investors and these investors at least some of them according to the developer have visited Virginia Beach.

[vdogg]

That is if you believe the developer. Their story changes every month. Their operation looks less like that of a serious company and more like that of a used car salesman.  We may have to walk away from this one. 

[vdogg]

The fact that they cannot afford 40 million dollars worth of equity scares me. That is not a large amount of money for a project of this scale. Armada Hoffler routinely invest that amount of money in the projects they build around town center.

[vdogg]

Southside Daily has a completely different take on this.  I simply cannot account for this discrepancy, but according to them, the project is moving forward. Were they and the pilot at the same meeting? 

http://southsidedaily.com/2016/09/28/city-council-to-vote-on-arena-finance-deal-using-unrated-bonds/

[HRVT]

2 hours ago, vdogg said:

The fact that they cannot afford 40 million dollars worth of equity scares me. That is not a large amount of money for a project of this scale. Armada Hoffler routinely invest that amount of money in the projects they build around town center.

Exactly. They have reduced their share of the equity from approximately 20% (still a relatively paltry percentage) to approximately 10% (barely committed at all). Then there's the fact that we have no idea exactly what will be owed on the payments since we won't know what the bond ratings are going to be. Sure, maybe they have other investors... or one investor... but so did the Dome site proposal people supposedly and see how that worked out. 

They were putting just enough skin in the game before to make things interesting. The fact that they're backing up to almost no skin in the game makes me think that even the developer is aware that this isn't a great proposal, but if City Council is willing to take on the risk, why not?

I also find the comments that there won't be another arena proposal anytime soon to be nothing other than pressure to approve the deal through hell and highwater. The fact is that there are proposals for an arena ever few years. This one originally appeared to be a better deal than the others.... but that doesn't mean that you continue to push it through when that plan eventually turns into a potentially even worse deal than some of those previous proposals. It seems like Virginia Beach is going through something of a slow-play bait and switch. There's no reason to believe that the deal won't get worse down the road either.