Virginia Beach Arena (Cancelled)

[BFG]

Some good news and some kinda bad news. March Madness could be a little further away than people think. The most likely pro sport in this area would be Arena Football...if the AFL doesn't fold first.

http://pilotonline.com/sports/columnist/harry-minium/march-madness-in-virginia-beach-likely-but-in-a-decade/article_46773434-039a-56a7-bb86-24a3fc9805e2.html

[urbanvb]

That's not the most positive news however the good news is that AEG will be managing  the arena. Since they're the world's largest group, hopefully they will bring top acts to the center. I'm expecting some pretty big acts. 

[vdogg]

Buried deep in this article, the city manager has stated that USM will close on the loan in June. Groundbreaking will also be in June, and the Dome site parking lot will be a staging area for arena construction. This seems to be a significantly accelerated time frame. Gonna be fun watching this go up.

http://southsidedaily.com/2017/05/03/as-oceanfront-tourism-corridor-shapes-up-parking-field-house-funding-requires-more-planning/

[carolinaboy]

21 hours ago, vdogg said:

Buried deep in this article, the city manager has stated that USM will close on the loan in June. Groundbreaking will also be in June, and the Dome site parking lot will be a staging area for arena construction. This seems to be a significantly accelerated time frame. Gonna be fun watching this go up.

http://southsidedaily.com/2017/05/03/as-oceanfront-tourism-corridor-shapes-up-parking-field-house-funding-requires-more-planning/

I'm tasking you with frequent photo updates of the construction progress (please). Oh yeah, get over to Block 9 and snap some photos as well.

[vdogg]

Closing in July with groundbreaking soon to follow? I'm anxious to see them get this deal signed.

http://www.esgco.com/news-and-press-releases/2017/06/arena-financing-nears-completion/

[Nathan_in_DC]

On ‎3‎/‎18‎/‎2017 at 9:47 AM, HRVT said:

Hockey is a little bit of a niche sport (HUGE in the north and not that big in the south).

Tell that to Nashville and Middle Tennessee. They seem to have missed that memo.

[HRVT]

10 hours ago, Nathan_in_DC said:

Tell that to Nashville and Middle Tennessee. They seem to have missed that memo.

I'm certainly glad to see the spread of hockey and to see Nashville doing well this year. But they have one of of the smallest arenas in the NHL, bigger only then Winnipeg and the New York Islanders and then exactly 12 seats larger than the arena for the Arizona Coyotes. Two of those teams are heavily rumored to be relocating. Granted, Nashville isn't on that list.

But when you look at the other "southern" teams in hockey, only Tampa Bay and the LA Kings are in the upper half of the league in attendance (Dallas is literally at #16 though). But four of the bottom ten teams in the league attendance-wise are southern teams. That's pretty bad when you consider that there only eight teams in the NHL that you can even remotely consider in the south (I'm counting LA and Anaheim in that). Carolina has far and away the worst attendance in the league (it's only a matter of time until they relocate IMO, probably within the next five years). Arizona is next to the lowest and they're also rumored to be relocating. And let's not forget that hockey even failed in Atlanta, which is one of the nation's largest metropolitan areas... but it's in the south.

It'll be interesting to see how Las Vegas draws.

Edited June 23, 2017 by HRVT

[urbanlife]

2 hours ago, HRVT said:

I'm certainly glad to see the spread of hockey and to see Nashville doing well this year. But they have one of of the smallest arenas in the NHL, bigger only then Winnipeg and the New York Islanders and then exactly 12 seats larger than the arena for the Arizona Coyotes. Two of those teams are heavily rumored to be relocating. Granted, Nashville isn't on that list.

But when you look at the other "southern" teams in hockey, only Tampa Bay and the LA Kings are in the upper half of the league in attendance (Dallas is literally at #16 though). But four of the bottom ten teams in the league attendance-wise are southern teams. That's pretty bad when you consider that there only eight teams in the NHL that you can even remotely consider in the south (I'm counting LA and Anaheim in that). Carolina has far and away the worst attendance in the league (it's only a matter of time until they relocate IMO, probably within the next five years). Arizona is next to the lowest and they're also rumored to be relocating. And let's not forget that hockey even failed in Atlanta, which is one of the nation's largest metropolitan areas... but it's in the south.

It'll be interesting to see how Las Vegas draws.

I know Seattle is actively pursuing a NHL team with the renovations planned for the Key Arena, and even Portland has the Moda Center which can easily handle an NHL team. Plus both our minor league teams do well attendance wise, plus combine that with the potential rivalry similar to what we see in MLS with the Timbers, Sounders, and Whitecaps, there is going to be some serious competition for any NHL teams thinking about relocating.

[HRVT]

20 hours ago, urbanlife said:

I know Seattle is actively pursuing a NHL team with the renovations planned for the Key Arena, and even Portland has the Moda Center which can easily handle an NHL team. Plus both our minor league teams do well attendance wise, plus combine that with the potential rivalry similar to what we see in MLS with the Timbers, Sounders, and Whitecaps, there is going to be some serious competition for any NHL teams thinking about relocating.

Agreed, I think VB has a big uphill climb when it comes to getting into position. But with the NHL, the competition isn't just American cities, but Canadian ones as well. And I don't see the NHL expanding down south anytime soon. If anything, the south is going to lose the Coyotes and the Hurricanes over the next decade or so.

I really wonder if the Carolina Hurricanes wouldn't benefit by doing something similar to the Green Bay Packers back in the 70s, 80s, and 90s and play a couple games in Greensboro and/or Charlotte every year. You have 41 home dates in the NHL, so maybe have Raleigh get 36 of those while putting three in Greensboro and two in Charlotte.  

[baobabs727]

Luckily this arena doesn't need professional sports to get built or to make it profitable.

[BFG]

The plans to add a parking garage near the arena is causing a bit of controversy amongst Council...

https://pilotonline.com/news/government/local/plan-to-add-parking-garage-to-arena-project-concerns-virginia/article_7c4aa72e-dc5c-5d1c-85dc-f8442cea1b71.html

[vdogg]

However this eventually turns out I am getting the feeling that Mr. Hansen's days are numbered...

[metalman]

It think sizable garages and a better ingress/egress from the interstate are a must if they are going to build an arena.

[BFG]

With an 18,000-seat arena, a garage is a no-brainer. I get that council feels blindsided, but with that location, you have to do something sooner or later, esp. since the arena and field house will replace a few parking lots. You won't have light rail, you (currently) only have one entrance to the complex, and your nearest garage is several blocks away. People are not going to walk that far.

The Ted is half that size and has two adjacent garages. VB is asking for an absolute mess building an arena without one. If you're gonna do this, you gotta do it right.

[vdogg]

On 6/5/2017 at 8:31 PM, vdogg said:

Closing in July with groundbreaking soon to follow? I'm anxious to see them get this deal signed.

http://www.esgco.com/news-and-press-releases/2017/06/arena-financing-nears-completion/

Hmmm...

I'm starting to get a "Gadam's groundhog day" feel from this. Saying"two more weeks" every two weeks when nothing ever comes to fruition. I'm anxious to see this thing get done.

[baobabs727]

On 7/26/2017 at 1:55 PM, vdogg said:

Hmmm...

I'm starting to get a "Gadam's groundhog day" feel from this. Saying"two more weeks" every two weeks when nothing ever comes to fruition. I'm anxious to see this thing get done.

Indeed.  Anyone who has been here a while tends to get that feeling just about every time something big is announced, ha ha. In this case, I think anyone anywhere would be getting that feeling by now. Wow, let's hope this thing doesn't implode. 

As for the garage...duh! I have to  believe that some of those folks on Council are simply feigning surprise and ignorance at the prospect of this added feature and expense. I have no idea why they wouldn't have identified this need a long time ago. 

[vdogg]

Today is officially a month from the city imposed deadline. The fact that we've heard nothing from them, when they were originally expecting to close in June, is telling. I'm really hoping they pull through on this, but I'm preparing myself for the possibility (probability?) that they won't. So many major proposals just can't seem to get off the ground in this area. If this one falls through though, it won't be a good look for VB.

[BFG]

I would hate to see close to five years of work come to an end over this. The region needs a new arena badly...maybe it's a good thing Norfolk is considering upgrading the Scope, in case this falls through.

[urbanvb]

And the city of VB is awfully quiet about any developments with the arena as well. I really hope this doesn't fall through. 

[vdogg]

10 hours ago, BFG said:

I would hate to see close to five years of work come to an end over this. The region needs a new arena badly...maybe it's a good thing Norfolk is considering upgrading the Scope, in case this falls through.

I think Norfolk announcing plans for their own arena may have made the VB arena investors skittish. I really wish they hadn't done that, this area simply cannot support 2 arenas of this magnitude. 

[Virginia City]

Well if you are referring to the possible arena by military circle, I think that was contingent on VB not getting one.

[baobabs727]

I have very mixed suspicions on this matter. It could go either way. They've been telling us that there's nothing in their way besides final punctuation marks. Lol. They've been telling us that the financing partners are very excited about the project. They've been telling us that they're looking forward to getting started...early. And yet nothing has happened.

It could be that they were overly optimistic. It could be they were spinning the facts as many people in public relations do as a matter of routine.

However, it could also mean that they were being completely truthful and that there's nothing to this silence besides the signaling of a delay in their own rather optimistic predictions. Out of an uber abundance of caution, of course. 

All I know is that time keeps on ticking, ticking, ticking....

[metalman]

...into the future.

[HRVT]

11 hours ago, vdogg said:

I think Norfolk announcing plans for their own arena may have made the VB arena investors skittish. I really wish they hadn't done that, this area simply cannot support 2 arenas of this magnitude. 

Unfortunately, that may have been part of the point. Torpedo Virginia Beach's grand plans and then upgrade the Scope ever so slightly, even if it's still going to be far from major league ready.

But these kinds of things happen with large arenas. Unfortunately, the signs have been there for a while that there were struggles going on. And perhaps a slightly less cynical reason for Norfolk's proposal is that they had heard that the VB project was going south (and I actually had this thought at the time the Norfolk project was announced). If the VB arena project were going through, the upgrades to Scope would be pretty silly.

[BFG]

So, SBNation decided to have a little fun and grant "expansion" teams to VB and Seattle. Interestingly enough, both cities have arena plans that are in limbo, and are also regions optioning the same company to upgrade their older arenas.

https://www.sbnation.com/nba/2017/8/9/16117538/nba-expansion-draft-seattle-sonics-adam-silver-virgina-beach

Also, the Pilot offers an editorial bringing everything back to earth. Because it's the Pilot. 

https://pilotonline.com/sports/basketball/professional/will-an-nba-team-come-to-the-virginia-beach-oceanfront/article_bff99b68-a410-53ab-9713-0e2467f16f22.amp.html