Arena or Amazon: Does Seattle know what's important?

[Fiat Lux]

Originally Posted by pesto

Didn't Stern say that the Kings are staying in Sacto. and the Hornets in Nawlins? Who's left? The Grizz?

Sacramento still has a few more hurdles, but it is looking better for them in Sac. Hornets are a mess and will move sooner than later.

[krudmonk]

NBA makes perfect sense; NHL not so much.

[Fiat Lux]

Originally Posted by krudmonk

NBA makes perfect sense; NHL not so much.

NHL makes a lot of sense.

- Seattle is the second largest market without NHL (that hasn't recently lost a team)

- Has two WHL (major junior) teams that have averaged a combined 10,000 fans a game many years

- Has second most people who play hockey of the states that have never had the NHL. Only Wisconsin has more. Washington has 2,000 more hockey players than Arizona and Georgia combined!

- Hockey history, including USA's first Stanley Cup championship

- close to metro Vancouver, home to an NHL team with high ticket prices that always sells out (look at all the Canadian fans at Blue Jays games in Seattle for hint)

- close to metro Portland, which supplies Seahawks and Mariners fans too

- Would give the Vancouver Canucks a regional travel partner

- Would be part of a regional cable network that would also broadcast into hockey crazy Alaska

[Cashville]

Originally Posted by pesto

Didn't Stern say that the Kings are staying in Sacto. and the Hornets in Nawlins? Who's left? The Grizz?

Stern says a lot of shit, at one point he was against having a team in New Orleans period. If he had to do it all over no doubt he would have done everything in his power to keel the Sonics in Seattle and have the Hornets in OKC. No way the Hornets are playing in New Orleans 5 years from now, its too small of a market that does not care about basketball.

[bnk]

Great news today out in the great northwest.
Seattle is no longer the most miserable sport city.

http://sports.yahoo.com/top/news?slu..._cities_022812


Atlanta, Seattle top list of America’s most miserable sports cities

By Tom Van Riper, Forbes.com Feb 28, 5:03 pm EST

It’s been quite a year for sports fans in Atlanta. Since last spring, the NHL Thrashers left town for Winnipeg, baseball’s Braves blew a near-lock playoff spot on the final day of the season, and the NBA Hawks and NFL Falcons got bounced out of the post-season early yet again.

That was enough to push Atlanta, always among the top finishers in Forbes’ annual ranking of America’s Most Miserable Sports Cities, back to the top spot for the first time since 2008. Last year’s “winner,” Seattle, slips to No. 2. Phoenix, Buffalo and San Diego, as usual, round out the top five.


...

[krudmonk]

Originally Posted by Fiat Lux

NHL makes a lot of sense.

- Seattle is the second largest market without NHL (that hasn't recently lost a team)

- Has two WHL (major junior) teams that have averaged a combined 10,000 fans a game many years

- Has second most people who play hockey of the states that have never had the NHL. Only Wisconsin has more. Washington has 2,000 more hockey players than Arizona and Georgia combined!

- Hockey history, including USA's first Stanley Cup championship

- close to metro Vancouver, home to an NHL team with high ticket prices that always sells out (look at all the Canadian fans at Blue Jays games in Seattle for hint)

- close to metro Portland, which supplies Seahawks and Mariners fans too

- Would give the Vancouver Canucks a regional travel partner

- Would be part of a regional cable network that would also broadcast into hockey crazy Alaska

Well I didn't mean it would be a Phoenix/Atlanta disaster, but the NHL would certainly arrive after the NBA at this new venue, and would thus be last to the party after all the other big leagues and NCAA. Seattle would be a very crowded market.

NHL with no NBA? Way more potential to capture casual fans (obviously little overlap among die-hards), but won't happen.

[Fiat Lux]

Originally Posted by krudmonk

Well I didn't mean it would be a Phoenix/Atlanta disaster, but the NHL would certainly arrive after the NBA at this new venue....

They are on record as needing both NHL and NBA to proceed with an arena. I assume they also want an NHL team to form a regional sports network.

There are 4.2 million people in metro Seattle (and growing, WA one of 6 states to add 100,000 people since 4/1/2010), another 3,000,000 people to the north within a 3 hour drive, most of them hockey crazed Canadians, and another 3,000,000 people within a 3 hour drive to the south.

Since the different sports attract a different fan base, all can and should succeed. Due to Seattle's awful winter weather, the winter arena sports teams (NBA/NHL) have an advantage in not having to compete with the awesome summer weather, which killed the Mariners when they played indoors and weren't winning.

[JiminyCricket II]

Back to part of the topic on hand, here is the envelop in which they can build the towers (read: it wont LOOK like this, just the space they are allowed to build within) due to height restrictions:

Originally from LCIII at SSC:

[mhays]

No they can't. That would be 10,000,000 sf...about 270,000 sf land area x 37 floors.

It's just the envelope they can build 3,000,000 sf within.

[Black Box]

I'm just amazed at the possibilities and potential of the city during this decade. There is so much large scale, rapid transformation happening all at once. I don't want to jinx it, but mhays, if the city grew by a higher percentage compared to 1990-2000, that would easily be nearly 70,000 new residents, I'd die.

[mhays]

I wouldn't be shocked by 70,000 within city limits.

But still tough. Seattle has an extremely low amount of truly unused, developable land. No dispersed vacancy, and no big empty canvas area, i.e. the Pearl, or Denver's Central Platte Valley or Stapleton, or San Francisco's ballpark area, or Battery Park City, or Vancouver's Expo site. The closest we have is the 26(?) acre Yesler Terrace, which might grow from 550 to up to 5,000 units in 15+ years. Even single full blocks aren't that plentiful. Develoment will need to be piecemeal.

The rate of construction would need to be high. Figure an average of 6,500 units (or net addition) going at any given time, with an average of 18 months construction, so 4,333 per year, with an average of maybe 1.65 people each, and that would merit 71,500. It would require a fairly constant boom.

At some point, land availability will be greatly diminished, especially because a sizeable percentage of land owners will "hold" in any given decade. Adding 43,333 units would involve very high land prices and start getting into tight supply, both in townhouse zoned areas, breadloaf zoned areas, and highrise zoned areas.

Wait, I'm being lazy, but I don't recall that we grew that much even in percentage terms in 1990-2000, or even 2000 to 2010...

My prediction is 50,000 growth 2010-2020. Still damn good. Maybe later in the decade we can also address out overabundance of single family zoning.

[Black Box]

Not posting the link, but referring to US Census Bureau numbers, we grew 9.1% from 1990-2000 and 8.1% from 2000-2010.

[mhays]

That aligns with 50,000 rather than 70,000.

There's more momentum and developer desire to build infill today. There's also less public reaction. But our remaining zoned capacity is lower too.

[JiminyCricket II]

Originally Posted by mhays

Seattle has an extremely low amount of truly unused, developable land. No dispersed vacancy, and no big empty canvas area, i.e. the Pearl, or Denver's Central Platte Valley or Stapleton, or San Francisco's ballpark area, or Battery Park City, or Vancouver's Expo site.

What about redevelop-able land? It just seems to me that Interbay has huge potential even with residential and commercial mixing in with the existing industrial. Especially with Ballard's explosion, maybe interbay will be the the spillover spot.

[mhays]

Interbay is mostly land that won't change -- rail, seaport, former garbage dump that's now golf. Even the developable land is often not considered suitable for housing; for example a Port study of its inland property concluded that. The result might be a little district at Dravus (already begun), and a scattering along the edges, such as more housing along 15th.

Seattle has a commercial land crunch too. Offices will take care of themselves because they can afford to. Industrial land will gradually go away if not protected. Due to the importance of those jobs, the tax base, and services they provide, a lot of industrial land will be protected.

[Black Box]

Yes, I guess you are correct, mhays, it would be about 55,000. I too often round up such precise figures. If it were 10%, we'd easily be inbetween those two numbers.

[J. Will]

http://www.bizjournals.com/sacrament...gs.html?page=2

Sacramento council approves moving forward on Kings arena

The Sacramento City Council voted 7-2, with Councilmembers Sandy Sheedy and Kevin McCarty dissenting, on Tuesday night to proceed with efforts toward a new arena.
The nonbinding vote after four hours of discussion was met with cheers and chants from the packed council chambers. The council heard from many opponents and supporters of the project.


http://basketball.realgm.com/wiretap...e_Through_2024

Hornets Reach Agreement With Louisiana On Lease Through 2024

Governor Bobby Jindal will announce that the State of Louisiana has reached an agreement in principle to keep the Hornets in New Orleans through at least 2024 with no escape clause, multiple sources confirmed.

[M II A II R II K]

Seattle blessed by downtown's upswing


March 17, 2012

By Jon Talton

Read More: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/htm...ltoncol18.html

.....

No metropolitan area succeeds without a thriving downtown. Fortunately for Seattle, its core is not only healthy but also booming again. And luckily for the core, it has Amazon.com. The company's South Lake Union headquarters, with 1.7 million square feet in 11 separate buildings, is likely to spread into the Denny Triangle, where the online-retail giant is considering adding a staggering 3 million square feet. It has already single-handedly driven down the vacancy rate in the northern edge of downtown by leasing up other space nearby.

- Meanwhile, more construction is planned north of CenturyLink Field, including a 25-story apartment tower. South of the stadiums, a basketball/hockey arena might actually happen. And long-term, bringing down the viaduct will open the waterfront for one of America's most promising urban-redevelopment projects. This is a remarkable turnaround from the fallout of Washington Mutual's collapse, when downtown employment fell from a 2008 high of 244,500 to around 222,000 last year. Largely because of the nation's largest bank failure, 12 percent of downtown jobs were lost between 2000 and 2010, compared with a 4 percent decline for the county as a whole.

- That will almost certainly now be reversed, not only because of Amazon but also the other companies it will attract, as well as the new campus for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Even Boeing has leased office space downtown. Meanwhile, downtown residents keep increasing — to more than 60,000 in 2009, up 77 percent since 1990, and including 3,200 children. Seattle has seen more residents move into its downtown core since 1990 than Boston, Denver, Philadelphia, Portland, San Diego or even San Francisco. Per-capita income is slightly higher than the citywide average. Many places dream about a "live-work-play"downtown. Seattle actually has one. The biggest reasons: Seattle never allowed its downtown to collapse, especially losing all its retail to malls.

- It also has good bones: A variety of architecture, including renovated historic buildings; cultural centers; the Port of Seattle; the retail core with its flagship Nordstrom, grand old Macy's and hundreds of specialty shops, including unique locally owned stores; Pike Place Market; a large corporate base; and the stadiums. Downtown is the region's transit and passenger-rail hub. Tourism is a big driver of the economy. The core is a foodie paradise. Another plus: Downtown has maintained strong civic connections and continued to draw investment. This is particularly true with such stewards as Paul Allen, whose Vulcan Real Estate led the South Lake Union revival. Finally, Seattle has enough residents who have what might be called urban values. They crave the energy, diversity, authenticity and density of downtown — what urbanist Jane Jacobs called its "underlying intricacy."

.....

[mhays]

That has some details wrong (like Amazon occupies way more than 1.7msf already) but the gist is right.

The real boom is rental apartments. It's a pretty large wave already, with a lot more coming this year if you believe their developers.

[J. Will]

Has the retail recovered? From February 4, 2010:

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/htm...owntown05.html

The number of retail stores in greater downtown Seattle has dropped by more than 10 percent over the past five years, the Downtown Seattle Association says.

The store count fell from 1,010 in 2004 to 901 in 2009, association President Kate Joncas told an audience of more than 900 at the group's annual "State of Downtown" economic forum Thursday.

Has the store count in whatever area the article talks about recovered to over 1000?