New Downtown Baseball Stadium, AAA Club, and Associated RE Development

[NCAABound]

I should clarify....I meant Wichita's renderings make it look kinda blah. Compared to the real pics from Vegas.

[WstateU]

Wichita is only a "rendering", this looks like the actual Vegas park... in fairness, a big difference. If we get anything close to Vegas, this old man will be happy.

[NCAABound]

Yeah I'm trying to figure out if it's just the rendering software they are using, but it sure looks a lot better than Wichita.Or it could be the good old Wichita leadership just doing it on the cheap again.

[ShockerFever]

I drove by the new Las Vegas Aviators' stadium in Summerlin the other day. Looks nice, but not incredibly different than the Wichita ballpark renderings. They do have some mesh seats which I assume will be cooler than hard plastic seats, probably some misters, and it appears a pool or some type of Spool/Cocktail pool near the outfield.

https://lasvegassun.com/photos/galleries/2019/apr/02/20190328_sun_lvballpark_wv_web/embed/

Definitely more pizazz then the Wichita renderings IMO.

[Veritas]

They have released some new renderings of the new stadium

https://www.bizjournals.com/wichita/news/2019/04/05/city-baseball-team-have-new-renderings-of-stadium.html?iana=hpmvp_wich_news_headline

I drove by the new Las Vegas Aviators' stadium in Summerlin the other day. Looks nice, but not incredibly different than the Wichita ballpark renderings. They do have some mesh seats which I assume will be cooler than hard plastic seats, probably some misters, and it appears a pool or some type of Spool/Cocktail pool near the outfield.

https://lasvegassun.com/photos/galleries/2019/apr/02/20190328_sun_lvballpark_wv_web/embed/

[Dark Lord]

They have released some new renderings of the new stadium

https://www.bizjournals.com/wichita/news/2019/04/05/city-baseball-team-have-new-renderings-of-stadium.html?iana=hpmvp_wich_news_headline

[JJClamdip]

POGO, call me.

[pogo]

Water walk was a BIG disappointment and the way it turned out. IBA as has been pointed out a disappointment for some but again those people feel we could have gotten more bang for the buck. Possibly. I gave no clue really no one else really knows either. IBA was built with money in hand and not a hope for future development to fund it. I have no problem with the city moving forward with a plan like this but it does have risk. It has better potential to transform the area. The new construction around the river is exciting. The new apartment complex on the river as is the library. More people are living downtown and lots of them will be looking for places to spend their free time. A ballpark and subsequent development may be the catalyst to attract urban dwellers to take in a game and frequent establishments before and after a game. Mix in families attending for the same reasons and you have potential for a vibrant area. Obviously sustained attendance will be a challenge as with any venue but I think Wichita needs a facility like this in that location. I am with everyone else that want this to be better than I could ever have imagined. I want it to be great. I refuse to let pas performance temper my enthusiasm for what could be.

[Aargh]

My problem with this deal is that baseball teams come and go. Land deeds are forever. What do we do in 10 years or so when the team moves on to the next place that is willing to throw a new stadium and a million dollars at the owner to induce them to move? If we end up with an empty stadium, or a team that can only draw 1,500, which has been the pattern here for minor league ball, then the development district that's supposed to pay off the stadium won't be able to do that and taxpayers will be stuck with the bill.

If that comes to pass, a lot of people supporting this deal will adamantly oppose any tax increases. IBA was put to a vote, and the taxpayers agreed to raise taxes to build it. It wasn't built until the finances were certain. This is a different deal. The city committed to spending $80 mill based on a projection that assumes baseball will draw a lot of people to the area, which is difficult to support based on the history of baseball attendance in Wichita.

I supported IBA, but that deal was discussed, debated, and voted on. The city wasn't relying on development around the arena to pay for the arena. I can understand why there hasn't been recent development near L-D. Go back to the '50's and '60's when L-D was still in decent shape and there were significant minor league teams here, and there still wasn't any development around L-D. IBA has had little effect on development in that area.

Outdoor events in Kansas work in October when we have great weather, but are a little dicey the rest of the year.

I favored spending the money for a new stadium until I heard about the land giveaway. It's tough enough to get people in Wichita to watch minor league baseball. Make them walk 5 or 10 minutes to get to the park is going to be another obstacle to putting butts in seats. I wonder if the city providing free parking adjacent to the stadium might be more valuable to minor league baseball than having "somebody" develop "something" around the stadium.

[Dark Lord]

The only thing I somewhat get hesitant about is half-assing ****. When they commit to these projects, they need to follow all the way through. The arena from a design standpoint was a disaster, especially considering the amount paid for it. Waterwalk was half-assed. The stadium and development around it needs to be done RIGHT. And it all needs to be put together as close on the timeline as possible. It would be dumb to build a new stadium and not have any kind of development surrounding it when it first opens. That is the time to get people snagged in.

This is where I'm apprehensive about. That the project is so rushed that they cut corners just to get something opened in 12 months. Have we actually seen a final rendering yet or do we just have speculative stuff? All of this stuff should have been done a year ago.

I'm all for the development and project IF it is done right. And unfortunately, the city has had a decent history with ****ing projects up.

My only concern.

I would think that in this case, Lou has at least a bit of a voice in how things will proceed and I would guarantee that he and his team will be championing doing things right.

[Veritas]

Re WstateU. I think the KS side of KC metro does indeed give a rats ass about Wichita. Gives a rats ass in publishing every negative spin they can about Wichita in order to focus growth in the JoCo area. Can Wichita become part of Oklahoma and give Topeka and Joco the middle finger.
That is why Bardo was so refreshing. He fought for Wichita and WSU.

[Shock Top]

Waterwalk, the Arena, Spaghetti Works, Meads Corner, etc.

There are a lot of great developers and visionaries in this town. If the red tape and John Q complainer would get out of their way, Wichita would be much better off.

[Shock Top]

People want nice ****, but when people propose projects to bring nice **** to the area, people complain and fight it till it goes away, then complain again about how Wichita doesn’t have nice ****.

It’s odd.

[Kung Wu]

Yeah, but to be fair, Denver's city council was passing around a blunt while they were approving those deals. "Let's just goooo with the flooooow, maaan."

[Kung Wu]

I say soccer! But I am more of a Minor League Baseball AND Soccer dude. Let's build TWO stadiums!