02-06-2020, 02:20 PM
A downtown arena would be a depressing monolith every night it wasn't hosting something. Traffic on game nights would be really annoying since it would be all up in people's business instead of mostly contained at the Aud's current parking lots. I don't know what average use of an arena is but I reckon it's gotta be 3 nights a week without any events for most places. I can't see how having a huge empty block 3 or 4 nights a week would be better than just having a mixed use development on that block.
I think the city missed a chance to expand the Aud more when they decided to do the last one, apparently the Rangers wanted space for 11,500 which would cost $44m at the time. I am not really keen on seeing city money spent to build sports venues but since the Rangers are publicly owned it might make some money back?
It's been a long time since I've been to a ranger's game but I can't see a lot of people taking transit; if a family/group wants to go, parking and gas would have to be more than 26$ if that family were to pay full fare for transit, usually driving to the game is quicker. Anyone with a van or SUV could take a bigger group and split the parking/gas costs with more people.
I think the city missed a chance to expand the Aud more when they decided to do the last one, apparently the Rangers wanted space for 11,500 which would cost $44m at the time. I am not really keen on seeing city money spent to build sports venues but since the Rangers are publicly owned it might make some money back?
It's been a long time since I've been to a ranger's game but I can't see a lot of people taking transit; if a family/group wants to go, parking and gas would have to be more than 26$ if that family were to pay full fare for transit, usually driving to the game is quicker. Anyone with a van or SUV could take a bigger group and split the parking/gas costs with more people.