There's a huge power plant whereany stadium would go on the Chula Vista bay

Tag : charger
The teams are confident market research supports the increases, butseason-ticket holders say the price they are being asked to pay inthe new stadiums -- the Mets’ $800 million Citi Field, the$1.3 billion Yankee Stadium and the $1.6 billion (and climbing)Jets-Giants stadium -- is turning them into something other thanfans. Instead, interviews with two dozen fans indicated, they arestarting to feel like unwitting bankers.

Whoa. $1.6 billion for a new Jets-Giants stadium? And the price tagis climbing!!??
The latest figures from Dallas claim the new stadium there is goingto cost a total of $1.1 billion. It had the advantage of goingthrough earlier than the New York project. The Dallas facility isincredible: Look at this place .

OK, take a second to process this. A San Diego discussion continuesamong those hoping to build the Chargers a new stadium to competewith these big beasts of the sports world in Texas and on the EastCoast. The conversation left off in Chula Vista -- a city dealingwith brutal internal politics, a major fiscal crisis and a muchmore pronounced desire to build a convention center on the bayfront than a stadium. That city, however big of football fans itsresidents may be, is kind of shrugging its shoulders at the idea ofa stadium.

Also, let's remember that there's a huge power plant right whereany stadium would go on the Chula Vista bay front.

So if it costs $1.6 billion to build a stadium in New York -- and$1.1 billion to build one a few years earlier in Texas, wherethere's almost as much land as air -- how much can we imagine aChula Vista bay front stadium costing in a few years? I mean, theycan't even start building until the power plant is gone. And it'snot even being taken down yet.
So here it is: With the dollar collapsing, construction costs andinflation soaring, is there any way in the world that a new stadiumon bay-front land could cost anything less than $2 billion?

Wrap your mind around that figure for a second. The Chargers had aproposal to build a new stadium at Qualcomm for maybe $600 millionat most. And it wouldn't pencil out for investors. That much, a measly $600 million, wouldn't work out for thehousing developers who were supposedly going to build it inexchange for the chance to build some condos.

That's $600 million. Imagine this region trying to finance a $1.5billion-to-$2 billion dollar construction project.

No way. It ain't happening.

Look at the Giants-Jets proposal. It's being done withoutgovernment funding. Hurray, right? It can be done.
But look at it: These are two teams partnering up to build the thing. Both teams are taking on$650 million in debt each . How are they going to pay the debt off? They're passing the coststo season-ticket holders who will have to pay $1,000 to $20,000just to keep their rights to their tickets.

Again, these are two NFL teams that will play twice as many gamesat their home stadium than the Chargers would. And both teams eachhave arguably bigger fan bases that the Chargers (no question theGiants have a bigger following. The Jets? It's probably a closecall).
So unless San Diego gets another football team, (the EscondidoWildfires anyone?) it will have to close the funding gap withsomething else.

What? Taxpayer dollars.

OK, the fact is, whatever public funding the Chargers are able tosqueeze out of local government would have to be immense just tomake the project possible. I mean, hundreds and hundreds ofmillions. And yet, unlike Dallas or Denver or Phoenix, it isvirtually impossible in San Diego to pass a special tax to financea new stadium. In those places, you merely ask people to vote andsee if you can get a majority. In San Diego, you'd have to get asuper majority of two-thirds support.

Ain't happening.

So the Chargers would have to finance it. Look at this news out ofNew York, Charger fans, you want a stadium, you're going to have topony up: at least double what fans in New York are going to coughup. Are you prepared to pay $2,000 to $40,000 just to maintain yourright to purchase Charger season tickets (which themselves wouldcost double)?

If so, maybe we can work something out.

But the wildly inflating prices of new stadiums in this country,and San Diego's inability to pass a special tax to subsidize it,make it almost certain that there's going to be no deal. Heck, evenif the local governments, as the result of some kind of unexpectedKumbaya moment and were able to throw in as much as $500 million tothe project, the Chargers and their fans would still have to comeup with well more than $1 billion.

Both these things happening are equally unlikely. Without adramatic and unimaginable shift in local fortunes, the Chargerswill not be getting a new stadium in the next decade. If this factmeans the team will leave, that's something the fans should getused to.

-- SCOTT LEWIS