New stadium rumors

[OpIv37]

What they can seat, and what they actually do, aren't the same thing. Pretty sure 15-20k empty seats don't add to traffic woes too much.

Knowing Buffalo has a professional hockey team with a downtown stadium and inquiring whether anybody has actually attended a sporting event downtown is just condescending.

Pretty sure you've never been to DC. A car with a flat tire or a light drizzle can add to traffic woes. Hell, they literally report "sunshine delays" on the local news during morning rush hour.

[Skooby]

Miami's stadium is basically in a slum.

[THATHURMANATOR]

It'd be $.20 more per trip to Batavia, outrage.

What does this even mean?

[stuckincincy]

Pretty sure you've never been to DC. A car with a flat tire or a light drizzle can add to traffic woes. Hell, they literally report "sunshine delays" on the local news during morning rush hour.

Sun delays are a problem in Cinci on certain days. Things do slow down, and there's generally a number of crashes.

[Don't Panic]

Places I'd be good with:

1. Outer Harbor Area where the old Pier used to be
2. La Salle Park (loved playing softball there back in the 90s but there are plenty of other places to play)
3. Squaw Island
4. West end of Tonawanda north of where the 290 hits the 190 (near 2 Mile Creek Rd)
5. Right where it is
6. Niagara Falls

There are flaws in all of these, but that's the list as I see it.

I think moving towards Rochester is pointless. If you want a suburban stadium, just spend $400 million and renovate the Ralph. If we're building new, it has to be near a better draw/higher density area.

[DraftBoy]

The area honestly doesn't matter if you don't have the right development and infrastructure around it.

This isn't as simple or as cut and dry as just picking a spot and building a new stadium.

[Mr. Pink]

Downtown Buffalo would be a nightmare as parking there is woefully insufficient as it is.

They'd have to undertake not only building the stadium but also a few parking ramps nearby.

Routes into downtown are sufficient enough to handle the traffic flow as you have 5, 190 and 33 going in.

Pembroke, Batavia would be interesting choices as there is plenty of room to build a stadium, add in a few parking lots and maybe a ramp or two. Niagara Falls could just level a few of the neighbors - no one will miss them anyway as most of the American side of the Falls is a dump - but it would be a massive project and more costly plus the routes into the Falls aren't as friendly as into the city or Pembroke/Batavia.

[THATHURMANATOR]

Batavia is idiotic

Moves farther away from the vast majority of fans in buffalo and southern Ontario

[soapman]

This is such a dumb debate. The stadium belongs in Downtown Buffalo. That's what real cities do. We are talking about catering to 18% of the fan base? The majority of the fan base is in the city. Yes traffic and parking is bad but you revitalize a city through making a move like putting the stadium downtown. No one wants to come to Orchard Park. Why would they want to come to an equally unattractive place like Batavie or the American side of the falls?

[Mr. Pink]

Batavia is idiotic

Moves farther away from the vast majority of fans in buffalo and southern Ontario

Batavia is just as idiotic as OP was, IMO.

[WagonCircler]

Downtown Buffalo would be a nightmare as parking there is woefully insufficient as it is.

They'd have to undertake not only building the stadium but also a few parking ramps nearby.

Routes into downtown are sufficient enough to handle the traffic flow as you have 5, 190 and 33 going in..

This is what I like about the Outer Harbor (former Pier/Shooters location).

You get the best of both worlds. It's still Downtown, for all intents and purposes, and there would be plenty of room for parking/tailgating. Plus, it might finally get the Godforsaken skyway torn down.

[THATHURMANATOR]

Batavia is just as idiotic as OP was, IMO.

Explain what your statement has to do with this current situation.

[Mace]

Those of you clamoring for a downtown stadium: have you ever actually been to a sporting event at a downtown stadium before?

I've been to baseball and football games in DC and Baltimore plenty of times.

Advantages: stuff to do before and after the game.

Disadvantages: pretty much everything else. Parking and public transportation are both woefully insufficient. Traffic is terrible. There is no tailgating culture because the only people who can afford the lots close to the stadium aren't exactly the typical tailgating type. And pregaming at a bar is much more expensive than tailgating.

Assuming for just one fleeting moment that Buffalo as a municipality has the vaguest clue, Downtown is entirely perfect in the general idea of Downtown and the lengthy waterfront.

We've been talking about redoing the roads, have cleared lots of junk, and supposedly intend to clear more, there are acres and acres of useless, they could in theory entirely rebuild and customize a good chunk of useless city to make it everything you want and nothing you don't. They already have it in progress in a general sense with the endless canal district project. This is probably Buffalo's last real chance to save itself in our lifetimes, and recreate itself like former rust belt cities have with some degree of success.

If they choose a site elsewhere, Niagara Falls, Batavia, etc, this city is done and it's just a matter of time. This is about the only chance this city has left to put on some good clothes, with any realistic expectation of the state kicking in after decades of us dorking around with state money uselessly and having the bus company own the waterfront when they don't even run good busses.

Hope and pray Mayor Brown wakes from his apathetic coma, they look at and seize the land if they have to (they'll do it for anything else, like an endlessly unfinished bridge projected to be finished in Y2K), and build one simple smart hub of instructure to complement harborcenter and make the city a place again.

In one really short window of time, we have the chance to tailor and customize something to revitalize the city and the population. If they blow this, we're looking at opt-out and it's our own fault while the bootlicks we keep reelecting retire to comfortable lives like they always do.

I guess the whole common sense idea which doesn't seem to be really upsets me. Stop dorking around Buffalo, or die, it's that simple by now.

And I live deep within it.

[BertSquirtgum]

Building the stadium in batavia would be the most ******ed thing ever.

No, no it wouldn't.

[BertSquirtgum]

18% of the fan base? The majority of the fan base is in the city.

No, no it isn't.

[WagonCircler]

We are talking about catering to 18% of the fan base? The majority of the fan base is in the city.

Where does that number come from?

I don't think anywhere close to a majority is in the city. And unlike many fan bases, I think we are in odd situation in that Buffalo isn't even the geographic center of the fan base.

Once you go west, into Ohio and PA, the overwhelming number of Steelers fans and generations of Browns fans makes Bills fans rare. I would think that the majority of Bills fans are in all of the suburbs, in every direction (obviously there are no due west suburbs in Lake Erie) and eastward, as well as northward in Southern Ontario.

I'd personally like to see the stadium, provided that we actually get one, very close to Downtown, but I don't think there's one Bills fan in WNY would would consider any of the sites being discussed in this thread as a deal breaker.

I can't imagine even one serious person who doesn't have some kind of agenda (i.e. passive aggressive Canadians who really want the Bills to move to Toronto but pretend otherwise) who would rather see the Bills go away rather than see them in Batavia or Lancaster or Niagara Falls.

If we actually get a new stadium, that means we have a new, local owner committed to keeping the team here for at least 20 or 30 years. And if that's the case, I don't care if they build it on Jefferson and Best streets or the freaking Love Canal, I'll just be happy to have the Sword of Damocles no longer hanging above our heads.

So and comments like "Batavia would be ******ed" of "F - - - Pembroke" are....******ed.

[better days]

Places I'd be good with:

1. Outer Harbor Area where the old Pier used to be
2. La Salle Park (loved playing softball there back in the 90s but there are plenty of other places to play)
3. Squaw Island
4. West end of Tonawanda north of where the 290 hits the 190 (near 2 Mile Creek Rd)
5. Right where it is
6. Niagara Falls

There are flaws in all of these, but that's the list as I see it.

I think moving towards Rochester is pointless. If you want a suburban stadium, just spend $400 million and renovate the Ralph. If we're building new, it has to be near a better draw/higher density area.

I don't think anyone could come up with a worse list of sites in Western New York than the above list.

[better days]

This is such a dumb debate. The stadium belongs in Downtown Buffalo. That's what real cities do. We are talking about catering to 18% of the fan base? The majority of the fan base is in the city. Yes traffic and parking is bad but you revitalize a city through making a move like putting the stadium downtown. No one wants to come to Orchard Park. Why would they want to come to an equally unattractive place like Batavie or the American side of the falls?

Cheektowaga alone has a greater population than the City of Buffalo.

Add in West Seneca, Depew /Lancaster, Orchard Park, Amherst, ETC., The Suburbs DWARF the City of Buffalo in population & the number of Bills fans.

[Skooby]

Cheektowaga alone has a greater population than the City of Buffalo.

Add in West Seneca, Depew /Lancaster, Orchard Park, Amherst, ETC., The Suburbs DWARF the City of Buffalo in population & the number of Bills fans.

How many of those folks in Cheektowaga have eaten at Captain's cove , bought Scheafers light from Fays drug store, danced at Club Otto's, ate pudding at Lums ? That's what I want to know.

[BertSquirtgum]

How many of those folks in Cheektowaga have eaten at Captain's cove , bought Scheafers light from Fays drug store, danced at Club Otto's, ate pudding at Lums ? That's what I want to know.

What the **** does it matter?