My blogging cohort and all knowing Replacements fan, Scotty Hudson has been saying for years that a 15,000 seat Event Center would be too big for our demographic and population in the metro area, and apparently a consultant firm agrees;
A 10,000-seat events center would be optimal and could attract most concerts and compete for some national sporting events on the high school and college levels.
No surprise. Sioux Falls has often had the mentality, if you build it, they will come. Sometimes that is the case, but not always. Besides funding, and location, a 15,000 seat event center is just too big, especially when we have similiar facilities within an hour and two and half hours away.
Several factors threaten to limit the city’s potential to compete for large regional or national conventions, sporting events and concerts, Kaatz said. Too few hotel rooms, the availability and cost of airline service into the city, and the proximity of the centers to an entertainment district all could hinder Sioux Falls’ efforts to lure business.
What? They have a Buffalo Wild Wings just two blocks away? What do you expect, we reopen Happy Chef? Maybe the Ghost and Sy are right. Maybe it should be downtown. I know the perfect place for it, contaminated dirt and all.
In another major point, Kaatz said that dramatically increasing the size of the convention center without building up necessary support facilities, such as hotels, might not bring in corresponding growth. He argued that because the convention center is booked 60 percent of the time, and heading toward the 70 percent mark, it might be close to reaching its potential, given the existing support facilities nearby.
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“Let’s not put ourselves in a position where we are not as successful in the future as we were in the past,” he said.
The only good thing about Sioux City; a good punk rock music scene
That has always been my agrument about Sioux Falls fast growth. Slower educated growth is superior to fast haphazard growth. Who are we competing with? Seriously. We have NO competition in our region. NONE. You have to drive two and half hours before getting in a city larger then us, and frankly, Omaha isn’t that great. Are we afraid of Sioux City?
Don’t make me laugh.
Kaatz’s analysis is based on the Sioux Falls that exists today or one that will grow incrementally, Baloun said. But that’s not necessarily the city the task force envisions the new events and convention centers serving.
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“John gave us a very conservative look,” Baloun told Kaatz and the task force. “But there are strategies in place to do other things you don’t know yet.”
BAHAHAHAHA! Why are you holding out on us? And why didn’t you use those strategies instead of paying a consultant thousands of dollars for a report you are going to throw in the garbage?
Kind of reminds of the audit of the Pavilion a few years ago. “Thanks for the suggestions where we can improve. But we will ignore them and continue to go down the wrong path.”
I still say they need something in conjunction with the Fairgrounds so it can be a multi-use facility – and it needs to stay away from the current Arena so both can be used concurrently without major parking issues.
That land just west of I-29 and North of Madison street is looking better all the time.
I agree with the consultant, you have to build it in an entertainment district. That would be either by the Mall or Downtown.
A 10,000 seat facility DT is the only thing that will pay off in the short run and the long run.
Redeveloping all the land around the arena would take decades. DT already has the buildings and infrastructure in place.
Build it by the arena and you might get a few chain restaurants and another sports bar. Build DT and you’ll create an entertainment district.
You and Sy need to start a consulting firm. The great part about it is you get paid thousands for advice they will never use. So who cares if it is correct or not.
Dude’s right.
Build it at the Cherapa site and plunk another $10 mil apiece into parking capacity and renovating HWF/Arena. Make the Arena part of the CC so you get more square footage without adding walls. Open the wall between to two and put in the modular seating that can be customized to fit whatever’s going on.
You’d have two excellent facilites that are close enought to draw on each other’s hotel/dining/entertainment capacities, but they are far enough apart that the crowds won’t be on top of each other if you have a concert, game, convention/trade show all on the same weekend.
The downtown EC will fastrack or draw up to a cool billion $$ of new developement around it over the next 10-20 years which will help pay it off long before the bond term. After that you are in gracy land like Fargo & Sioux City.
Make it a landmark and build it Green like Cherapa and it will cost less to heat & cool it than we are spending on our crappy old Arena. Plus you could get a bunch of Fed $$ for doing so.
Any other site and we will be short changed for generations.
L3wis:
“You and Sy need to start a consulting firm.”
They say if you can’t make it in the real world, be a consultant.
damn typos, I meant gravy land, not gracy…say goodnight gracy.
All we’d need are some letters behind our names and the checks would start flowing in.
Then hire the C-man to be the spokesman for the firm since no one is going to try and shout down a 14 year old kid.
I agree with the consultant, you have to build it in an entertainment district. That would be either by the Mall or Downtown.
Just depends upon how large you want that district. The DTSF crowd has done everything in their power to prevent downtown from becoming a true entertainment district and they fight against anyone who wants to open a new bar or offer live music.
It seems in their view entertainment is fine on a large scale, but they surely don’t seem to want a nightlife downtown. How many framing shops, kitchen gadget stores, or artsy little niche shops do we really need and how do they benefit a potential events center?
So if they want it in close proximety to resturaunts and hotels, then build the damn thing by Lake Loraine (directly South of Lowes). Ample parking, easy access to I-29 including access from both 41st and 26th, tons of hotels and resturants in the area, the mall and movie theaters are within driving distance, and they could even do the whole lakeside venue thing with a nature area and park.
And just think – we don’t even need to move the damn railroad tracks.
Freissen wants both arms and a leg for that ground, Cost. That’s why nothing’s happened out there and why they’ve gone from single family to twin homes to high rise condos to nothing around Lake Lorraine. Any time someone puts pencil to paper they need to cram more people in there to make it break even.
The mall area is overbuilt and growing naturally, that’s the last area in town that needs a boost. Plus, I’d wager you’d get some serious NIMBY’s coming out against it from the surround neighborhoods if you prposed an EC there, like you will in nearly any suburban site.
I think the money’s already in the pipe for the tracks coming out, but I might be off. As much as I hate to say it, that would’ve certainly been a nice, shovel ready stimulus project had we had out shit together.
Costner:
“the mall and movie theaters are within driving distance, and they could even do the whole lakeside venue thing with a nature area and park.”
That’s a good thought, but a better one IMHO is to make the entertainment area within walking distance and give it it’s own identity like Riverwalk or the Old Market. You’d also get to tie in with PTTF and Falls Park, which would be moving to the next level vs. square one at Lake Lorraine.
The next major shopping mall should be 15 miles east at the Pipestone Exit. No sales tax on food or clothing in Minnesota. Brandon will build the events center. Sioux Falls officials are corrupt and need hundred thousand dollar consultants for everything. Even then, they do not listen.
Brandon will build the events center.
With what money?
Personally, I’m not sure the DTSF crew really knows what it wants downtown. They seem to have the little niche shops and boutiques on one hand, and people who would actually like to see some nightlife on the other. It’s like a tug-of-war between the people who want to return to 1952 and people who want to actually have a nightlife in thi town that doesn’t involve drinking buckets of crappy beer at a sports bar.
Is Sioux City Pete, still Sioux City Pete? I thought I heard he moved to Seattle?
Ted-
Probably, I just thought the picture was cool.
“The DTSF crowd has done everything in their power to prevent downtown from becoming a true entertainment district and they fight against anyone who wants to open a new bar or offer live music.”
I agree Costner. When I first turned 21 there was three venues you could see live music at and a dance club. Now what do we have DT? Two smokey dive bars. A jazz club, a patio you can listen to the Hegg brothers play keyboards and a piano bar. That’s it. They chased the entertainment for young people out of DT and replaced it with middle-aged yuppy stuff.
That was the best article the Argus has ever printed. I don’t believe we need an events center at all, but I can accept a 10,000 seat venue if the community is truly behind it. The question that I have had from day one, though, is who exactly will use it. The so-called sports teams don’t need extra seats, and outside of Elton John (whose immediate sellout was extremely fishy) local concerts rarely sell more than 5000 tickets. With the record industry imploding, the number of acts that can even sell that many tickets are dwindling every year and the giant acts are shortening their tour schedules to 15-20 cities. Even Minneapolis misses some of the year’s biggest tours.
I know that the city believes that SDSU and USD’s move to Division 1 will lead to more national tournaments, but IMHO this is highly unlikely to happen more than once every few years. As a good friend of mine once said, “you don’t build an addition on your house because your uncle visits once every five years”.
I came around when they decided to pay for it with a bed and booze tax (the most logical way) but apparently the Hotel and Bar owners put the task force members balls in a vice and told them not to do it. I will be strongly opposed to it if they want to pay for it with a 2 cent increase on food and other goods. It is completely unfair to make people pay for an event center if they will never attend it. IMO, quality of life projects should affect everyone’s quality of life not just the minority who get boners over watching USD basketball games and Elton John concerts. It is unfair and immoral taxation to pay for the place through food taxes. Omaha does it right with the bed and booze tax. Tax the people who use the facility, it’s a no-brainer. But that’s not how it works in Sux and South Dakota. Make the little man pay for things he will never use. Fucking stupid. I swear I will show up to every EC public meeting and tell them that raising the retail tax to pay for this project is assinine.
I could live with that, but not for a 15,000 seat building. They’ll never convince promoters that they have a chance in hell of selling that many tickets.
Do you think Dr Al and his Tea Baggers will protest the money for a new events center? Why doesn’t the back craker and the baggers protest the huge run up in debt and fiscal problems the city of Sioux Falls has? Is it too close to his buddies and friends?
Oh, but John, if you read the audit (of 50% of the budget) everything is fucking rosey in Sux Falls. Why would we protest that?