Calgary Field House | ?m | ?s City of Calgary |

[Surrealplaces]

I don't think there is a thread for this, if so let me know and I'll merge the threads.

The city is having an inaugural meeting for this next week.

New fieldhouse committee to hold inaugural meeting on Wednesday

A new council committee tasked with getting a multisport fieldhouse constructed in Calgary will meet for the first time this week, and advocates for the project say…

calgaryherald.com

 

[Tarsus]

Is the field house essentially a new stadium or is it something different?

 

[Beltline_B]

The field house is meant to be a general multi-use sports facility, but depending on what direction things go it might end up being a new stadium.

 

[BKha]

As far as I know, this is only a multi-purpose, indoor sports facility. You might be able to get away with a smaller stadium of around 20k but the original intention was to make it more of an indoor sporting facility of all types of sports, and less of a stadium.

 

[Joborule]

The field house is meant to be a general multi-use sports facility, but depending on what direction things go it might end up being a new stadium.

If they were to take the stadium route, I would hate it a lot if it's just a closed roof, and not retractable.

Football/soccer games in the middle of the summer with no outside exposure or sunlight? Fuck that.

 

[CalgaryTiger]

Interestingly not mentioned in the article or asked about was the potential for the Calgary NEXT project to be brought back in some form. This committee should be somewhat informed about what's happening in the City/ICON and CSEC negotiations.

 

[Mountain Man]

We should have this field house close to the UofC, and if the Flames want to pay for a new one as part of CalgaryNext, then they can. That development isn't happening for a long time, so lets get this one going in the meantime.

 

[maestro]

Kids would also be happy with a turf field set up on a parking lot in the Beltline. and it could be done while they are still kids.

 

[artvandelay]

We should have this field house close to the UofC, and if the Flames want to pay for a new one as part of CalgaryNext, then they can. That development isn't happening for a long time, so lets get this one going in the meantime.

If we are spending hundreds of millions of public on a field house, I'd much rather combine it with a football stadium that has a much wider user base. I'll probably never use a fieldhouse, but I do go to 1-2 Stamps games per year.

 

[darwink]

'd much rather combine it with a football stadium that has a much wider user base

worth double the cost?

 

[403808]

worth double the cost?

It is if you need to put public money into a new or substantially renovated football stadium.

 

[darwink]

It is if you need to put public money into a new or substantially renovated football stadium.

need is doing a lot of work there. The olympic's estimate was just above $80 million for mcmahon iirc. I'd guess that going from a fieldhouse which was convertible into a 7,500 seat covered stadium to 30,000 seats would be north of $300 million bucks.

 

[CalgaryTiger]

Something about a stone and birds... Even if it is a big stone, the birds are pretty big too.

The olympic's estimate was just above $80 million for mcmahon iirc.

What did that $80M go towards? I would assume it would make it more usable but by no means give you what you get with a new build.

$300M for something of use versus $80M for new lipstick on an old pig...

 

[Joborule]

It depends on how high end CSEC would want their stadium to be, and how many permanent seats. With the health of the CFL these days, Calgary doesn't need a 30K stadium. I would imagine CSEC is targeting a MLS team (which is probably why they're bringing CalgaryNEXT back into discussion to have options), and MLS stadiums typically hover around +20K of permanent capacity.

So you can put lipstick on McMahon and reduce capacity for about ~100M, or spend probably the same money on a completely new build; ideally in a better location. If it's a very basic standard; like Dick's Sporting Goods Park in Denver, CO or Toyota Stadium in Dallas, TX, it should fit within that budget. But if they push to be more state of the art like Citypark in St. Louis, MO or Q2 Sadium in Austin, TX, it'll be getting north of $300 million, and I don't think it's worth it in this market. The stadium can be initially built, and then scaled up with future renovations.

 

[darwink]

It depends on how high end CSEC would want their stadium to be, and how many permanent seats. With the health of the CFL these days, Calgary doesn't need a 30K stadium. I would imagine CSEC is targeting a MLS team (which is probably why they're bringing CalgaryNEXT back into discussion to have options), and MLS stadiums typically hover around +20K of permanent capacity.

So you can put lipstick on McMahon and reduce capacity for about ~100M, or spend probably the same money on a completely new build; ideally in a better location. If it's a very basic standard; like Dick's Sporting Goods Park in Denver, CO or Toyota Stadium in Dallas, TX, it should fit within that budget. But if they push to be more state of the art like Citypark in St. Louis, MO or Q2 Sadium in Austin, TX, it'll be getting north of $300 million, and I don't think it's worth it in this market. The stadium can be initially built, and then scaled up with future renovations.

In the end the problem is we don't have funds available for either the Field House or McMahon renovations. As for those costs estimates, can't just run those numbers using inflation. The Colorado construction cost index is up 90% over that time, and then you get that into canadian bucks. All of a sudden Dicks is $167 million. Add to that $64 million in non-stadium costs funded by the municipality - $164 million today. $331 million in total.