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New Oakland Coliseum and New SF 49ers Stadium Key to Sucessful Bay Area Super Bowl Bid - Jerry McDonald, Oakland Tribune (Published 2/05/2006)
Detroit is looking at a high of 30 degrees today with the possibility of snow.
Not a big deal where football is concerned, because Ford Field has a roof.
Football, however, is only a small part of the Super Bowl. More than 50,000 people, not to mention thousands of credential media, have come from out of town to see the Seattle Seahawks face the Pittsburgh Steelers in Super Bowl XL.
Meanwhile, the temperature in Oakland and San Francisco today is expected to be within a degree or two of 60 degrees under a cloudless sky.
What does Detroit have that the Bay Area doesn't?
Detroit doesn't have the city of San Francisco, the Napa Valley, snow skiing in the Sierra or the Monterey and Carmel coastlines all reachable on a day trip. It doesn't have as many quality hotels and restaurants.
Yet Detroit has a state-of-the-art stadium and possession of a sporting spectacle that will dump hundreds of millions of dollars into the local economy, placing it front and center on a world stage.
If the three rules of profitable real estate are location, location and location, the three most important factors for getting a Super Bowl are stadiums, stadiums and stadiums.
NFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue, at his annual Super Bowl press conference Friday, said he liked the idea of a Bay Area Super Bowl, provided the facilities are either brand new or substantially upgraded.
"I think the Bay Area certainly would be a very attractive place to host future Super Bowls, eventually both in San Francisco andfrom Sports 1
Oakland," Tagliabue said. "But I do think it is contingent upon state-of-the-art stadiums, new stadiums.
"Those stadiums are among the oldest in the league. I think they're the only pre-1970 stadiums that haven't been thoroughly renovated, so I think there is work to be done. But I think eventually we should get there."
Super Bowl XIX, in which the San Francisco 49ers beat the Miami Dolphins 38-16 before 84,059 fans at Stanford Stadium, is the only one of 40 Super bowls to be played in the Bay Area.
Super Bowls over the next four seasons have been awarded to Miami, Glendale, Ariz., Tampa and Miami again. Arlington, Texas, has a date in 2011 contingent on a new stadium for the Dallas Cowboys, and Kansas City is in the picture for 2014 or 2016 based on a retractable roof on Arrowhead Stadium.
Twice, in 1999 and 2003, San Francisco lost Super Bowl dates because of an inadequate facility. The 49ers decided in
1996 against making $27 million in renovations to Candlestick Park to make it Super Bowl worthy, instead focusing on getting a new stadium built to host the 2003 game. When there was no progress on that front, NFL owners in 1999 moved the 2003 game to San Diego.
It reaped the benefits of the Super Bowl to the tune of an estimated $367 million in revenue.
San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom and 49ers management have expressed optimism that a new stadium eventually will be built near Monster Park, but there remains no financial plan in place or a timetable for completion. The club's lease at Monster Park expires following the 2007 season.
"While having the Super Bowl in the Bay Area is exciting for the fans and great for the businesses, our focus is on playing in the game no matter what city it's in," 49ers spokesman Aaron Salkin said.
Oakland, meanwhile, already has a stadium issue on its hands concerning the A's, who are seeking a baseball-only facility.
Yet with San Francisco showing few tangible signs of putting a shovel in the ground, McAfee Coliseum, as unlikely as it sounds, is the Bay Area's most viable option for hosting a Super Bowl.
Although Tagliabue included McAfee Coliseum in with sites that haven't undergone a major renovation since 1970, Oakland's stadium increased in capacity from 54,000 to 63,125 and added 128 luxury boxes in 1996 as part of the $225 million deal to bring the Raiders back from Los Angeles in 1995. That still leaves the Coliseum short of the 70,000 minimum the NFL is seeking to host future Super Bowls.
When NFL owners determined in 1999 that San Francisco wasn't going to make good on its stadium for the 2003 game, Oakland came forward with a plan supported by the Raiders to increase stadium capacity by 7,500 and keep the game in the Bay Area.
The NFL decided on San Diego for 2003, and it just happened to be the year the Raiders returned to the Super Bowl after an 18-year absence, losing 48-21 to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
The plan was doomed in large part to the fractured relationship between the Raiders and the city of Oakland and Alameda County with regard to litigation over the ill-fated Personal Seat License plan.
A subsequent bid for the 2005 Super Bowl spearheaded by former city employee Zennie Abraham and former ANG Newspapers publisher Scott McKibben went unrecognized by the Raiders and failed, with the game going to Jacksonville.
By contrast, Detroit's bid included Ford Field, which opened in 2002, and an organized committee led by local businessman Roger Penske, Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick and the considerable might of the Ford family of Ford Motor Co.
According to Michael Kelly, president and CEO of the host committee for next year's Super Bowl in Miami who was also involved in successful bids by Tampa (2001) and Jacksonville, a unified front would be essential between the Raiders and 49ers as well as the surrounding counties.
"It's a matter of putting aside differences and getting an offer on the table," Kelly said. "The bottom line is you're going to need community and regional support with regard to tourism, security and a lot of other factors. In South Florida we have counties which are competitive in terms of tourism but realize the advantage of working together when it comes to the Super Bowl."
There has been a thaw within the past several months between the Raiders and local government. The sides agreed jointly to disband the PSL program and settle existing lawsuits save for a $34 million judgment ordered by a Sacramento jury to the Raiders in 2003.
Alameda County supervisor Gail Steele and Oakland City Council president and mayoral hopeful Ignacio de La Fuente were seen at both training camp in Napa and at the Raiders facility, touring the grounds with CEO Amy Trask.
Trask said she "absolutely" believes a Super Bowl could take place in Oakland, and that the stadium capacity and relatively small press box are problems that could be addressed. Presumably, that would include a lease extension beyond the 2010 season.
"We are enjoying a productive working relationship with city and county officials, have re-established a business relationship, and if somebody feels this is an intelligent thing to look at, we'd be happy to do so," Trask said.
Abraham, CEO of Sports Business Simulations, said, "The warming between the Raiders and the city and county was a major hurdle to overcome. The big thing is to rewire how people think about Oakland."
Visit the SBS home page at http://www.sbs-world.com to learn about SBS.
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