South end zone expansion question

[8dog]

Your Athl Dept budget and your private fundraising potential are not correlated. Oregon State got a single $50 mill gift.

 

[Maroonthirteen]

Your Athl Dept budget and your private fundraising potential are not correlated. Oregon State got a single $50 mill gift.

I figured that was the problem. Cohen can't drum up (maybe no fault of his own) a large private donation to kickoff a large scale renovation of the west side.

Im glad they are doing something with the west side. But IMO they just need to save the $2million on balconies and $30 million on the 200 level renovation and put it towards a complete rebuild of the west side on down the road. When the hump is paid for and Dude is paid for.

 

[thatsbaseball]

Would we lose many seats by going to all chairbacks on the lower levels ? I mean that just jumps out at me as the next move we should make.

 

[Cooterpoot]

I figured that was the problem. Cohen can't drum up (maybe no fault of his own) a large private donation to kickoff a large scale renovation of the west side.

Im glad they are doing something with the west side. But IMO they just need to save the $2million on balconies and $30 million on the 200 level renovation and put it towards a complete rebuild of the west side on down the road. When the hump is paid for and Dude is paid for.

We just announced a reno of the press box level to suites? That's going to happen pretty fast.

 

[Go Budaw]

I figured that was the problem. Cohen can't drum up (maybe no fault of his own) a large private donation to kickoff a large scale renovation of the west side.

Im glad they are doing something with the west side. But IMO they just need to save the $2million on balconies and $30 million on the 200 level renovation and put it towards a complete rebuild of the west side on down the road. When the hump is paid for and Dude is paid for.

+1. My thoughts exactly.

 

[8dog]

Id rather ask people for NIL money and do creative things like the balconies. ROI on a total rebuild seems questionable.

 

[Trojanbulldog19]

We don't have TAMU money but when my wife was working there like back in 15 they completed leveled one half and rebuilt it in a season basically. Very impressive what they were able to do. I don't understand the lipstick approach but it could just be funding related. Tear that **** down and build it right

 

[kired]

Would we lose many seats by going to all chairbacks on the lower levels ? I mean that just jumps out at me as the next move we should make.

Use maroon seats and the whole place will look full on tv. Addition by subtraction, or something like that.

 

[Trojanbulldog19]

That is correct

 

[Go Budaw]

Id rather ask people for NIL money and do creative things like the balconies. ROI on a total rebuild seems questionable.

ROI on the balconies is going to be zilch for a minimum of a decade. ROI on the new baseball stadium is going to be negative for a long *** time as well. Doesn’t mean either was a bad idea….it just means you can’t use ROI as the only deciding factor for new projects. We’re going to continue bring in way more money than we can spend towards decent ROI initiatives….might as well use that to leverage larger projects when it makes sense.

If you want to look at past precedent, see LSU. They used to have two upper decks just like our current west side. They were not full field width (ran between the 20’s, more or less), and had open air club levels underneath. They tore down and rebuilt both, in back to back off-seasons, 15ish years ago. That’s how outdated our current west side set up is. Obviously times have changed….if we did a similar project it would probably make sense to do even more of the balconies (maybe even 100%), or maybe even another level of skyboxes….who knows. But we’re extremely limited in what we can do if we try to work it into the existing bones of the current west side.

 

[8dog]

And to clarify I mean financial and non financial ROI. Im just not sure what we gain by doing a $150 mill total reno. Does it really help with crowds? What do we gain there?

 

[Maroonthirteen]

Id rather ask people for NIL money and do creative things like the balconies. ROI on a total rebuild seems questionable.

Oregon State seems to think the extra revenue generated by new and additional premium seating will cover the cost of what they have to finance.

https://leadership.oregonstate.edu/...ser_stadium_west_grandstands_presentation.pdf

 

[Maroonthirteen]

We just announced a reno of the press box level to suites? That's going to happen pretty fast.

True. IT may look amazing. I will just have to wait and see on the renderings. However, how many skyboxes and club level or loge seating can you add in that space? Seems like a tight fit.

Im just of the opinion they need to rebuild the whole west side. So, MSU can build many more premium seatings options for that space and generate much more revenue. In addition to making upgrades to the regular seating to compete with the comforts of home and TV for the regular fans.

 

[Go Budaw]

And to clarify I mean financial and non financial ROI. Im just not sure what we gain by doing a $150 mill total reno. Does it really help with crowds? What do we gain there?

You gain more modernized premium seating, and a blank slate to do whatever you want on top in the 300 level. For example, you could extend the upper deck over the first level to provide shade / weather protection on top rows, etc. You could also provide covered awning up top like Bryant Denny has on its upper decks. You could get rid of the upper deck entirely and just stack some combination of club level, skyboxes, party deck, or what have you. The biggest benefit is a blank slate to configure to our exact needs.

Compare that to the alleged current plan, where we are just going to cram a club level and skyboxes into the existing space, which limits us in terms of how much premium seating we can add (existing upper deck and 200 level don’t stretch the full field length - they run between the 20’s, more or less), and I’m assuming there will also be other concessions made. It just reeks of “leave the first few rows of the baseball grandstand in place and build around it”….but on a much more visible scale.

 

[8dog]

Yes. Thats the standard logic. And in this case it’s feasible bc they want to pay for $85 mill of this with donations. If we raised $85 mill I think we could spend that money much better elsewhere. But I cant imagine we could raise that much. The Oregon state stadium reno would pay off $40 mill in financing. I also don’t think OSU has near the premium seating we have. So they can sell high dollar seating. We have to be getting close to maxing out on ours.

 

[Dawgpile]

Look at this photo and tell me it doesn't seem out of place...

View attachment 25023

I believe what makes the building look "out of place" is the dumbass placement of the video board. It's always been too close to the field where it is, and the legs that 'picture frame' the front of the M-Club look awkward. If the leg bases were in front of or to the sides of the stairwell wings, then it would look much better. But, remembering the foundations they dug for the video board.... It ain't moving anytime soon.