Toronto Rogers Centre Renovations | ?m | ?s | Toronto Blue Jays | Populous

Richard White said:
You can put lipstick on a pig but it is still a pig.

No amount of superficial renovations will change the fact it is a 1980s concrete bunker. Look at aerial photos of the dome with it open. The stadium looks like Exhibition Stadium.. it looks dated.
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And?

The issue is economics, not aesthetics.

The cost of a new stadium of any description is huge; with or without land acquisition costs; and the latter, especially anywhere near downtown, would be astronomical.

Moving out of the downtown, may or may not put attendance at risk; but would surely diminish corporate money on which any stadium depends.

Keeping it near downtown, without replacing it in-situ, likely means a sweetheart deal from government.

Alternatively, rebuilding in-situ means relocating the team for 2 or more seasons; and I'm not sure how you paint a picture with a healthy ROI on that.

I'm not a huge fan of the Dome, but I don't care to subsidize Rogers in replacing it either.

@T.E.C.II is rightly expressing that there's a lot of sunk investment in the exiting facility, and I'm adding the prospects of ROI on any new site aren't great.

Sure there may be money to be made in redeveloping the existing site..............but if the upfront on a new stadium is, $1B let's say........I'm not convinced there's a rush on this.

Maybe there is, maybe Rogers has sufficiently ambitious plans for the existing site and a creative plan to swipe public land for far less than its worth........ we shall see.
 
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I personally don't think the existing stadium is all that ugly- just opening up the facade between the supports and updating the glass would have a tremendous impact.

The Skydome will likely never be an exceptional baseball stadium, but I think a good number of its faults can be resolved via renovation and reconfiguring of the spaces within the structure.
 
If they played a year or two in Montreal and built a simple stadium on top of the existing parking structure would it still cost a billion?
Don't think we need a stadium with a roof as a replacement. Play the first couple weeks of the season in warmer climates and then do what the rest of fans do in baseball and dress accordingly to the weather.
Also these traditional ball parks attract people because they're great baseball atmospheres. I think in the long-run it would pay itself off. I think they could do a good renovation with what their working with but they'd need a good extensive plan for it to work.
 
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Moving the stadium to some other public land (Downsview, Portlands or near Unilever perhaps) in exchange for Rail Deck funding between Blue Jays Way and Spadina (integrating with the Union Park Rail deck), while turning the current stadium lands into a great public park, would be a good compromise, in my opinion.
 
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utwatch said:
If they played a year or two in Montreal and built a simple stadium on top of the existing parking structure would it still cost a billion?
Don't think we need a stadium with a roof as a replacement. Play the first couple weeks of the season in warmer climates and then do what the rest of fans do in baseball and dress accordingly to the weather.
Also these traditional ball parks attract people because they're great baseball atmospheres. I think in the long-run it would pay itself off. I think they could do a good renovation with what their working with but they'd need a good extensive plan for it to work.
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I don't know, I think there's something to be said for having a stadium where there's never a rain out. And I wonder how long it would take to get the field in playing condition if we have a long winter, which is often the case in Toronto?
 
Ugh? when most world class cities try to have there entertainment venues downtown, many here want them out, ..i don't get it??
...we have already dissected our Entertainment District with condos, have said no to any Casino venues, now want the Dome demolished for public space,
haha what next, when Scotia Bank Arena becomes obsolete send them packing to the suburbs
 
T.E.C.II said:
I don't know, I think there's something to be said for having a stadium where there's never a rain out. And I wonder how long it would take to get the field in playing condition if we have a long winter, which is often the case in Toronto?
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Well.. look at Yankee Stadium, Wrigley Field or Fenway. All open air and they have no issues opening in April.

The first jays game on record was played in snow.

See here:

April 7, 1977: The day the Blue Jays began

www.sportsnet.ca www.sportsnet.ca
 
And do you really want to go back to snowy games? I think most fans wouldn't. And I'm not sure the weather gets as bad in those locations as it does here. Plus, a new stadium would likely be close to the water, so it would be even colder.

I'm not opposed to a new stadium, or even a roofless one, but I think we need to be realistic.
 
I am incredibly intrigued by Brookfield's involvement in the process. It's very unusual for a company the likes of Brookfield to invest in something like a stadium, unless there is some significant mixed-use stuff planned. My theory is that there is going to be a significant retrofit of the stadium done to bring the stadium up to an "ultramodern" standard, as well as integrating offices.

My guess is that if it's a giant retrofit, it goes something like this. The roof comes off and the exterior envelope of the Rogers Centre gets completely reclad into something more modern, probably a steel and glass structure to refresh the exterior look without being too tacky. The Marriott gets ripped down to make the back of the stadium more open. A tower is built in place of one or both of the concrete wings that currently hold the retracted roof up, with a mixture of office and hotel uses (to replace the Marriott). Who knows, maybe Rogers could even take up residence in one of the towers, similarly to how MLSE's offices are at Scotiabank Arena.

I know the roof is a big point of contention here, but if they retain it, there is really no more space for mixed-use redevelopment. It's probably going to have to be one or the other. I personally believe Toronto will be fine with an outdoor stadium. The climates in Detroit and Minneapolis aren't any different, and they have fully outdoor baseball stadiums that work fine.

Maybe, if they do go for mixed use and towers, it could look something like VEB Arena in Moscow, which has offices in all 4 corners of the arena, one of which is a 142 metre tall skyscraper:
arena_cska05.jpg


header-10.jpg
 
TheTigerMaster said:
Moving the stadium to some other public land (Downsview, Portlands or near Unilever perhaps) in exchange for Rail Deck funding between Blue Jays Way and Spadina (integrating with the Union Park Rail deck), while turning the current stadium lands into a great public park, would be a good compromise, in my opinion.
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Liberty Village. Allow Rogers to build a 38 - 40,000 seat baseball-only stadium on the Lamport site in exchange for the Dome's land. Problem solved.
 
Richard White said:
I doubt there is enough room to build a baseball stadium there. It looks quite small.
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Site is about 200 x 200 metres. The Dome site is about 230 x 230 metres. Lamport + the parking lot to the south could easily fit a baseball diamond and a smaller, quaint and more personable stadium which seems to be what everybody wants.
 
PinkLucy said:
It would be traffic and transit hell.
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True. Liberty Village wasn't built to handle a stadium of that magnitude. You would anger alot of people building it.

Also.. shoehorning a stadium into the site wouldn't be at all a good idea. Just because the measurements work doesn't mean you should do it.
 
PinkLucy said:
It would be traffic and transit hell.
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Perhaps, but I'd liken it to something similar to Wrigleyville. You'd be stupid to drive into Wrigleyville and the same principle would apply here. Plus the Lakeshore GO is immediately to the south and along with the proposed LV GO station, that would make it more palatable. Who knows what happens with the Ontario Line but perhaps there's some development ideas in the works considering Rogers-Shapiro have brought Brookfield into the mix.
 
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