[Bonsai Tree]

Originally Posted by jpIllInoIs

With the money behind the Bears bid for Arlington including Bet rivers casino, Neil Blum real estate and the Halas McCaskey family, and the shear acreage of the real estate involved it is safe to assume the Bears envision a new mega stadium ala, SoFi home of the Rams & Chargers. It will include casino amenities, hotels and other entertainment as well as massive parking. Let Arlington have that.. good and bad.

Chicago can still gain plenty, including increased NCAA football, Concerts and the like. Also the new stadium will be immediately eligible for a Super Bowl and will develop some sort of College bowl game. The major events will draw visitors that will not be content with hanging out in AH for the week. In fact it is likely that networks will plant a few cameras out there for Stadium background shots and then produce alot of content in the city.

As for Soldier Field, the city can target unique NCaa games like an annual rivalry matchup with the HBC (historically black colleges). Call it the Walter Payton Bowl (Jackson State). And bring in an annual Army, Navy or Air Force match up as the home team against a regional foe like Western Michigan or Iowa State. Also an annual Northwestern game, U of I game, Northern ILL. game. Just being realistic that Notre Dame will never give up a home date in an 80000+ stadium for 62000 Soldier Field game.

Why not do an annual double header with small college matchups. EIU v. WIU in the afternoon, and SIU v ISU in the evening. Call it a Chicago homecoming weekend. All the state schools are on Amtrak lines so travel options can be included in ticket and hotel pricing.

The Fire are at SF but they are not drawing well mainly due to a poor record, hopefully that will change. It is still possible to get Concacaf and friendly international matchups at SF. Soldier Field and Chicago will live on.

None of that is worth the money that taxpayers are probably going to have to pony up for a new stadium. There are 0 benefits of a new stadium other than making the Bears richer. Everyone talks about how great a super-bowl is for a city, but it's a one-off event every few decades. Completely pointless to make that a part of an argument. I wholeheartedly disagree with your position here. Even with all of your great programming changes, you've maybe increased a few extra events a year for the Chicagoland region? At most?