[combusean]

Originally Posted by HooverDam

***WARNING LONG POST AHEAD*****

We need more long posts on this topic. I didn't think anyone shared the idea of the Phoenix Olympics

Did anyone see the article today in the Republic about Sun Devil Stadium? Its in desperate need of repairs, its 50 years old, by the time Phoenix had a realistic chance at the Olympics it would be over 60. They could do repairs on it or....hello new Olympic stadium.

Yes.

With UofP being available, ASU could temporarily play there while you demolish SDS (and trust me I love that place and would be sad to see it go) and put in an Olympic stadium that holds 80-90K then can be paired down to 60-70K for ASU. You can't use UofP like has been mentioned because there's no room for a track, but in a new stadium in Tempe you could do it.

Sun Devil Stadium it is.

I disagree with this notion that Phoenix wouldn't tax itself for something like the Olympics. Phoenix is still a conservative town and while it likely won't vote to tax itself over things that are viewed as kinda leftist or whatever I think they would for sports arenas/infrastructure (the past 40 years attest to this). This Valley is sports bug nutty and would jump at the chance I think to go for an Olympic bid.

Exactly. My brother loves the idea. lol. Sports arenas are arguably a bigger push because they are professional venues and limited to the public off hours. A velodrome and whitewater park would have certainly enough public use to at least warrant a city subsidy if not be ultimately profitable, and they'd be hosting events in the future that just don't exist here yet. The Olympics would fully round out our craze for building new venues so we could finally focus on other shit.

As far as when like I said before I think Africa has the inside track on 2020, 2024 would be the very earliest and by that point it would've been 28 years since the US had the games.

If emerging cities in Africa can get the games there's no reason we shouldn't. We are an emerging city as well.

Glynnjamin, the problem with your idea about spreading things out across the state is the IOC doesn't really love that. A big draw for London was that the average Olympian traveling from their village to the event would only have a 20 minute commute. Obviously there's no way we'd be able to match that, but for the most part we'd want to try to limit commutes to 40 minutes maximum.

Athens, GA was 80 miles from Atlanta and I doubt they had rail. An 80 MPH train isn't *that* hard to connect to Tucson. I don't know about other cities tho that are harder to get.

The exception would be Soccer which has so many teams every host city outsources some of the earlier matches (Atlanta had games in Florida & Alabama). Luckily Arizona Stadium in Tucson & the Walkup Skydome in Flagstaff (which would have to have field turf put in) would work ideally. Again I don't think you can count on Chase Field for many events as its the D'backs season and they're not going to want to risk destroying their field. Incidentally, Im sure the D'backs would love the spillover boost in attendance they'd see from all the foreign visitors going to their first major league baseball game.

Not having Chase Field available would absolutely suck. I would hope that things could be timed easily and maybe the D-backs could do out-of-town "home" games in other cities (they did this in Monterrey at least once iirc).

As far as an Olympic village goes I hadn't thought of the Railyards, thats interesting because it would feed more directly into downtown and that would certainly be a good thing. It wouldn't have super direct access to LRT but I guess the short 2 or 3 block walk up to the 12th St stations wouldn't be too bad. And if you had a stop at Central & Lincoln on a Southbound line that could serve the Village as well. Additionally, perhaps a temporary stop along the Commuter/HSR could be made for the Olympic Village.

Atlanta used housing from their Olympic village after the game as Residential housing for GaTech which would be a model I'd hope PHX would follow, the Olympic Village could become the campus of a new university.

Good idea to bring a new university into the discussion. I will factor that in.

Breaking the topic down into two categories here's what we'd need/the best fits in my estimation:

Infrastructure:

• Cross state High Speed Rail: You'd want to use the opportunity to build rail from Nogales to Williams (with then likely a shuttle taking people to the Canyon) and then onto Las Vegas. Also a Phx-LA connection to help get people in/out of the city.

I think any mass transit service to those areas is warranted, even if those venues are ultimately needed.

I see this as a two phase approach, where we build at the bare minimum of what we need anyway, and in phase 2 build the Olympic Ideal once mustered by the IOC. Start with 79 MPH diesel electric commuter rail and see what a fully electrified line. The great thing about this whole idea is that puts every other plan for Phoenix in context.

• Commuter rail: this just piggy backs on the HSR system really in the "X" shape we saw that MAG put out a while back
• Rehabbed/revitalized Phx Union Station w/ either a people mover or shuttle to a...
• New Phx Central Terminal, a real terminal not just a bus stop

Who knows how this works out. A South Central line for LRT would bridge the RR tracks, but the buses are where they're at now. There's a two block empty lot on Central and the tracks with siding space further east.

• Vastly expanded LRT:
  • to Downtown Glendale & Westgate via Glendale ave. LRT down Thomas Rd West connecting to Criket.
  • North up 51st Ave going by Maryvale stadium, through Downtown Glendale and onto ASU West.
  • Expand the East leg to Stapley & Main in Mesa (w/ shuttles taking people to HoHoKam park).
  • LRT or modern streetcar connecting Papago Park/DBG/Zoo/Phx Muni, across McDowell and up to Old Town S'Dale and S'Dale stadium
  • LRT south on Central Ave to Ed Pastor Transit Center (especially if the Village is on the riverbanks)
• Make sure Terminal 4 expansion and Terminal 2 rebuild are finished in time to handle increased loads
• Increase capacity at Phx-Mesa Gateway airport as a reliever airport
• Replace Convention Center South building w/ a new matching building, likely wouldn't need to span the entire block maybe something slightly larger than the West building
• Increase (double?) Downtown Phx hotel space
• New Central Ave Bridge (explained later)

I think we might not be so lucky in our availability to use the Spring Training facilities. I like the idea of an I-10/101 LRT connection (because that's what they're going to build anyway) and a Glendale Avenue connection with a full on cross-town streetcar on Thomas Rd from Cricket/Desert Sky to Scottsdale CC.

As far as the Olympic Village goes I really can't decide if I think a River Centric spot or something on the rail yards would be better. I like the Railyards because it feeds into downtown, but would UP go for that?

Yes. The present yards would be used very little if at all if the Picacho yards were built.

The River area has a lot more open space and would likely lead to everyone's dream of the Salt Flowing, so thats a wonderful long term effect. I think my gut would lean towards a Salt River Centric site, take a look at this aerial from Expo 67 in Montreal to get an idea:



While Combusean is right that there's a big suitable parcel over by 19th Ave, I think its a beat too off the beaten path/not along potential LRT to be suitable.

The Grand Avenue streetcar could connect the Coliseum and go back down 19th Avenue to the river. With LRT down Washington on its way to the 10 we'd fully loop the State Capitol area with transit and connect that sketch central area all the way south.

It would be better suited as a place displaced businesses from an Olympic Village around Central Ave could move to. Here's where I'd envision the Village going (with the river flowing all the way from Tempe to 19th Ave):



Thats a pretty huge grouping of parcels totaling approx. 281 acres according to Google Maps (NW quadrant: 99 acres, NE: 15 acres, SW: 122 acres, SE: 45 acres). I don't think just the Village proper would take up nearly all of that but due to the airport and its location you'd likely want to cap all the buildings at 80-100 feet so it would only be moderately dense at best.

Both are good candidates. I'm way more inclined to use open parcels of land rather than than force a whole bunch of businesses out. There are pros and cons to each concept. Built out ... a brand new neighborhood of 8 story buildings? Imagine the street scene. 8 storiesish make the best neighborhoods and street scenes (using mostly early 20th century examples but still).

Also that area could house on the South Bank a new Spring Training facility (2 of out of the 3: Cardinals/Astros/Twins) and its fields (or those could go over by 19th ave as well) which would of course be used as an Olympic venue then afterwards be re-purposed for Spring Training.

Before you fill in the river though I think you'd want to demolish the Central Ave bridge and build a new one. One that carries both automobiles, pedestrians, bikes and a LRT over the river. Great cities have great bridges and that could be Phoenix's lone opportunity to build a great bridge.

Your bridge idea might have sold me on Central Ave. Actually, since it needs to be rebuilt anyway that easily favors the Central Avenue site. The location of the velodrome on the way to South Mountain gives it another point so cyclists can eat up the future Blue Line.

OK onto the Venues:

I couldn't find this info anywhere. I even called and asked how many they had for that Celebrity Game they had there but the only info they had was 125K for the entire game session, not how many actually sat and watched the Celeb Game. My guess would be about 5K though from what it looked like on TV.

http://www.phoenix.gov/conventioncenter/stackedPlan.pdf

I am assuming two venues are available here--one on the top ballroom and one on the lower level.

Two images I took of the lower level:





8,000 people sounds about right. The competition area for a variety of events could be in the center columned area with good seats on 4 sides and crappy seats on the corners squares.

The upper level:



Shorter roof gives it about 6,000. It could be raised maybe?

Here's how Id preliminarily break down events between venues:

I'm compiling the 1996-2016 venues into a table sorted by sport along with 1 - 3 options suggested by everyone for Phoenix along with an eyeball estimate of construction costs. Everything should be in context by then.