Halifax Stadium Discussion

[counterfactual]

Originally Posted by Empire

Where would you put the stadium?

Cogswell would be pretty awesome.

Plenty of room there, and you could also smash down the ugly education dept building and the useless "self storage" building for more room if need be.

Stadium would be near the downtown core (with existing bars, restaurants, etc for post or pre-game entertainment), hotels, waterfront, existing ferry services on the waterfront, major bus routes, etc.

Also, it would be a natural transit hub, which is what the area is already being suggested for the site.

It would be an impressive site, to see the stadium, presumably with some highrise buildings around it (also planned for Cogswell) as you approached the city by Barrington, from MacKay or McDonald.

[RyeJay]

Originally Posted by counterfactual

Cogswell would be pretty awesome.

It would be.

[c-way-dude]

Is the CFL considering offering Halifax a conditional franchise to push the stadium process?
tsn.ca/cfl/story/?id=443195

[IanWatson]

Cogswell actually has very little space (especially in one large chunk of a size necessary to hold a stadium) when you realize that roads will still have to go through there even once the overpass comes down. It's not just going to be a big empty plot of land.

One of the arguments for a peninsular stadium seems to be density. I don't quite get how this follows. For most of the time stadiums sit empty. They're block killers during the day. And living next to a stadium isn't ideal to a lot of people. Wouldn't peninsular lands be better used to actually, you know, put buildings with people in them?

I spent a weekend in Indianapolis. Their NFL stadium is right in the core. Sure, I'll concede that it made for a sweet atmosphere when the Colts were having their preseason game on Saturday night. The rest of the weekend? The three blocks around there were absolutely dead. Not a soul.

Perhaps some useful context information for this discussion is that the population of peninsular Halifax is circa 50,000. If you put the stadium at Kept Road you probably get a comfortable walking distance for half the peninsula. I'd hazard a guess that population density is higher in the South End, but I'll be generous and assume it's even across the peninsula. So best case scenario our walking market is 25,000 people. So the big question is, what proportion of them will actually go to the game, and is it worth catering to that crowd if it results in many more choke points for other forms of transportation?

[MonctonRad]

My two cents:

Gorsebrook - If buy-in by the universities for this project is felt important, then Gorsebrook would likely be the best site but it appears that Saint Mary's wants their own stadium, and it is virtually guaranteed that the denizens of the deep south end would be apoplectic with latent NIMBYism if such a travesty were ever visited upon them. Gorsebrook would also be inconvenient to many people outside the southern part of the peninsula. For these reasons, I think Gorsebrook is a non starter.

VGH site - An interesting possibility. The VGH site is close to SGR and convenient to Dalhousie. Transit connections are good. In many ways, this is an ideal solution. The biggest objection here would be that the site would be unavailable until the Infirmary is expanded, and the VGH demolished. This would delay the construction of a stadium by at least 5-7 years. There would be no CFL team for at least 10 years.

Halifax Forum site - This also applies to other sites mentioned in the northern portions of the peninsula. Another very good choice. The land is flat and site preparation costs would be low. Transit connections would be easy to establish. There is the potential for on site parking for fans coming in from out of town. The site would also be fairly easily accessible to people driving in by car. This might actually be the ideal compromise location for a stadium.

Cogswell Interchange - I am concerned that this location may be too cramped and I am also concerned that this location (in the heart of the core) might be too congested for traffic movement as well. It is important to remember that a stadium is not the same as an arena like the Metro Centre. While the Metro Centre sees activity on many days of the year, there would only be about 9 home games per year for a CFL team and only a smattering of concerts and other suitable events for a stadium. The Cogswell interchange therefore might be better repurposed for more intensive economic activities than just a sports stadium - pehaps more high rise development should be considered instead.

Shannon Park - A bad idea all the way around. The only walkable area nearby is Highfield Park (a slum) and major costly infrastructure upgrades would be necessary to make the site accessible for large numbers of fans. Even all the chatter on here about ferries would entail literally tens of millions of dollars to accomplish. Now add on the costs of an interchange to directly access the site from the MacKay Bridge and you would have the Minister of Finance losing whatever of his grey hair that he has left. I also think a location by the water would be cold and damp and the only thing visible as a viewplane from the stadium would be the smokestacks at the NS Power plant. Finally, although the feds might contribute the land for free, the first nations communities legally have first dibs on it. Be prepared for lawsuits lasting for decades (and making generations of lawyers wealthy) before this land might be available. It is difficult to think of one redeeming feature about Shannon Park.

Dartmouth Crossing - This remains a viable possibility even though it would not be a popular option for the urbanists populating this forum. On the plus side, the road infrastructure around Dartmouth Crossing is pretty well developed and there are lots of options for surface parking in the area. It would be the most convenient location for out of towners coming to games, but the least convenient option for peninsula dwellers. Since the constituency with the most power here are peninsular Haligonians and not Truro residents, I imagine that Dartmouth Crossing will not be considered.

Overall, I think the stadium should go somewhere in the northern part of the peninsula.

[counterfactual]

Originally Posted by IanWatson

Cogswell actually has very little space (especially in one large chunk of a size necessary to hold a stadium) when you realize that roads will still have to go through there even once the overpass comes down. It's not just going to be a big empty plot of land.

One of the arguments for a peninsular stadium seems to be density. I don't quite get how this follows. For most of the time stadiums sit empty. They're block killers during the day. And living next to a stadium isn't ideal to a lot of people. Wouldn't peninsular lands be better used to actually, you know, put buildings with people in them?

I spent a weekend in Indianapolis. Their NFL stadium is right in the core. Sure, I'll concede that it made for a sweet atmosphere when the Colts were having their preseason game on Saturday night. The rest of the weekend? The three blocks around there were absolutely dead. Not a soul.

Perhaps some useful context information for this discussion is that the population of peninsular Halifax is circa 50,000. If you put the stadium at Kept Road you probably get a comfortable walking distance for half the peninsula. I'd hazard a guess that population density is higher in the South End, but I'll be generous and assume it's even across the peninsula. So best case scenario our walking market is 25,000 people. So the big question is, what proportion of them will actually go to the game, and is it worth catering to that crowd if it results in many more choke points for other forms of transportation?

A fair point about the need to have even more density around Cogswell.

I'm willing to drop my demand for a stadium at Cogswell in return for a guarantee that developments there will be at least 30+ floors, and for a major urban transit hub, for buses and LRT.

Deal?

(if only I had the leverage...)

[Keith P.]

In this never-ending discussion, we have also discussed a location in Dartmouth Crossing, perhaps near the existing sports fields, and redevelopment of Exhibition Park near Bayers Lake.

[counterfactual]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

My two cents:

Gorsebrook - If buy-in by the universities for this project is felt important, then Gorsebrook would likely be the best site but it appears that Saint Mary's wants their own stadium, and it is virtually guaranteed that the denizens of the deep south end would be apoplectic with latent NIMBYism if such a travesty were ever visited upon them. Gorsebrook would also be inconvenient to many people outside the southern part of the peninsula. For these reasons, I think Gorsebrook is a non starter.

VGH site - An interesting possibility. The VGH site is close to SGR and convenient to Dalhousie. Transit connections are good. In many ways, this is an ideal solution. The biggest objection here would be that the site would be unavailable until the Infirmary is expanded, and the VGH demolished. This would delay the construction of a stadium by at least 5-7 years. There would be no CFL team for at least 10 years.

Halifax Forum site - This also applies to other sites mentioned in the northern portions of the peninsula. Another very good choice. The land is flat and site preparation costs would be low. Transit connections would be easy to establish. There is the potential for on site parking for fans coming in from out of town. The site would also be fairly easily accessible to people driving in by car. This might actually be the ideal compromise location for a stadium.

Cogswell Interchange - I am concerned that this location may be too cramped and I am also concerned that this location (in the heart of the core) might be too congested for traffic movement as well. It is important to remember that a stadium is not the same as an arena like the Metro Centre. While the Metro Centre sees activity on many days of the year, there would only be about 9 home games per year for a CFL team and only a smattering of concerts and other suitable events for a stadium. The Cogswell interchange therefore might be better repurposed for more intensive economic activities than just a sports stadium - pehaps more high rise development should be considered instead.

Shannon Park - A bad idea all the way around. The only walkable area nearby is Highfield Park (a slum) and major costly infrastructure upgrades would be necessary to make the site accessible for large numbers of fans. Even all the chatter on here about ferries would entail literally tens of millions of dollars to accomplish. Now add on the costs of an interchange to directly access the site from the MacKay Bridge and you would have the Minister of Finance losing whatever of his grey hair that he has left. I also think a location by the water would be cold and damp and the only thing visible as a viewplane from the stadium would be the smokestacks at the NS Power plant. Finally, although the feds might contribute the land for free, the first nations communities legally have first dibs on it. Be prepared for lawsuits lasting for decades (and making generations of lawyers wealthy) before this land might be available. It is difficult to think of one redeeming feature about Shannon Park.

Dartmouth Crossing - This remains a viable possibility even though it would not be a popular option for the urbanists populating this forum. On the plus side, the road infrastructure around Dartmouth Crossing is pretty well developed and there are lots of options for surface parking in the area. It would be the most convenient location for out of towners coming to games, but the least convenient option for peninsula dwellers. Since the constituency with the most power here are peninsular Haligonians and not Truro residents, I imagine that Dartmouth Crossing will not be considered.

Overall, I think the stadium should go somewhere in the northern part of the peninsula.

I agree that VGH and Gorsebrook would never happen, as the NIMBY south end would literally lose their minds.

Halifax Forum is a great idea, however. If people say why... I say: why not?

As for a debate among the least bad, I would still strongly prefer Shannon Park over Dartmouth Crossing. All of the criticisms you have for Shannon Park apply doubly to Dartmouth Crossing. There is *nothing* walkable near DC. It is nowhere near water, nor railcuts, so alternative transit impossible. Shannon Park would at least have a view to the water. DC would have a view toward... Micmac Mall and some trees and manmade mud banks.

And DC is basically accessible by two roads: a route Bayers and from the Circumferential. If people don't think DC would be a traffic nightmare, need to give their head a shake. DC is close to the site of where the ultimate traffic nightmare could be found years ago: the Micmac Rotary. Also not on the peninsula.

Whoever these powerful Halignonians are, blocking Dartmouth Crossing consideration, well, I agree with them. The population of Truro is 12,000. There are more students than that attending Dalhousie University. Tell me again why we would locate a stadium out in middle of the forest, to cater to small populations of out of towners?

That's like locating Maple Leaf Gardens in Barrie, so the Muskoka crowd can drive up easier.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen. I have come to bury Dartmouth Crossing, not to praise it.

[Antigonish]

Originally Posted by Keith P.

In this never-ending discussion, we have also discussed a location in Dartmouth Crossing, perhaps near the existing sports fields, and redevelopment of Exhibition Park near Bayers Lake.

That's just way to far out of the way. The hockey stadium in Ottawa is in an awful location. They struggle to sell tickets during weekday evening games due to how far out of downtown it is and the poor transit to the stadium.

Halifax should NEVER make that mistake.

[Empire]

To get an idea of how much space is required for a stadium go to Google maps and locate Lansdowne Stadium and zoom in so the scale in the bottom left is set to 200m. Take a screen shot and paste it into paint. Crop the image so it looks like a reasonable comparison to what would be required in Halifax. Then choose a site in Halifax with 200m scale..... copy, crop and bring image in along side Lansdowne and compare the site. You will find that there are very few sites that would be suitable. The worst site would be the Cogswell St. exchange.

[counterfactual]

Originally Posted by Empire

To get an idea of how much space is required for a stadium go to Google maps and locate Lansdowne Stadium and zoom in so the scale in the bottom left is set to 200m. Take a screen shot and paste it into paint. Crop the image so it looks like a reasonable comparison to what would be required in Halifax. Then choose a site in Halifax with 200m scale..... copy, crop and bring image in along side Lansdowne and compare the site. You will find that there are very few sites that would be suitable. The worst site would be the Cogswell St. exchange.

How about Halifax Forum?

[counterfactual]

Originally Posted by Antigonish

That's just way to far out of the way. The hockey stadium in Ottawa is in an awful location. They struggle to sell tickets during weekday evening games due to how far out of downtown it is and the poor transit to the stadium.

Halifax should NEVER make that mistake.

This 10000X

[Nouvellecosse]

Using the Google Distance Measurement Tool, it appears Landsdowne Park's dimensions (for the actual building, not including peripheral land for things like parking) are about 200m x 100m. Based on that my absolute most ideal dream option would be to buy and redevelop part of the West End mall, which just isn't as busy as it used to be god bless it. Tear down the Walmart/Sobeys wing and that little strip mall with the Moore's depot in it, build the stadium on that space, then shift the Walmart to the Bay's current location (which has a huge amount of parking in the form of a garage that's barely even used) and move the Bay downtown. There could be another new garage built on one of the existing surface parking lots surrounding the site if needed and have the Sobeys on the ground level of the garage.

That would be ideal as it would have near perfect access to transit as well as reasonable access to both bridges and not far from the bi-hi either.

But of course there's no indication the property managers are looking to sell at this point so I'll just have to dream.

[Drybrain]

Originally Posted by counterfactual

Cogswell would be pretty awesome.

Plenty of room there, and you could also smash down the ugly education dept building and the useless "self storage" building for more room if need be.

Stadium would be near the downtown core (with existing bars, restaurants, etc for post or pre-game entertainment), hotels, waterfront, existing ferry services on the waterfront, major bus routes, etc.

Also, it would be a natural transit hub, which is what the area is already being suggested for the site.

It would be an impressive site, to see the stadium, presumably with some highrise buildings around it (also planned for Cogswell) as you approached the city by Barrington, from MacKay or McDonald.

Really seems doubtful there's enough room for all that at that location, though, doesn't it?

It would be far more valuable in terms of urban vitality, tax revenue, etc, to develop the site with a mix of residential and commercial--a new neighbourhood merging the North End and downtown. I envision a smaller version of Toronto's West Donlands/Pan-Am Village (one of the few well-planned inner-city projects that city has undertaken recently since St. Lawrence neighbourhood 40 years ago.)

Better than a big building that'll be empty most of the time.

[Empire]

Originally Posted by counterfactual

How about Halifax Forum?

Too small.

[Drybrain]

Originally Posted by IanWatson

I spent a weekend in Indianapolis. Their NFL stadium is right in the core. Sure, I'll concede that it made for a sweet atmosphere when the Colts were having their preseason game on Saturday night. The rest of the weekend? The three blocks around there were absolutely dead. Not a soul.

This is the thing--neighbourhoods around stadiums are almost uniformly awful. The scale of the stadium repels all else.

GM Place is in a decent area, but it's really wedged in among a bunch of condos and office towers, which there wouldn't room for at Cogswell. In Canada, Rogers Centre's surrounding area is basically a bunch of lifeless condo towers and an expressway, Saddledome is parking lots and the gateway to the worst neighbourhood in town.

A stadium at Cogswell would just replace one barrier between downtown and the North End (the interchange) with another.

As far as Gorsebrook, yeah, it's too buried down at the end of the peninsula with no access from elsewhere in HRM. If it's on the peninsula, north makes the most sense by far.

[Phalanx]

The other issue with the Forum is that the Forum still gets a fair amount of use as a sports/exhibition/concert venue. It would be different if it sat largely unused, but it would have to be replaced otherwise.

[Empire]

Originally Posted by Drybrain

This is the thing--neighbourhoods around stadiums are almost uniformly awful. The scale of the stadium repels all else.

GM Place is in a decent area, but it's really wedged in among a bunch of condos and office towers, which there wouldn't room for at Cogswell. In Canada, Rogers Centre's surrounding area is basically a bunch of lifeless condo towers and an expressway, Saddledome is parking lots and the gateway to the worst neighbourhood in town.

A stadium at Cogswell would just replace one barrier between downtown and the North End (the interchange) with another.

As far as Gorsebrook, yeah, it's too buried down at the end of the peninsula with no access from elsewhere in HRM. If it's on the peninsula, north makes the most sense by far.

The stadium will be used for large scale concerts as well. If you are directly across the street from the stadium in a single family home it may be less than ideal. The stadium would likely be 10 storeys high and the section facing the street will be the backside of econo bleachers.

[scooby074]

Originally Posted by IanWatson

Cogswell actually has very little space (especially in one large chunk of a size necessary to hold a stadium) when you realize that roads will still have to go through there even once the overpass comes down. It's not just going to be a big empty plot of land.

One of the arguments for a peninsular stadium seems to be density. I don't quite get how this follows. For most of the time stadiums sit empty. They're block killers during the day. And living next to a stadium isn't ideal to a lot of people. Wouldn't peninsular lands be better used to actually, you know, put buildings with people in them?

I spent a weekend in Indianapolis. Their NFL stadium is right in the core. Sure, I'll concede that it made for a sweet atmosphere when the Colts were having their preseason game on Saturday night. The rest of the weekend? The three blocks around there were absolutely dead. Not a soul.

Perhaps some useful context information for this discussion is that the population of peninsular Halifax is circa 50,000. If you put the stadium at Kept Road you probably get a comfortable walking distance for half the peninsula. I'd hazard a guess that population density is higher in the South End, but I'll be generous and assume it's even across the peninsula. So best case scenario our walking market is 25,000 people. So the big question is, what proportion of them will actually go to the game, and is it worth catering to that crowd if it results in many more choke points for other forms of transportation?

Exactly.

The Cogswell lands are far too valuable (and likely too small when parking is considered) for a stadium

Shannon Park will not only be the best location, but building there will also eliminate the eyesore that the abandoned buildings of SP have created.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Waye Mason

1 - about 30% of the population lives on the peninsula and in Dartmouth inside the circ, so putting a stadium outside of that does not make sense. Put it east of that or west of that and then all the centre and the other side of the harbour away from the stadium needs to travel across the core to get there. The stadium needs to go in Burnside and area, or on the peninsula near the downtown/university/hospital/Quinpool access, because then you are leveraging the transportation network you already have in place.

Yeah, the "most people don't live downtown" logic doesn't make sense, because there's no single location that does a good job of serving all of the people who live outside of the urban core.

The argument that suburbs and highways eliminate traffic problems is obviously wrong too. Halifax's suburbs are full of traffic disasters built with lots of money. It is not reasonable to assume that building in a suburb means that there will be zero traffic issues. Highways don't have infinite capacity -- a highway lane is on the order of 2,000 cars per hour. A stadium could likely max out a single exit/entrance of a four-lane highway if most people drive.

It's good to point out stuff like the cruise ships too. The hotel rooms are mostly downtown along with most of the tourist attractions, and transportation investments on the peninsula serve a dual purpose by helping commuters and a larger number of local residents. Population alone is not a good way to look at this.

I'm not sure if there is a suitable location on the peninsula but building the stadium off of the peninsula should be seen more as an unfortunate workaround than prudent planning.