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May 24, 2012
Houston proposes $655m to redo Astrodome, replace Reliant Arena
It took awhile, but Houston finally has a plan for what to do with the Astrodome, which has sat empty since 2006 and is now all wrinkly. The Harris County Sports and Convention Corporation yesterday proposed that voters be asked to approve spending $270 million to convert the dome to a "multipurpose venue" for concerts, football, soccer, and hockey, while replacing the neighboring Reliant Arena with a $385 million exhibit space and 10,000-seat arena.
A consultant for Convention Sports & Leisure, which helped the sports authority develop the plan, spoke of how the dome is "an icon to the city of Houston," but still: $655 million?!? Admittedly, it's cheaper than the last estimate of redoing the dome, but it still sounds like an awful lot of money to spend for creating a multipurpose venue out of what was always a multipurpose venue, plus replacing an arena that is vacant precisely because there's already a new arena across town.
The Harris County body also included an option to spend $64 million to raze the dome and replace it with a park, and maybe that's the real goal here: Toss out a crazy-expensive renovation plan, and let voters decide once and for all whether they'd rather throw good money after bad or just cut their losses and demolish the place, iconic or not. Or maybe we're just seeing the beginning of a trend of building stadiums and arenas for nobody to play in.
Reliant Park doesn't seem to have any problem competing with the downtown venues for business. The auto show is actually out at Reliant Convention Center, not the GRB downtown. Never really knew what went on at Reliant Arena when I lived there, but obviously they want to compete with Toyota Center. Maybe they'll even try to steal the Houston Aeros hockey team, since Toyota Center is too big and they already curtain off the upper deck. As for the Astrodome, I'm not sure what they have in mind. Honestly, I think this is a plan entirely based on nostalgia. Everyone else may think it is a dump, but the Astrodome holds a very special place in Houstonians hearts. It's their Tiger Stadium (the 8th wonder of the world), and they don't want to see it end up a dirt lot like the ol' ballpark in Detroit. Remember, they didn't want the Astros to move out, the Astros did. I would not be surprised in the least if this plan ends up passing.
Posted by Ben on May 24, 2012 10:18 AM
Neil,
I think you hit the nail on the head here. Seems that Harris County doesn't want the blowback of proposing to tear down the Astrodome so they're floating this as a way to illuminate what kinds of costs would be associated with updating and maintaining it.
Posted by Ben Miller on May 24, 2012 11:42 AM