Reply With QuoteLink: JSOnline: Mone, UWM want to stay
Don Walker is the best friend UWM has in the MJS. I was very happy to see him get the UWM perspective on this.
Link: JSOnline: Mone, UWM want to stay
Don Walker is the best friend UWM has in the MJS. I was very happy to see him get the UWM perspective on this.
Can i suggest a change in the color or boldness or underlining links? They are the exact same as the regular font and it would be impossible to tell otherwise without the "LINK:" in front of them. This is for the pantherU theme of course.
MSG has a 5,000-seat theater attached to its complex. Perhaps a compromise can be reached where a smaller arena (5,000-6,000 seats) that could double as a theater could be built as part of the new arena complex. The smaller arena could also replace the Milwaukee Theater and serve as a home to the Admirals and Wave as well.
No doubt. I'm always tweaking.Originally Posted by lutzow10
If Panther Arena comes down, the Panthers will have to go back to the KC. They need to make a push to play half of their home games at the new Arena.
How does one get a building torn down. If the WCD says we are not selling, there is nothing the Bucks can do. Is that correct or is there more to it?
March Madness starts in November
I don't buy that the Arena is going to get torn down. That's a load of hogwash. If any state taxpayer money is used to take down the Arena, then there MUST be money out of that set aside to build Milwaukee an on-campus arena. The Klotsche Center is NOT an option for any long-term scenario.
Jimmy, when it comes to the question of how tearing down the Arena would affect the University, the main players in this thing probably have a spectrum of opinion ranging from ignorance to apathy to hostility. The billionaires from NY probably never heard of us. What has the JS ever done for us that makes you think they'd have a moment's qualm about the effect on UWM if they have an opportunity to make money on the deal? Marquette detests the idea that their old home has our name on it -- something the new Bucks arena would never have for them.
That's why it's important that the University and its constituents put the political pressure on any government actors in this deal.
It's a shame we can't count on the JS to be an honest broker in this discussion, because when it comes time to squeeze the public for hundreds of millions in direct support or infrastructure improvement -- and I guarantee you that time will come -- an honest broker would be putting an aerial view of downtown Milwaukee on the front page and asking why it's being suggested that the public should underwrite much higher costs by tearing down working facilities like the Arena when there is open space for a new mega-arena immediately adjacent to the BC to the north. For that matter, if the pitch is that a new basketball arena will spur development, then building it in the middle of what is already a highly developed area is moronic. On the other hand, if you build it into the Park East corridor, it would open up the possibility of redevelopment in the light industrial area west of Schlitz Park, an area that shares some of the characteristics of the third ward as far as retail/commercial/residential potential.
Not to mention opens the area south of the Park East currently taken by the BC for development. Which, I may add, will fetch higher taxes than the P.E. Corridor will (Oh, and BTW, will actually get developed and not just sit vacant for years).
Another thing that would prevent the Arena from being used:
The only way they can make it happen is if the Bradley Center can be used in the meantime. For that to happen, both State and Kilbourn will need to be closed down, since the Arena space from north to south isn't big enough for the Bradley Center to sit, let alone big enough for a building 150% the size of the BC. They will also need to build over the surface lot between the Arena and the Convention Center, which eliminates any possibility of the convention center being expanded to the north ever. We know the Convention Center is good, but it needs to be about 50% larger than it is right now to make it an elite convention center, the kind that brings in all kinds of conventions that the current space cannot draw because of its lack of size. The size of the convention center is very important, because while the Bucks have 41 dates, the Admirals have 25 and the Golden Eagles have 18, the fact of the matter is the wide majority of time - especially from May through September - there's nothing going on in the Bradley Center. There are musical acts, to be sure, but in the warm summer months many of those acts opt for outdoor venues around Milwaukee, which leaves the Bradley Center unused and downtown lacking a huge tourist attraction. A bigger convention center will draw the kind of summer conventions our downtown craves, which brings in all kinds of tourism revenue for the city and state, and allows lots of business to get paid - a lot. If they built the Bradley Center attached to the Convention Center, that's possible, but the Convention Center doesn't need huge arena space - they already have arena floor space to offer with the Arena. They need more conventional convention (heh) space, something that cannot be provided in the arena.
Glad to see someone else is looking at the map. You are exactly right that there is insufficient space north to south between State and Kilbourn to build a modern NBA sized arena. The only way to enlarge that footprint (without tearing the BC down first, which is absurd unless the Bucks plan to play at the Klotsche themselves for two years) is to build over Kilbourn. So if you're doing that, what happens to all that happy horsesh!t about Kilbourn being the "grand vista" or however it was referred to in the plan that first proposed demolishing the Arena? It makes no sense. On the other hand, the already vacant land north of the BC between 4th and 6th and Highland and McKinley is big enough for anything this side of Jerry's World.
By the way, someone at the Athletic Department or the Wisconsin Center District is on the ball. If you zoom in on the Google map of that part of downtown, the Arena is already correctly labeled the "UW-Milwaukee Panther Arena." Cool!
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