Dallas Convention Center

[Tivo_Kenevil]

Can we just destroy the convention center; it's a boondoggle? We never even use it to it's full capacity currently, why continue to build another one....

[R1070]

So Dallas

Yep! lol

[northsouth]

This is what happens when shiny rendering that was primarily a concept drawing is forced to confront reality. Constructing such a large building over a highway isn't impossible but it's difficult and impractical, and if you insist on doing it anyway it's more expensive than just nudging it over onto solid ground. You also have to deal with logistical concerns, both for the CC and the neighbors. Conventions don't materialize fully-formed in the halls, they have to be trucked in, and you need somewhere to load and unload those trucks. Food has to come in and trash has to go out. You need extra space to do construction, preferably a spot not presently occupied by the CC. If TXDOT needs a place to park construction equipment and (likely) put in a temporary concrete plant, I'd rather it be walled off there in the corner away from everything.

Never fall in love with a rendering, it's more a product of politics and advertising than engineering and architecture.

[beefphil]

this is terrible who would want to be in that park? lol

[IcedCowboyCoffee]

I think it would entirely depend on if they plan to shield such a park, and how well they pull that off. A small space like this would need a wall to dampen the sound. If they can pull that off it should be a nice small park right next door to the Alamo drafthouse. But yeah it's a very peculiar space.

In a hypothetical high speed rail station scenario, for anyone who decides to walk from the station to the convention center this small piece of land will likely be the first place they set foot in Dallas. Certainly couldn't hurt to spruce it up like this, but in an ideal world the park should extend all the way across I30.

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[MC_ScattCat]

Can someone explain to me what they are doing in the empty parking lot? I read the UPRR and TXDOT have some sort of staging area planned for a project. What project are they referring to?

[Tnexster]

Can someone explain to me what they are doing in the empty parking lot? I read the UPRR and TXDOT have some sort of staging area planned for a project. What project are they referring to?

I believe it is the I-30 canyon, which has been fast tracked.

[CTroyMathis]

I wonder how hard it would be to sacrifice a mere 22KSF (e.g. Aldi or Trader Joes or whatever) space that would only moderately need to be adapted much like any major convention (non-structural changes) to concept out an inclusion of leasing a grocer space specifically on a corner/wing of the place at a relatively prominent spot and not a hidden spot (such as facing the Trinity and out of view) w/in the facility. I mean, F it, try it out. Ridiculously small effort with all that money going in to this facility that will not always be full. It'd be able to be re-integrated back into the greater facility if necessary in the future w/little effort if something doesn't work out. The place technically would have built-in parking, train, bus, other pedestrian accessibility if it is put in a solid, reasonable spot. Off-street loading dock for the behind-the-scenes, check. Low hanging fruit. . .

Blasphemy! A grocery store at a multi-billion dollar tax-payer-paid blank-slate and heres-your-chance-to-open-a-door-to-something-else-also-useful within a large facility that won't always even be full - crazy talk, haha!

[CTroyMathis]

Oh, and, for fun and not entirely serious - go ahead and just throw in a 20K seat soccer-only stadium. All in.

[IcedCowboyCoffee]

"WNBA’s Dallas Wings poised to relocate to downtown Dallas arena in proposed deal with city"
- https://www.dallasnews.com/sports/wings/2024/04/20/dallas-officials-poised-to-approve-deal-to-bring-wnbas-dallas-wings-to-downtown-arena/

Honestly a perfect match for the Memorial Auditorium, I'm really excited this is happening. Now I'm curious what the renovation will look like and how much seating it will be able to fit when it finishes in 2026. Wiki says it currently has 9,294 capacity but I don't know if that includes temporary floor seating which I've sat in for some presentations there. 9k is also not a whole ton more than their current 7,000 facility. It's a good fit for their current attendance numbers but I'm hoping the renovation will enable them to boost that capacity count to at least 10-11k somehow because if the league gets bigger they could outgrow the place quickly. They averaged 4.5k+ last year and the league is well positioned to get a huge boost of new fans this year thanks to Caitlin Clark.

But until that day they outgrow the arena comes it's going to be so cool to see professional basketball played in this place as a standalone facility.

[Tivo_Kenevil]

Always thought this would be a good venue for them. Glad they're moving to a more accessible area.

[rickbansal]

They'll never sell 10-11K seats. Keep it small and intimate - a mostly filled 7K arena is much more intimidating and fun than 50% 11K arena.

[IcedCowboyCoffee]

You're right, the arena's current size is ideal for this moment for this team.
But never say never! NWSL went from averaging 4k attendance to 10k in a matter of ten years. WNBA as a league was averaging 6.5k last year. DFW is a tough sports market just because of the sheer number of sports here fighting for people's limited time, but even FC Dallas, who was famously the butt of MLS attendance jokes, has now been selling out every game for the past year (even though we are absolutely dreadful to watch).

Once it's untethered from the convention center Dallas should be pushing hard to capture traveling tournaments/events in niche small-crowd sports for this arena. Tennis, boxing, martial arts, table tennis, fencing, sumo, volleyball, gymnastics--all that sort of stuff. We should hope to have something to attend every single weekend. If the surrounding area really pans out like we hope it does it should be a genuinely cool place to watch sports.

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[Tivo_Kenevil]

The Hunts should do DFW a solid and sell FC Dallas. We all know they will always prioritize the Chiefs over them. Sell them to someone who will prioritize this team and is actually passionate about winning in MLS.

[rono3849]

The Hunts should do DFW a solid and sell FC Dallas. We all know they will always prioritize the Chiefs over them. Sell them to someone who will prioritize this team and is actually passionate about winning in MLS.

The Hunts can multitask. They have delivered the infrastructure for a great franchise and now they can focus on building a great team. Let's see what the next few years bring. Look how long it took before the Rangers became a contending team and eventually World Champions.

Memorial Auditorium has been a relatively dormant venue for quite a long time. I support the city's effort to upgrade the arena into a 21st Century events facility for sports & entertainment. Frankly, the city was foolish in tearing down Reunion Arena. It could have been a huge asset for the city to attract secondary events & entertainment when AAC was too large & expensive to host them. Dickey's Arena is currently filling that niche.

[IcedCowboyCoffee]

Breaks my heart that there's no way in hell FC Dallas will ever come back to Dallas. The Hunts got too good of a deal up there and all the Frisco growth since then has vindicated that choice. I mentioned they're selling out now, but I wonder if that has more to do with there simply being more people in Frisco now rather than it having anything to do with what the Hunts have done with the team (60k Frisco population when the team started up there to 220k now). People want something to do Saturday nights.

There are so many solid spots near downtown for a 20-30k soccer stadium, the obvious and ironic one being the old Reunion arena site, but I can't imagine Hunt Realty wanting anything to do with that. There's also that big empty lot along Riverfront blvd. There's also some of that industrial space next to the future harold simmons park in west Dallas. Could even work something out with the postal service for some of the space on their distribution warehouse lot. Build a shared parking structure.

I put the new 30k seat Geodis Park stadium in Nashville in the Trinity River, for scale. lol.

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There's also building it in conjunction with whatever the Mavericks do if they happen to jump across the freeway to the Design District. But even further from downtown, if they wanted to replicate the massive soccer complex they have up in Frisco they could put a new stadium as part of Moneygram park.
But all of this would never happen with FC Dallas. It would require getting an additional MLS team and becoming a two team metro like NYC and LA are, or it would be for a potential NWSL team, or the USL Super League team that's coming (but I have a suspicion the USL team is going to be more on the Fort Worth end of the metro...)

[dallaz]

This great! It will bring some type of draw to the area. Next to it is the The Black Academy of Arts and Letters (performing arts). It’s located in the original theater portion of the complex, which is getting completely renovated as well. So, both venues (or anchor facilities) will now have permanent tenants. Which is great! Also, the planned entertainment district between the Memorial Auditorium complex and the new convention center sounds a lot more promising and doable. Since both are on each end, they can both drive traffic into the district.

[IcedCowboyCoffee]

I'm just hoping the city doesn't have eyes on getting a sponsor for the auditorium and slapping a giant logo on it. I'm tired of calling places "Toyota Stadium" "AT&T Stadium" "American Airlines Center" etc etc etc.

"Dallas Memorial Arena", "Dallas Memorial", or "Memorial Arena" would all be great names. Keeps a historical, classier aura on the place.

Or hell even "George Dahl Arena" would be good. Just anything but painting tacky names like "CBRE Group Arena" or "Southwest Airlines Auditorium" on top of the dome roof.

[Tnexster]

Dallas Wings' downtown move gets city council approval
Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson calls move a 'really big deal'

https://www.bizjournals.com/dallas/news ... -wnba.html

The WNBA's Dallas Wings moved one step closer to officially calling downtown Dallas home beginning in 2026.

The Dallas City Council unanimously approved a 15-year deal on April 24 that will see the franchise relocate from UT-Arlington’s College Park Center to the Dallas Memorial Auditorium, part of the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center downtown. The Wings will occupy the auditorium for a minimum of 70 days between April 15 and Nov. 1, according to the resolution, but the deal includes year-round use of the facility for training and office space.

The agreement includes $19 million in incentives paid over three calendar years, according to the resolution. City officials expect to offset the costs by at least $1.5 million in annual revenues over the next 15 years, according to the resolution.

The WNBA's Board of Governors still needs to give final approval, though that is expected to be a formality.

[R1070]

That's great. Would also love to see the MLS team play somewhere in Central Dallas. They are just too far away from so many people in the 'plex.