Satellite Pictures of Stadium Sites

[ManCans]

Just to give everyone an idea of what the parking will be like at the new stadium site:

http://terraserver.microsoft.com/image.aspx?T=4&S=11&Z=10&X=1478&Y=10349&W=3

http://terraserver.microsoft.com/image.aspx?T=4&S=11&Z=10&X=1386&Y=10435&W=3

The new stadium will go right in the middle of that big parking lot, and pretty much take up the whole thing. As you can see, there will be even less dedicated parking than at Monster Park.

[statniner]

Fact:

Chuck Norris takes martial arts lessons from Joe Staley.

[krnbanguboi]

stat don't put that crap here.

The site looks kind of small. And some suburban homes are surrounding it.

[Ronin 49er]

Fact: I will be doing grass angels on that golf course across the street.

[TheWiz]

Problem #1: You're once again using language to exxagerate the amount of space that will be lost to the new stadium. "Most" of the parking lot will be filled? How about less than half the space? The stadium itself will occupy the transmission station you see in the upper right corner, south to a few feet before the bridge across the causeway and then from there about two-thirds of the distance across the lot sideways. If you broke the lot up into 9 equal rectangles, 3 by 3 with the station being one of those 3, the stadium takes up about 4 of them. That's 4 out of 9, which is less than half so "Most" is a incorrect.

Problem #2: Is the rest of the parking escaping your vision? As in the big lot across the Causeway? Or perhaps the one to the west of the stadium? Or perhaps the teams own practice lot which will take care of some of the parking?

Problem #3: Wait, parking lots cannot be BUILT? I didn't realize they had to pre-exist. So, plans to purchase the vacant space in front of the country club as parking doesn't exist? The spots which run all along the west side of Great America are not in your photo and that will hold several thousand spots. Also, the college to the SW has several thousand more, a whopping half a mile walk. People who park in the northern lots at Candlestick go just as far so don't pretend it's some unusual distance.

Problem #4: Guess what: It's called a parking garage. You know what, not every fan wants to tailgate. Some like to know they can park close under cover and have a short walk to the stadium. Older fans who pay good money don't want to have to walk a quarter mile because every spot in that radius was taken up at 8 am. It may shock the 20-35 crowd who love to be out there early drinking beer and firing up grills, but a lot of STH's are older and would prefer easy access parking. Not to generalize too much but older fans and those who don't tailgate do want the garage. Not only will it replace most of the spots lost to the stadium, but a lot of fans want it. Just because there are a lot of younger people in here complaining about tailgaiting space, a lot of people not on her want a garage.

Problem #5: Where is the graphic that shows the last Candlestick proposal? Because it featured a stadium all over the southern half of the lot where the current stadium is. It would be about 20% bigger than the 'Stick. Then that entire northern lot? A massive parking garage that wouldn't even give you a view to the north of the city. The actual surface space would be cut down by about a third. Mostly by a garage to handle the extra spots needed for a bigger stadium and by the stadium itself. Funny enough, you'll find problems with this. First of all, a garage that far away was not optimal for fans. Secondly, it features less surface parking than the Santa Clara site. Also, that garage is more or less a blind stab in terms of whether it can even be built.

Problem #6: The team has turned down the Candlestick Site. Even the city is not trying it as an alternative at this point. The stadium is too far beyond a renovation and the problems of building elsewhere on the site are too numerous to bother with. If all of the sites in the world couldn't match the parking of candlestick, tough luck. That's life. You can't have your cake and eat it too. Santa Clara may not have amazing parking. Any place that will will just be hard to reach or have traffic problems. Otherwise it will be so remote it will cost even MORE to build and so on and so forth. You won't find a perfect site, trust me. In the end, every site has problems. You know what? Candlestick itself has less than good traffic access and it has terrible infrastructure to date. Despite ample parking, it wouldn't even be an ideal site to build on if the stadium wasn't there already. Everyone would be complaining about the unusual location, traffic, and how small a stadium we're getting for so much money.

Problem #7: This is highly unrelated and me being crabby about an ongoing irk I have. But how is the 'Stick special? Fans have been complaining that the quickie artist drawing released last year was too boring. What in God's name makes the 'Stick so special in its design? It's a mongrel if anything else, a complete disaster of architecture and functionality. It's only amazing or pretty in the same way a 5-year olds fingerpaint project is. You may admire it for what has happened there, in 30 years, you'd look at the Santa Clara stadium the same way! Special events will happen there too, hall of famers will play there and chances are a championship or many may be won. Yet we've been in Monster Park for over 30 years and fans actually have the temerity to say the new site isn't appealing? It's akin to dating the ugliest girl in school for a year and then turning down the head cheerleader because she's only the 6th hottest girl in school and you feel you deserve better.

[ManCans]

Too tired to respond to this tonight, but goodness Wiz, I think you're getting a little too close to this issue. I'm just trying to show the size of the new location compared to the old location, which will indeed have less surface area dedicated solely to stadium parking than Candlestick Point. More tomorrow.

[Fromthe3rdRow]

Thanks for the satellite images. However, I think our dear readers might be interested in the actual proposal submitted by the team in regards to parking. (Click on thumbnail below to see the full picture.)

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y2/NinerTest/th_StadiumParking.jpg (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y2/NinerTest/StadiumParking.jpg)

There are over 30,000 parking spaces in the areas highlighted in blue. All are within a short walk to the stadium. There are 6000 spaces in the area immediately surrounding the stadium.

The team has given this issue plenty of thought. The complete parking and transportation plan can be viewed at the following link: Santa Clara Stadium Proposal (http://www.ci.santa-clara.ca.us/pdf/collateral/49ers-20070424-stadium-proposal.pdf) (The transit and parking plan starts on page 5.)

But thanks for contributing to the discussion! Nice work!

[ManCans]

Thanks for the satellite images. However, I think our dear readers might be interested in the actual proposal submitted by the team in regards to parking. (Click on thumbnail below to see the full picture.)

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y2/NinerTest/th_StadiumParking.jpg (http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y2/NinerTest/StadiumParking.jpg)

There are over 30,000 parking spaces in the areas highlighted in blue. All are within a short walk to the stadium. There are 6000 spaces in the area immediately surrounding the stadium.

The team has given this issue plenty of thought. The complete parking and transportation plan can be viewed at the following link: Santa Clara Stadium Proposal (http://www.ci.santa-clara.ca.us/pdf/collateral/49ers-20070424-stadium-proposal.pdf) (The transit and parking plan starts on page 5.)

But thanks for contributing to the discussion! Nice work!Thanks for clarifying that there STILL won't be enough parking spaces available, even with the blue areas.

[HawkMan]

It's like" We Can't Play Unless We Have A Nice Stadium" I'm seeing that all around the NFL.

[ManCans]

Before I respond to this, I'd like to reiterate that I'm coming at this from a season ticket holder perspective. I don't have a political agenda, like several other posters seem to have. I'm only interested in a new stadium, and the gameday experience, regardless of the location.
Problem #1: You're once again using language to exxagerate the amount of space that will be lost to the new stadium. "Most" of the parking lot will be filled? How about less than half the space? The stadium itself will occupy the transmission station you see in the upper right corner, south to a few feet before the bridge across the causeway and then from there about two-thirds of the distance across the lot sideways. If you broke the lot up into 9 equal rectangles, 3 by 3 with the station being one of those 3, the stadium takes up about 4 of them. That's 4 out of 9, which is less than half so "Most" is a incorrect.I'm going off of this image posted on 49ers.com:

http://49ers.com/nm_files/Image/High%20Res%20Stadium/threeimage.jpg

As you can see from the design, the majority of the parking lot will be taken up by the stadium, the park, and the concourse. A small section of the southern parking lot will remain available for parking, but I'd say about 2/3 of the existing parking lot will no longer be available for parking.
Problem #2: Is the rest of the parking escaping your vision? As in the big lot across the Causeway? Or perhaps the one to the west of the stadium? Or perhaps the teams own practice lot which will take care of some of the parking?I'm aware of the remaining parking lots, and it's still not even close to the surface space available at Candlestick/Hunter's Point.
Problem #3: Wait, parking lots cannot be BUILT? I didn't realize they had to pre-exist. So, plans to purchase the vacant space in front of the country club as parking doesn't exist? The spots which run all along the west side of Great America are not in your photo and that will hold several thousand spots. Also, the college to the SW has several thousand more, a whopping half a mile walk. People who park in the northern lots at Candlestick go just as far so don't pretend it's some unusual distance.Again, you're losing sight of the overall picture. Even with all this auxiliary parking, it still won't be enough, and cannot possibly match the potential surface space available with the combination of Candlestick and Hunter's Point. Not to mention that you completely ignored the potential conflicts with Great America. The amusement park stays open until the end of October, which is almost HALF the football season. Not to mention events such as concerts, festivals, truck rallies, ArenaCross, car, boat & RV shows, etc. that could also cause a great deal of strife with GA.
Problem #4: Guess what: It's called a parking garage. You know what, not every fan wants to tailgate. Some like to know they can park close under cover and have a short walk to the stadium. Older fans who pay good money don't want to have to walk a quarter mile because every spot in that radius was taken up at 8 am. It may shock the 20-35 crowd who love to be out there early drinking beer and firing up grills, but a lot of STH's are older and would prefer easy access parking. Not to generalize too much but older fans and those who don't tailgate do want the garage. Not only will it replace most of the spots lost to the stadium, but a lot of fans want it. Just because there are a lot of younger people in here complaining about tailgaiting space, a lot of people not on her want a garage.I didn't want to get into the parking garage because I thought the potential pitfalls were obvious. Getting out of a parking lot after an event is already tedious at best. Now, with the addition of several levels of parking, the volume through the bottleneck will TRIPLE at the very least. Not to mention all those cars idling in a semi-enclosed space. The air quality will probably be horrendous. Simply put, I will NOT park in that parking garage, ever.
Problem #5: Where is the graphic that shows the last Candlestick proposal? Because it featured a stadium all over the southern half of the lot where the current stadium is. It would be about 20% bigger than the 'Stick. Then that entire northern lot? A massive parking garage that wouldn't even give you a view to the north of the city. The actual surface space would be cut down by about a third. Mostly by a garage to handle the extra spots needed for a bigger stadium and by the stadium itself. Funny enough, you'll find problems with this. First of all, a garage that far away was not optimal for fans. Secondly, it features less surface parking than the Santa Clara site. Also, that garage is more or less a blind stab in terms of whether it can even be built.I'm not sure which proposal you're talking about. As I said, I'm not approaching this from a political perspective, only a practical perspective. The east side of Candlestick Point is large and undeveloped; a perfect spot to build a new stadium (Yes, it would be closer to the water, but AT&T Park is also built on the waterfront). The surface space would only increase after the demolition of Monster Park. If the city turned over the overflow parking areas to the team (which would now be closer to the stadium), along with a significant area of southern Hunter's Point, the potential parking area would be immense (I don't think a parking garage is even necessary). I'm sorry, but Santa Clara just can't compete with that.
Problem #6: The team has turned down the Candlestick Site. Even the city is not trying it as an alternative at this point. The stadium is too far beyond a renovation and the problems of building elsewhere on the site are too numerous to bother with. If all of the sites in the world couldn't match the parking of candlestick, tough luck. That's life. You can't have your cake and eat it too. Santa Clara may not have amazing parking. Any place that will will just be hard to reach or have traffic problems. Otherwise it will be so remote it will cost even MORE to build and so on and so forth. You won't find a perfect site, trust me. In the end, every site has problems. You know what? Candlestick itself has less than good traffic access and it has terrible infrastructure to date. Despite ample parking, it wouldn't even be an ideal site to build on if the stadium wasn't there already. Everyone would be complaining about the unusual location, traffic, and how small a stadium we're getting for so much money.Again, this is an area that I have no insider knowledge. However, I'm not one to believe someone else's word as to whether the project is do-able or not. I've heard far too many times how something is impossible or impractical, when a simple creative solution is all that's required. The Candlestick Point infrastructure is going to be upgraded by the city, whether a stadium is built or not. That's all part of the development planned for the area, and a weak excuse by Dr. York, IMO. I've used Arco Arena as an example of how even a small access point can be designed to allow maximum traffic flow (Arco uses a round-robin airport parking lot design which really keeps traffic moving). By comparison, HP Pavilion is a HORRIBLE place to exit.
Problem #7: This is highly unrelated and me being crabby about an ongoing irk I have. But how is the 'Stick special? Fans have been complaining that the quickie artist drawing released last year was too boring. What in God's name makes the 'Stick so special in its design? It's a mongrel if anything else, a complete disaster of architecture and functionality. It's only amazing or pretty in the same way a 5-year olds fingerpaint project is. You may admire it for what has happened there, in 30 years, you'd look at the Santa Clara stadium the same way! Special events will happen there too, hall of famers will play there and chances are a championship or many may be won. Yet we've been in Monster Park for over 30 years and fans actually have the temerity to say the new site isn't appealing? It's akin to dating the ugliest girl in school for a year and then turning down the head cheerleader because she's only the 6th hottest girl in school and you feel you deserve better.Again, I have no such affection for Candlestick. I'm approaching this from a practical perspective. To me, the issue is 'poor access' vs. 'limited parking'. Now, if the team builds in Santa Clara, I'm probably going to have to find a way to park and ride to the stadium, since I'm pretty sure parking is going to be a major problem. If that works out to be a simple and easy solution, I will maintain my STH status. If I spend most of my time on gameday trying to find a place to park, I will not renew my season tickets, which I suspect many others will do under similar circumstances.

[TheWiz]

Thanks for clarifying that there STILL won't be enough parking spaces available, even with the blue areas.

What is 'enough'? A history of stadiums and stadium building says nearly 40k spaces is far more than ENOUGH for a 65k seat stadium. Given how fans don't all arrive in individual vehicles or even drive a car, how many more parking spots do you want? One for every man woman and child?

Before I respond to this, I'd like to reiterate that I'm coming at this from a season ticket holder perspective. I don't have a political agenda, like several other posters seem to have. I'm only interested in a new stadium, and the gameday experience, regardless of the location.
I'm going off of this image posted on 49ers.com:

http://49ers.com/nm_files/Image/High%20Res%20Stadium/threeimage.jpg

As you can see from the design, the majority of the parking lot will be taken up by the stadium, the park, and the concourse. A small section of the southern parking lot will remain available for parking, but I'd say about 2/3 of the existing parking lot will no longer be available for parking.
I'm aware of the remaining parking lots, and it's still not even close to the surface space available at Candlestick/Hunter's Point.
Again, you're losing sight of the overall picture. Even with all this auxiliary parking, it still won't be enough, and cannot possibly match the potential surface space available with the combination of Candlestick and Hunter's Point. Not to mention that you completely ignored the potential conflicts with Great America. The amusement park stays open until the end of October, which is almost HALF the football season. Not to mention events such as concerts, festivals, truck rallies, ArenaCross, car, boat & RV shows, etc. that could also cause a great deal of strife with GA.

- That is an artists drawing of what the site could look like. NOTHING IS FINAL. Teams don't hire architects to create detailed and worked out designs and pay them hundreds of thousands of dollars if not millions to do so until they actually have clearance to make the stadium. The Giants and Jets FINALLY just got full approval and financing and are just now hiring firms to do to the design. Otherwise it's like putting a down payment on a home you've never seen that you may not even be able to buy. It's one drawing thrown together by one artist.

- Secondly, Where do two-thirds go? I mean, I see a whole corner of the lot to the south still there and I see an entire parking garage taking about over a third of the lot. How wide is that walkway? No one knows, it may not even be constructed. How much space is lost between the stadium and the waterway? No one knows, it hasn't been built. Some colored pencil fan made a cutesie drawing in a firm of what might look nice.


I didn't want to get into the parking garage because I thought the potential pitfalls were obvious. Getting out of a parking lot after an event is already tedious at best. Now, with the addition of several levels of parking, the volume through the bottleneck will TRIPLE at the very least. Not to mention all those cars idling in a semi-enclosed space. The air quality will probably be horrendous. Simply put, I will NOT park in that parking garage, ever.

First of all, stadium lots can be constructed so that they are pay to enter. So, there is no line to get out of the garage, you just drive. Secondly, the proposed Garage has multiple exits, not just one.

But, it's of your opinion that nothing should be built if it doesn't benefit you and to heck with everyone else? The team should ignore the thousands of others who would prefer to park closer to the stadium? Because by building a garage, you increase the volume of cars that can be closer to the stadium. For those thousands of fans who don't want to walk and like the convenience, they prefer a garage. So, you've just got to live with the fact that not every fan thinks tailgaiting space is more crucial than walking distance.


I'm not sure which proposal you're talking about. As I said, I'm not approaching this from a political perspective, only a practical perspective.

What's political about a stadium proposal? The proposal was made public last year about this time which is also when the team decided to start looking at Santa Clara. Then they later officially dumped the project proposal at Candlestick.


The east side of Candlestick Point is large and undeveloped; a perfect spot to build a new stadium (Yes, it would be closer to the water, but AT&T Park is also built on the waterfront). The surface space would only increase after the demolition of Monster Park. If the city turned over the overflow parking areas to the team (which would now be closer to the stadium), along with a significant area of southern Hunter's Point, the potential parking area would be immense (I don't think a parking garage is even necessary). I'm sorry, but Santa Clara just can't compete with that.

Except you only raise more problems. First of all, Lennar corporation already came up with that plan. Their plan also found that if we wanted a 68k planned seating stadium on that lot, we'd also need a parking garage and the surface parking for that plan: smaller than Santa Clara. Yes, believe it. The plan called for nearly the same number of spots as Santa Clara, with over a fifth of those spots in one 8,000+ spot parking garage. You want to talk about parking jams? How about a monster-sized garage all along the north side of the current parking structure?

Also, where does everyone park for 3 years while half of the parking spaces are ripped up and fenced off? The traffic as roads are cut in half by cones to widen each side?


Again, this is an area that I have no insider knowledge. However, I'm not one to believe someone else's word as to whether the project is do-able or not. I've heard far too many times how something is impossible or impractical, when a simple creative solution is all that's required.

The proposed garage was actually going to be the 2nd largest volume parking garage ever built. And it was going to be built in a region known for earthquakes? A large reason the team didn't like the Lennar proposal was even though Lennar was willing to pay for the hundreds of millions to build the garage, Lennar could not guarantee it would be built. I'm not an engineer but when the firm that even proposes to build something admits that it may suffer major setbacks and it sounds like a stupid idea, I am not going to buy it. I'm not saying I know it's a bad idea, I'm just trusting the opinion of the people who actually did make the decision.


The Candlestick Point infrastructure is going to be upgraded by the city, whether a stadium is built or not. That's all part of the development planned for the area, and a weak excuse by Dr. York, IMO.

Actually, not true. Lennar corporation turned and spun their concept into a housing project off of Hunter's point and points west. As part of that, the city has agreed to fix the roads and infrastructure under that development as part of the deal. Also, IF the team built the stadium on Hunter's Point, the city would pay the extra millions to extend that infrastructure to the site for the stadium. On the other hand, Candlestick is not adjacent to that development nearly as much as a stadium would be. The city has not offered to pay a penny to help build on Candlestick Point. The costs to lay all new infrastructure to the stadium would be vastly more expensive for the team. The team has never said infrastructure is a problem at Hunter's Point, the city made it clear that they would help cover that.


I've used Arco Arena as an example of how even a small access point can be designed to allow maximum traffic flow (Arco uses a round-robin airport parking lot design which really keeps traffic moving). By comparison, HP Pavilion is a HORRIBLE place to exit.

So, a small access point makes for great traffic flow but a parking garage is a guaranteed traffic jam? I'm being argumentative, I know. But, who exactly and where exactly would this wonderful highway and traffic structure be built? Who is paying for it? The city has, as far as I know, yet released a single traffic analysis of Hunter's Point. The more I look at it though, I can only see problems.


Again, I have no such affection for Candlestick. I'm approaching this from a practical perspective. To me, the issue is 'poor access' vs. 'limited parking'. Now, if the team builds in Santa Clara, I'm probably going to have to find a way to park and ride to the stadium, since I'm pretty sure parking is going to be a major problem. If that works out to be a simple and easy solution, I will maintain my STH status. If I spend most of my time on gameday trying to find a place to park, I will not renew my season tickets, which I suspect many others will do under similar circumstances.

I don't see why you think parking will be so impossible. It's very clear that there are easily as many spaces as needed for a stadium on the location. If half the people parking also came with a friend, the team would nearly fill the stadium up completely and everyone would have a parking spot. Meanwhile, I've heard fans call parking at Candlestick a nightmare because you're left roaming up and down rows all of the time trying to find that open spot and for many first time fans, the lots are confusing to figure out where to go.

I don't foresee any epidemic. I see lots of fans happy as heck to be in a new stadium that is many times better than Candlestick. Ones who enjoy being to get to and from the stadium easily. If taking an extra 5 minutes to find a spot is a life-wasting-I-hate-this-team-no-matter-how-nice-the-stadium-is makes a few thousand people give up STH rights to someone else, so be it. Meanwhile, a lot of fans will be happy to have a nice garage next door, more than the number who are disgruntled over having to park.

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Just to retrace Hunter's Point. Maybe you're right, the site itself may have more surface parking, I can't say. Perhaps there is plenty of room for a similar stadium, infrastructure paid for, and a study shows that the traffic wouldn't be as bad as I see it at first glance (and I think on its best day it would be worse than Candlestick on a bad day). All of that aside, the team would get their idyllic view, parking, and stay in the city.

Except you're still building on a Super Fund site. In order to build the infrastructure onto the site and start building a foundation the entire site must be cleaned. A single bad test while they're digging a trench for sewage pipes and construction grinds to a halt. In order to build a stadium, the team must hire architects to oversee construction and hire companies on contract and buy materials. When you lose 3 months due to a bad soil test, that's millions more to the architects, millions in penalties on the contracts since those companies are forced to drop other jobs to stay on this one, and the costs of materials inflate and rise. That can easily be a 25M-50M+ hit if a single bad thing happens. It would be even more disastrous if it happened after that stage and when the stadium itself was being erected. There is a strong risk of severe financial repercussions. That's why the team isn't as interested.

No owner, even one that can afford it with billions in his back pocket, would accept that risk. Ownership is a business and you don't even break even by losing an extra 100M in unexpected costs on a stadium. The stadium itself could end up as embraced by fans as a nice dip in a lake next to Chernobyl the way environmentalists will spin it. If the city offered to cover the overruns then we could easily end up costing the city millions upon millions and it would like Oakland and the Colliseum but much worse. Then the public would hold it against us for not just moving to Santa Clara and saving the city tens of millions. They'd also blame York for not taking the penalty himself as if it were his fault.

Now, of course the mayor's office doesn't want it to look that way. Newsome wants to make it seem that he can guarantee the soil will be magically spotless in about a quarter the remaining time it would take the Navy to do it. He can quadruple the crews out there but it still won't guarantee that a month into pipe laying some soil 6 feet down test positive, a cubic foot that they somehow overlooked out of many that was turned and tilled and cleaned. Then no one knows how much more was missed and kapow, someone takes a big loss.

That's even really opinion, that's just fact. It is a Super Fund site and even a poster here last winter who does it for a living said cleanup in Newsome's timeline with any guarantee is ridiculous. There is a serious risk and if it weren't for that, I'd be on board with Hunter's point if it stood up to Santa Clara. Until then Santa Clara has the traffic, infrastructure, and a nice location overall and it will be a very nice stadium and it is of no agenda but I just don't see any of the other proposal's matching it. I have never said it's the best possible site, it's just the best one available out of our choices and that is my opinion.

[sats0]

A few other points to ponder:

1. The proposed stadium is RIGHT NEXT to light rail and one block from Amtrak. There are already bus stops nearby for people to take public transportation.

2. There is a multi story parking structure right across the street at the Santa Clara Convention center that has 2,000 parking spaces.

3. The surrounding area has PLENTY of office buildings that have parking spaces already there for their employees. Since these spaces are empty on the weekends anyway, those spaces can also be used.

4. There are several nice hotels in the neighborhood so people can make a mini-vacation out of game day.

If it is possible for you, I recommend that people go by the area just to get an idea for themselves about the site. The weather is nice, there are no swirling winds, the streets are wide and there two major multi-lane roads right next to the site. If you are willing to be objective, I am certain a vast majority of you will come away happy with the location.

[ManCans]

I don't have a ton of time to argue with you, Wiz, as I have my own construction project I'm managing right now. Speaking of which, whilst digging the foundation for our new house, the excavation crew ran into lava cap. That ended up costing me an extra $15,000.00 to excavate, and I didn't even run into any hazardous material. The point being, there will ALWAYS be risks in construction, and there will ALWAYS be delays and cost overruns, regardless of the site. That's not endemic of a Super Fund site alone.

As far as parking is concerned, the Lennar plan calls for 19,500 spaces around the stadium, not including overflow parking, nor parking at local office buildings. That's significantly better than the 6,000 offered at the Santa Clara site. Lennar's traffic engineers has also stated that their traffic study of the Hunter's Point area concluded that the traffic dump time would be similar to what the Santa Clara site would experience. I don't know if it's correct or not, but there's your expert testimonial.

Again I don't have the time to research and put together a plan for Candlestick Point, so I'm just going to go ahead and throw my support behind the Hunter's Point plan. IMO, it's a far better business plan than Santa Clara, especially in it's parking and ability to support the stadium with mixed use development. Along the same lines as your argument for building a parking lot/parking garage, I say, "so, infrastucture can't be built?" I don't believe the new plan calls for a parking garage, as I can't seem to find one in the article. The issue of the parking garage is not about tailgating for me, as much as trying to push 3 times the amount of cars through the same bottleneck.

IMO, the Hunter's Point plan is far superior to Santa Clara.

[TheWiz]

I don't have a ton of time to argue with you, Wiz, as I have my own construction project I'm managing right now. Speaking of which, whilst digging the foundation for our new house, the excavation crew ran into lava cap. That ended up costing me an extra $15,000.00 to excavate, and I didn't even run into any hazardous material. The point being, there will ALWAYS be risks in construction, and there will ALWAYS be delays and cost overruns, regardless of the site. That's not endemic of a Super Fund site alone.

You're right. But we're not talking about a 3 day delay in steel shipments because of a typhoon outside of Kyoto or a surprise visit by EPA to complain about the sealent being used on the water pipes. When you hit a lava cap, did you need to stop building and excavate and check the surrounding 300 yards for more of them and bring in haz-mat specialists and the EPA? Based on the situation, one bad sample is enough reason to recheck EVERYTHING and that can be a very significant setback. Now, freak things can occur, you're right, construction always hits some snags but that's business. But when you know there is a significant risk beforehand of a multi-month and multi-milliondollar setback and complication, it's a different story.


As far as parking is concerned, the Lennar plan calls for 19,500 spaces around the stadium, not including overflow parking, nor parking at local office buildings. That's significantly better than the 6,000 offered at the Santa Clara site. Lennar's traffic engineers has also stated that their traffic study of the Hunter's Point area concluded that the traffic dump time would be similar to what the Santa Clara site would experience. I don't know if it's correct or not, but there's your expert testimonial.

Here is the problem with the logic, because on-site is a completely relative term. For example, there is a spot N of the stadium adjacent to the country club. There's a whole load of space just NW as well at the Convention Center which has a 2k parking garage and plans for another larger parking garage to be built. Now, just because they're across the road from the proposed Santa Clara site they're not "on-site". Yet those spots are actually closer to the stadium than a third of the 'on-site' spots at the Hunter's Point Site. So, what on-site counts as is really relative because if you just include spots that are not 'on-site' but yet within a quarter mile of the stadium, the on-site parking more than doubles.

True, it's not 19.6k but you know, I'm not qualifying "best stadium" purely by parking.


Again I don't have the time to research and put together a plan for Candlestick Point, so I'm just going to go ahead and throw my support behind the Hunter's Point plan. IMO, it's a far better business plan than Santa Clara, especially in it's parking and ability to support the stadium with mixed use development. Along the same lines as your argument for building a parking lot/parking garage, I say, "so, infrastucture can't be built?" I don't believe the new plan calls for a parking garage, as I can't seem to find one in the article. The issue of the parking garage is not about tailgating for me, as much as trying to push 3 times the amount of cars through the same bottleneck.

I don't see how the parking is any better. Just because more of the parking around Hunter's Point is conntuously connected and "on-site", as I pointed out above, means very little. Parking can even be closer and still not be "on-site".

Infrastructure can be built, but it's prohibitively expensive. Building a parking lot involves flattening a plot of land, putting in lines for lamp posts, and paving and painting the lot, Done. Infrastructure involves a LOT more. You need city approval and specialists and more engineers. Just to lay down sewage you've got to shut down the local area, dig up the lines under the nearest roads, dig out the entirely space for the pipeline, and lay down all of the piping to the stadium foundation. Now repeat that for all of the phone company lines, digital lines, water lines, electrical lines, etc. Then the cost to repave the roads and...there's a reason a stadium can rack up well over 100M alone in the process. At Candlestick, the lines going in to the current stadium are useless at their age. You'd need to extend all of the way from the main roads again. At least at Santa Clara, there is ample and sufficient lines right under the road between the stadium and the convention center. The team can run its lines right under the walkway and straight into the foundation at literally less than 10% of what it will cost for the Candlestick site.

In my experience, parking garages only back up because people have to wait for those at the front of the line to pay the guy in the booth to get out. There are easy ways to fix that. First, you pay to get into the lot, not out. Then the garage can have 3 gates to let people in. Then you can easily offer 3 exits from the garage. Also, even if you fill a 3k parking garage, not all of them leave at the same time. Some people need to leave early, some duck out after the first half if we're down. Half may split when we go up by 10 with 8 minutes left and others may stick until the final snap and yet others may stick around to get autographs after, etc. It's not like an opera where everyone leaves at the end and you've got thousands of cars trying to move out at once. Also, the garage might empty right onto the road, so they won't need to wait in lines like those in regular parking just to reach the road.



IMO, the Hunter's Point plan is far superior to Santa Clara.

And that's fine, I just disagree. I think the variety of transportation and mass transit ability make it an excellent choice in that aspect. I think the area is excellent for football, it's smack in an entertainment district. It also is a large boon to have the stadium right next to team facilities. It doesn't have excellent parking, but you can't get it all and that's one aspect I can live without. I'm watching college football right now and I can recall some of the many stadiums I've been to. At times parking on a bumpy grass field over a half mile from the stadium and walking in cold October wind and in the end, those stadiums get packed each week and are a lot larger in capacity and smaller in fan base than we have. If someone tells me I'd need to park at Mission College and walk up the road a half a mile and a little more to the stadium, I wouldn't care. If a short walk is that big to me, that's what the garage is for. I also don't see how a stadium with a high risk of coming in well overbudget and a season too late is a better option.

[Niner Jan]

This is fun, sitting on the sidelines and watching others go at each other with arguments and contra-arguments.

I've done all I can to speak up in favor of the Santa Clara stadium, and I'm worn to a frazzle debating how to STOP the building of the Mary Avenue Brudge (over 101 & 237) from ruining our Sunnyvale residential neighborhood.

I'll just bet on whoever joins the Wiz's team. He has most of the BEST answers. any way!

:wub: :hunter: :hatwave: :bat:

[ManCans]

You're right. But we're not talking about a 3 day delay in steel shipments because of a typhoon outside of Kyoto or a surprise visit by EPA to complain about the sealent being used on the water pipes. When you hit a lava cap, did you need to stop building and excavate and check the surrounding 300 yards for more of them and bring in haz-mat specialists and the EPA? Based on the situation, one bad sample is enough reason to recheck EVERYTHING and that can be a very significant setback. Now, freak things can occur, you're right, construction always hits some snags but that's business. But when you know there is a significant risk beforehand of a multi-month and multi-milliondollar setback and complication, it's a different story. Actually, the plan put forth by Lennar calls for the 27-acre area where the stadium will be built to be cleaned up first by the summer of 2009 so construction of the stadium could begin. If they started now, that would be 2 full years to get the site prepared for construction. That's about the best circumstances anyone could ask for when preparing a site for construction.
Here is the problem with the logic, because on-site is a completely relative term. For example, there is a spot N of the stadium adjacent to the country club. There's a whole load of space just NW as well at the Convention Center which has a 2k parking garage and plans for another larger parking garage to be built. Now, just because they're across the road from the proposed Santa Clara site they're not "on-site". Yet those spots are actually closer to the stadium than a third of the 'on-site' spots at the Hunter's Point Site. So, what on-site counts as is really relative because if you just include spots that are not 'on-site' but yet within a quarter mile of the stadium, the on-site parking more than doubles.

True, it's not 19.6k but you know, I'm not qualifying "best stadium" purely by parking.

I don't see how the parking is any better. Just because more of the parking around Hunter's Point is conntuously connected and "on-site", as I pointed out above, means very little. Parking can even be closer and still not be "on-site".The stadium will be relatively the same at either site. To me, parking is about 1/3 of the gameday experience, and tailgaters would probably say it's about half. Traffic is somewhat of an issue, but since I'm familiar with the streets of San Francisco, I usually don't have a problem getting where I need to go fairly easily. IMO, parking is MUCH more important than traffic. The most frustrating experience I've had at an event is being unable to find parking, which usually results in missing a significant part, if not the entire event. Now granted, this may not be an issue when all is said and done, but I don't think the York's plan has done enough to convince me that parking will not be a significant issue on gameday. Specifically, the lack of dedicated stadium parking in Santa Clara. Sure, you can say there's parking at the country club across the street, or the convention center, or the college a half mile away. But what if there's an event at the country club, or the convention center, or the college on gameday? For that matter, what about the thousands of amusement park-goers that will DEFINITELY compete for parking spaces with football fans on Sundays for half the season? It's already looking like a logistical nightmare. Furthermore, by not having dedicated parking regardless of whether it is on-site or not, the gameday experience could end up frustrating fans to the point where they stop coming to the games. And that could spell disaster.
Infrastructure can be built, but it's prohibitively expensive. Building a parking lot involves flattening a plot of land, putting in lines for lamp posts, and paving and painting the lot, Done. Infrastructure involves a LOT more. You need city approval and specialists and more engineers. Just to lay down sewage you've got to shut down the local area, dig up the lines under the nearest roads, dig out the entirely space for the pipeline, and lay down all of the piping to the stadium foundation. Now repeat that for all of the phone company lines, digital lines, water lines, electrical lines, etc. Then the cost to repave the roads and...there's a reason a stadium can rack up well over 100M alone in the process. At Candlestick, the lines going in to the current stadium are useless at their age. You'd need to extend all of the way from the main roads again. At least at Santa Clara, there is ample and sufficient lines right under the road between the stadium and the convention center. The team can run its lines right under the walkway and straight into the foundation at literally less than 10% of what it will cost for the Candlestick site.Again, the Lennar plan has financing in place with a two year head start to prepare the site. Infrastructure is not an issue.
In my experience, parking garages only back up because people have to wait for those at the front of the line to pay the guy in the booth to get out. There are easy ways to fix that. First, you pay to get into the lot, not out. Then the garage can have 3 gates to let people in. Then you can easily offer 3 exits from the garage. Also, even if you fill a 3k parking garage, not all of them leave at the same time. Some people need to leave early, some duck out after the first half if we're down. Half may split when we go up by 10 with 8 minutes left and others may stick until the final snap and yet others may stick around to get autographs after, etc. It's not like an opera where everyone leaves at the end and you've got thousands of cars trying to move out at once. Also, the garage might empty right onto the road, so they won't need to wait in lines like those in regular parking just to reach the road.It's still a bottleneck. Too many cars (in this case, triple the normal amount) competing for the same space, which will also be competing with traffic from other sites for the same roadway.
And that's fine, I just disagree. I think the variety of transportation and mass transit ability make it an excellent choice in that aspect. I think the area is excellent for football, it's smack in an entertainment district. It also is a large boon to have the stadium right next to team facilities. It doesn't have excellent parking, but you can't get it all and that's one aspect I can live without. I'm watching college football right now and I can recall some of the many stadiums I've been to. At times parking on a bumpy grass field over a half mile from the stadium and walking in cold October wind and in the end, those stadiums get packed each week and are a lot larger in capacity and smaller in fan base than we have. If someone tells me I'd need to park at Mission College and walk up the road a half a mile and a little more to the stadium, I wouldn't care. If a short walk is that big to me, that's what the garage is for. I also don't see how a stadium with a high risk of coming in well overbudget and a season too late is a better option.Sure, but if you had to park 2-3 miles away, unexpectedly, and missed half of an important game because you couldn't find parking, how would you feel then?

[Coldrain85]

I've done my share of posting on this subject as well. Hunter's Point is not going to happen. We can ramble on about it until we get carpal tunnel, but it's a no go. The fact that it's a Superfund site is only part of it. Some of that land is reclaimed, just like the land around Candlestick. Building a huge stadium on that ground would require a 9 figure sum just for the extra foundation work. Otherwise, a 7.0 quake could render the stadium useless. It's cost prohibitive to build near Candlestick, and Hunter's Point.

Even though it means an extra hour of driving for me, I'm all for this stadium being built in the south bay. It's advantages over Hunter's Point are numerous. The large number of access roads will be a great help. Hunter's Point would be a cluster**ck. All this talk about parking issues is for naught. We can be assured that there will be ample parking for those who wish to drive. The mass transit options are numerous as well, and easily accessible to both east bay and peninsula traffic. Being right at the south end of the bay one of the best things about it because the 680/880 and 101/280 traffic never even have to look at each other. That will certainly make a difference with respect to the game traffic.

People will be happy. And if some of my fellow STH's choose to pitch a fit and not renew their tickets, then better seats for me. I'll be in line for a SBL. I'll pay whatever it takes, even if I have to bust out the credit card.

I don't see this Santa Clara plan falling through.

[TheWiz]

Actually, the plan put forth by Lennar calls for the 27-acre area where the stadium will be built to be cleaned up first by the summer of 2009 so construction of the stadium could begin. If they started now, that would be 2 full years to get the site prepared for construction. That's about the best circumstances anyone could ask for when preparing a site for construction.

You're right that they're the best plans. That's why they're also unlikely. Actually, the best plans involve the city actually putting up 100M+ to finally support a team that has brought ten times that in name recognition and tourism over the past 50 years. But best plans are named that for a reason, they're ideal but not likely.


The stadium will be relatively the same at either site. To me, parking is about 1/3 of the gameday experience, and tailgaters would probably say it's about half.

Parking to me involves finding a place to park my vehicle. I don't see how the location of my car will affect the quality of the team of the field, taste of my food, coldness of my beer, or loudness and excitement of the crowd. The day I pull out a tape measure and base any part of the game experience upon the results I beg for someone to end my life. The majority of fans who come to games won't be tailgaters. Most of them will be fans who show up within an hour of kickoff and park in further lots and walks the entire 10 minutes to their seats or not drive cars at all.


Traffic is somewhat of an issue, but since I'm familiar with the streets of San Francisco, I usually don't have a problem getting where I need to go fairly easily. IMO, parking is MUCH more important than traffic. The most frustrating experience I've had at an event is being unable to find parking, which usually results in missing a significant part, if not the entire event.

So you want the team to base its decision of a stadium location entirely upon the combined familiarity of season ticket holders to the proposed location? I don't see how your parking troubles relate? After all, it seems more to me like you have been to events with no parking control more than anything.


Now granted, this may not be an issue when all is said and done, but I don't think the York's plan has done enough to convince me that parking will not be a significant issue on gameday. Specifically, the lack of dedicated stadium parking in Santa Clara. Sure, you can say there's parking at the country club across the street, or the convention center, or the college a half mile away. But what if there's an event at the country club, or the convention center, or the college on gameday? For that matter, what about the thousands of amusement park-goers that will DEFINITELY compete for parking spaces with football fans on Sundays for half the season? It's already looking like a logistical nightmare. Furthermore, by not having dedicated parking regardless of whether it is on-site or not, the gameday experience could end up frustrating fans to the point where they stop coming to the games. And that could spell disaster.

You're such a pessmist aren't you? If someone throws a house party and ask you to park on the street do you show up with a tape measure and a guest list and worry if there is sufficient space before you need to park on the next city block?

Who runs the stadium? The city stadium authority would. Who would run the convention center? The city. Seems to me like having the garages open on all of the possible dates is not a problem. Also, how do you deal with Great America? How many people ride rollercoasters when it's so cold outside you wear extra layers and 5 hours in a park seems more like windchill than a summer day? It is a summer industry you know and even preseason games don't get packed. I'm sure all whopping 3 or 4 home games a year when the park draws peak business that there will not be a problem.

You ever notice how you write 'could' so much? As in you're talking in hypotheticals. Heck a stadium in Santa Clara could crumble in an earthquake, we shouldn't build there! You know, parking at Hunter's Point could be very bad and force tens of thousands of cars to filter through tiny city streets trying to find the nearest highway. Fans could be so turned off by a field on a Super Fund site that even great parking will deter them. See, anyone can play that game. The point is you're focusing on extremes and negatives at the same time and speaking little of likelihood.


Again, the Lennar plan has financing in place with a two year head start to prepare the site. Infrastructure is not an issue.


Sure, but if you had to park 2-3 miles away, unexpectedly, and missed half of an important game because you couldn't find parking, how would you feel then?

Head start? I highly call "removing environmental toxins" a head start. Removing potential healtht hazards seems more like a requirement than it is a perk, don't you think? After all, if Santa Clara had public health problems on its Great America parking lot, don't you think they'd be cleaning it up too?


It's still a bottleneck. Too many cars (in this case, triple the normal amount) competing for the same space, which will also be competing with traffic from other sites for the same roadway.

Explain this to me. Take a lot of say, 4k cars and give them about 4 or 5 outlets. After all, parking lots don't empty onto roads blindly. They have natural entry and exit locations. Cars still need to wait to get out of their parking spot to get into then flow of traffic that goes to one of these exits onto a road. How exactly does a 2K car garage with 3 or 4 exits suffer more traffic? They've still got to migrate from their spot to an exit. If anything, the ratio of cars to exits is even better. Especially if some of those exits go right onto streets. How does traffic flow across 3 equally sized lots differ from a 3-car garage of equal parking area?

Also, I thought you refused to park in a garage? A garage offers a short walk and the convience of a nice and easy to find spot that is covered. If it takes them 2 more minutes to exit, isn't that their business? After all, if you've got a really short walk and an easy to find spot, who begrudges a slightly longer garage exit? At Hunter's Point, I see fans wandering roads just to find their way to a highway a LOT further away to the closest on ramps than Santa Clara appeals to. So, 'time lost' in a garage is no better than 'time lost' trying to drive south in traffic to find the ramp you used to use by Candlestick. Meanwhile Santa Clara filters north or south to double laned roads that have multiple on ramps to a pair of major highways no further than 2 miles from the stadium.

I've done my share of posting on this subject as well. Hunter's Point is not going to happen. We can ramble on about it until we get carpal tunnel, but it's a no go. The fact that it's a Superfund site is only part of it. Some of that land is reclaimed, just like the land around Candlestick. Building a huge stadium on that ground would require a 9 figure sum just for the extra foundation work. Otherwise, a 7.0 quake could render the stadium useless. It's cost prohibitive to build near Candlestick, and Hunter's Point.

A strong quake anywhere is a problem to building a stadium in the region. The team would need to move to eastern Las Vegas to avoid that problem.


Even though it means an extra hour of driving for me, I'm all for this stadium being built in the south bay. It's advantages over Hunter's Point are numerous. The large number of access roads will be a great help. Hunter's Point would be a cluster**ck. All this talk about parking issues is for naught. We can be assured that there will be ample parking for those who wish to drive. The mass transit options are numerous as well, and easily accessible to both east bay and peninsula traffic. Being right at the south end of the bay one of the best things about it because the 680/880 and 101/280 traffic never even have to look at each other. That will certainly make a difference with respect to the game traffic.

I agree. I care not for Lennar's "diffusion time". People who are more worried about the time to get out of a lot are ignoring the increase in time it takes to get home, period! Personally, I'd wait 10 more minutes in a garage if I could exit and by half a mile from a major highway. On the other hand with Hunter's Point, with 'ample on-site parking', how many people will exit into the water? They've all got to drive west and then it's all of those cars driving towards the nearest exit. Santa Clara gives multiple choices for exits, has wider roads north or south, and has a much better set of public transportation options.

Like it or not, the studies show Santa Clara can expect 17k-19k fans to arrive by foot, non-parking light rail, taxi services of some sort, or public buses. That leaves a little less than 50k fans to find parking spots. Thankfully, fans don't usually show up in single cars by themselves. If 8k fans are families of four, that's only 2k spaces for 8k fans. Most fans also show up in large packs or with spouses. The point is that team can easily acquire nearly 30k spaces, you only need to average 1.5 fans per car which is a terrible ratio and you'd still have space. I think if 30k+ fans show up in a car by themselves we can get a poll started and then call Eleanor Rigby and tell her where they all came from. Otherwise decades of stadium building shows that ManCans' "disaster by everyone showing up 1 person per car" has been averted without the need for a parking spot for every stadium seat.

People will be happy. And if some of my fellow STH's choose to pitch a fit and not renew their tickets, then better seats for me. I'll be in line for a SBL. I'll pay whatever it takes, even if I have to bust out the credit card.

I don't see this Santa Clara plan falling through.[/QUOTE]

[Niner Jan]

I'm still watching this like a Shakespeare comedy! Fun to watch the contenders jousting about. I've done with my lines, so I'm just watching
the finale before the curtain falls.

Good stuff! Movie stars get Oscars; I forget what stage players get.
I'm sure someone will know. My midnight mind can't remember. :zzz:

[Peter Proud]

I'm still watching this like a Shakespeare comedy! Fun to watch the contenders jousting about. I've done with my lines, so I'm just watching
the finale before the curtain falls.

Good stuff! Movie stars get Oscars; I forget what stage players get.
I'm sure someone will know. My midnight mind can't remember. :zzz:

They get Tony Awards

[smoking_rubber]

You've heard my opinion at great length.

I've softened those opinions some after visiting the site and taking closer looks at the neighborhood. Quite a few parking spaces are located around the neighboring corporations and many of them are beneath large trees so they're not completely visible by satalite. The streets are wide and the access is reasonable. FACT: there are plenty of available parking spaces in the area. The size of that "area" is what concerns me.

I still think they could have found a better location if their true intention was to improve the fan experience. The site will be crammed with parking garages to accommodate Great America, the stadium and the convention center. The possibility exists for a "perfect storm" when more than 100,000 cars will inundate the area. That won't happen often, but it adds information to my personal STH renewal debate.

I love to tailgate. I don't love it enough to walk a half-mile (each way) every week though. That added inconvenience will deter many fans from tailgating and over time, the tradition will fade. That's sad. FACT: They are CLEARLY choosing a site that discourages tailgating compared to Monster Park. The Wiz is right, not everyone wants to tailgate. The problem is: The people that DO want to tailgate are being treated like second-class fans and they're being shoved down the street. That suxs IMO.

All so that we can build on a site directly under the path of approaching jumbo jets? Aerial restrictions over the site COULD cause difficulties for network coverage. How much difficulty? Unless you're a pilot or air-traffic controller, you don't know either. As far as I know, no one has officially studied the aerial situation. . . including ME.

[ethanh]

I have question about traffic. Where is the major problem at Monster park, on the freeway, getting to the freeway, or getting out of the lot? Or does the whole thing back up?
I am home 25 minutes from seat to home with no traffic but that is cause I live in SOMA and have a great route home from where I park.

I assume that most traffic is getting to the freeways, constant cars pulling out of random lots and slowing the flow. If that is the case it does not matter how many freeways there are but how each lot empties onto them. If Santa Clara or Hunters Point had lots with many different surface roads leading out of the area and onto multiple on-ramps, it should not matter how many freeways there are? I see both HP and SC having lots of exit options. If the design is to dump everyone onto Evans(HP) ave or Great America Parkway(SC) there will be backups no matter how many freeways.

[smoking_rubber]

Good point ethanh. Great America Parkway will undoubtedly be snarled. Much like it is now at 5pm every weekday. Tasman Ave is almost useless, there is a stop light every 100 ft. It can take 20 minutes to get to 880 (3 miles) along Tasman right now. Imagine what that will be like after the game. It will require a massive traffic coordination effort (which is what they will most likely be required to accomplish) by the San Jose & Santa Clara police department.

[ManCans]

I have question about traffic. Where is the major problem at Monster park, on the freeway, getting to the freeway, or getting out of the lot? Or does the whole thing back up?
I am home 25 minutes from seat to home with no traffic but that is cause I live in SOMA and have a great route home from where I park.

I assume that most traffic is getting to the freeways, constant cars pulling out of random lots and slowing the flow. If that is the case it does not matter how many freeways there are but how each lot empties onto them. If Santa Clara or Hunters Point had lots with many different surface roads leading out of the area and onto multiple on-ramps, it should not matter how many freeways there are? I see both HP and SC having lots of exit options. If the design is to dump everyone onto Evans(HP) ave or Great America Parkway(SC) there will be backups no matter how many freeways.As I've observed, the problem exiting the stadium to the south is the one-lane freeway onramp that creates a terrible bottleneck. If the Monster Park freeway onramps were increased to two or three lanes, most of the bottleneck would be alleviated. The problem exiting north is two-fold. Many motorists make a beeline to the nearest freeway onramp and cause a traffic jam all the way to the Bay Bridge. There are several bottlenecks, including the I80/101 split, and the new Bay Bridge construction. Not enough motorists use 280 or 3rd avenue all the way to the 2nd avenue I80 onramp (which is how I get to the Bay Bridge pretty quickly).

[Peter Proud]

Rather than quote each poster and answer individually, I'll post what I know as how it currently effects me at Monster Park and how I see things for the Santa Clara site.

smoking_rubber: Currently I tailgate at Monster Park. From the furthest fence line to the stadium is probably a distance or 1/4 mile. At the pre-season game with the RAIDERS it took an hour to get out of the main parking lot and unto U.S. 101 SB.

In the past I have parked in the dirt triangle bounded by U.S. 101, the road that passes under U.S. 101 and leads to and from the park, and the NB exit to the park from U.S. 101. This lot is somewhere between 1/2 to 3/4 mile from the stadium. It might take 10-15 minutes to walk to or from the stadium, but after a game once you reach your car you are on U.S. 101 S/B in 10-15.

ethanh: I have no problem getting into Monster Park because I arrive 3-4 hours before kick-off. Anyone arriving within 1 hr. of kick-off will have problems because vehicles are backing up because of the late arrivals trying to get into the main lot without a parking pass, and the dirt lots are fairly full because of fans that don't want to park in the main lot because it takes 20-30 minutes sometime to just get out of the main lot.

Leaving the game via the south side exits from the main lot, vehicles are constantly try to squeeze thru from the right lanes to get to the left lanes so they can access the U.S. 101 NB exit ramp to get to NB 101. You also have people trying to get from the dirt lots on opposite side of the road from the main parking lot to move from the left lanes to the right lane so they can pass under 101 to get to SB 1O1.



smoking_rubber: On Great American Express way the lights can be set to flashing yellow with Police directing traffic to assist pedestrians and vehicles coming from the corporate lots.

The key to making things work no matter where the stadium is built is to educate the drivers avoid the mistakes of Monster Park.

[TheWiz]

You've heard my opinion at great length.

...

I still think they could have found a better location if their true intention was to improve the fan experience. The site will be crammed with parking garages to accommodate Great America, the stadium and the convention center. The possibility exists for a "perfect storm" when more than 100,000 cars will inundate the area. That won't happen often, but it adds information to my personal STH renewal debate.

First of all I've got to disagree strongly. Why would the ownership intentionally ignore sites that would be a better deal for fans on which the team could feasibly finance a stadium? Basic business to me dictates that even if it costs more, if it was a better product, more fans would buy into it. But choosing a cheaper and less useful site produces the opposite. So, to think they're going to go for economics but passed on better available sites is a little far fetched.

I don't see how the site will be 'crammed'. Only one garage will be on-site and it's right next to the stadium, has multiple exits. The current convention garage and the new on to be built are off-site and about 100-200 yards north of the stadium on the convention site.


I love to tailgate. I don't love it enough to walk a half-mile (each way) every week though. That added inconvenience will deter many fans from tailgating and over time, the tradition will fade. That's sad. FACT: They are CLEARLY choosing a site that discourages tailgating compared to Monster Park. The Wiz is right, not everyone wants to tailgate. The problem is: The people that DO want to tailgate are being treated like second-class fans and they're being shoved down the street. That suxs IMO.

I don't see how that is true. The Lennar proposal at Candlestick actually called for fewer surface spaces around the stadium. If you did tailgate it would be over a quarter mile away with that garage.

Here is the other problem, people are comparing against Monster Park. Monster Park is gone in a few years, live with it. Even the city can't make a bad case for renovating or building on that site. Comparing Santa Clara to monster park is like listening to your grandfather talk about 2 mile walks in hurricane's to get to school. You're not getting Monster Park back. Besides, last time I checked it was a poorly built renovated baseball stadium over 50 years old and yet people would rather have another dump for a stadium as long as they can tailgate? I'd rather tailgate at home with friends and then go to a top level stadium than sit in a dump just to eat hotdogs in the parking lot.


All so that we can build on a site directly under the path of approaching jumbo jets? Aerial restrictions over the site COULD cause difficulties for network coverage. How much difficulty? Unless you're a pilot or air-traffic controller, you don't know either. As far as I know, no one has officially studied the aerial situation. . . including ME.

Yeah, the team chose the site. They didn't build it. As I've also said before, jets likely won't be flying over the stadium during games. After 9/11, the Giants had ten times the traffic going towards NYC airports divert. They're called no-fly zones and for the length of a stadium, for security reasons, planes will need to not fly over the stadium. Airports a LOT larger than San Jose have done it before, I'm sure they will adjust. Also, given the huge investment lately in that airport, a few hundred thousand to build a few east-west runways for this purpose would be a drop in the bucket.

I have question about traffic. Where is the major problem at Monster park, on the freeway, getting to the freeway, or getting out of the lot? Or does the whole thing back up?
I am home 25 minutes from seat to home with no traffic but that is cause I live in SOMA and have a great route home from where I park.

I assume that most traffic is getting to the freeways, constant cars pulling out of random lots and slowing the flow. If that is the case it does not matter how many freeways there are but how each lot empties onto them. If Santa Clara or Hunters Point had lots with many different surface roads leading out of the area and onto multiple on-ramps, it should not matter how many freeways there are? I see both HP and SC having lots of exit options. If the design is to dump everyone onto Evans(HP) ave or Great America Parkway(SC) there will be backups no matter how many freeways.

All of the stadium traffic empties onto one of three roads. Those how go north along tasman will find an on-ramp within a half mile to the west I believe, and no more than 1.25 miles to the east. Meanwhile, if fans go south there are on-ramps to a parallel highway in similar fashion. There isn't just 1 large highway, but 2 and there are many on-ramps east or west for each within a small distance from the stadium lots. Currently Monster Park patrons must head W and NW off the peninsula and then N or S to one of 2 on-ramps. In Santa Clara, you have 3 directions to exit off onto for fans and twice the ramps and highways.

Good point ethanh. Great America Parkway will undoubtedly be snarled. Much like it is now at 5pm every weekday. Tasman Ave is almost useless, there is a stop light every 100 ft. It can take 20 minutes to get to 880 (3 miles) along Tasman right now. Imagine what that will be like after the game. It will require a massive traffic coordination effort (which is what they will most likely be required to accomplish) by the San Jose & Santa Clara police department.

First of all, fans won't even need 3 miles to reach any on-ramp. I believe 4 ramps onto 2 major roadways are within 3 miles. Secondly, it's not so hard and terrible to turn lights yellow and emply a dozen policemen to usher traffic across Tasmann for home games. You really DONT ever find better options than Santa Clara for traffic. Multiple exits, any direction works, and the proximity to highways is great.

[Coldrain85]

Th Wiz makes a good case on this one. The Santa Clara traffic options are as good as it gets w/o building a stadium first, and building a city around it.

Candlestick Point is completely out of the question. It is not going to happen. Even bringing it up at this point is a waste of time.

Hunter's Point is completely out of the question. It is not going to happen. The city of SF is not going to do their part to make it happen. They have already made that clear. If they were willing to foot at least some of the bill for infrastructure improvements like access roads and a BART extension, as well as cleaning up the Super Fund site, the proposal would still be alive right now. The city is not willing to do any of this, and therefore it's cost prohibitive for the team to build a stadium in Hunter's Point. Period. It's a dead issue.

There is currently 1 proposal that has any life at all, and that's Santa Clara. There is no way that SC is going to turn down this cash cow. I have no reason to believe that the feasibility studies will produce enough negative results to kill the plan. Same goes for the environmental studies.

I feel for those of you who live in SOMA, SF, and other places that are close to Hunter's Point. You're all going to have to get on the train, or drive for 1 hour. I live between Sacramento and Truckee, and I make the trip every time there's a home game. It means even more driving for me, but I'm not complaining. This new stadium is going to be glorious, and it will be in a great location in SC. As soon as y'all actually see it being built this bickering about a phantom stadium in Hunter's Point will be quickly forgotten.

If current STH's can't deal with the stadium moving 1 hour south, there's always the Raiders in that urine soaked dump in Oakland. They will still be close by, and I will end up with even better ST's. I attended my first game in 1987 and I groveled my uncle every year for one of his ST's until this year when I finally got my own. I figured I had better do it now. My uncle is getting old, and he has already decided that he's not going to renew when the team moves. I want to make sure I have access to a SBL, and the good seats that will come with it. The south bay is full of millionaires who will snap up any SBL's that don't get claimed by existing STH's. I want to make sure I'm in line way ahead of those folks.

[ethanh]

Candlestick Point is completely out of the question. It is not going to happen. Even bringing it up at this point is a waste of time.

Hunter's Point is completely out of the question. It is not going to happen. The city of SF is not going to do their part to make it happen. They have already made that clear. If they were willing to foot at least some of the bill for infrastructure improvements like access roads and a BART extension, as well as cleaning up the Super Fund site, the proposal would still be alive right now. The city is not willing to do any of this, and therefore it's cost prohibitive for the team to build a stadium in Hunter's Point. Period. It's a dead issue.

:link: Or are you just talking to be heard?
Telling 49ers fans that live in SF to root for the Raiders is moronic. Maybe the Raiders will change their name to 49ers and move to HP.

[smoking_rubber]

First of all I've got to disagree strongly. Why would the ownership intentionally ignore sites that would be a better deal for fans on which the team could feasibly finance a stadium? Basic business to me dictates that even if it costs more, if it was a better product, more fans would buy into it. But choosing a cheaper and less useful site produces the opposite. So, to think they're going to go for economics but passed on better available sites is a little far fetched.


Yes, I too am wondering WHY they would have chosen this site . . . no wait, I know . . . IT'S RIGHT NEXT DOOR AND THEY HAVE WANTED TO PUT A STADIUM THERE FOR YEARS!!!!!!!!!!!! It's not economics or comprehensive reviews that dictated that location . . . it's just stubbornness.

I don't see how the site will be 'crammed'. Only one garage will be on-site and it's right next to the stadium, has multiple exits. The current convention garage and the new on to be built are off-site and about 100-200 yards north of the stadium on the convention site.

You're forgetting that Great America is requiring a total of 8,000 parking spaces? They haven't announced their plan to resolve that issue, but it's a safe bet that they'll be building a second garage on the site. So . . . within a footprint roughly the same size as Monster Park's you'll have 4 parking garages, a convention center, a NFL Stadium, two luxurious hotels, and . . . it all butts up against a world-class theme park. That's a fairly accurate description of "Crammed" IMO.

I don't see how that is true. The Lennar proposal at Candlestick actually called for fewer surface spaces around the stadium. If you did tailgate it would be over a quarter mile away with that garage.

Here is the other problem, people are comparing against Monster Park. Monster Park is gone in a few years, live with it. Even the city can't make a bad case for renovating or building on that site. Comparing Santa Clara to monster park is like listening to your grandfather talk about 2 mile walks in hurricane's to get to school. You're not getting Monster Park back. Besides, last time I checked it was a poorly built renovated baseball stadium over 50 years old and yet people would rather have another dump for a stadium as long as they can tailgate? I'd rather tailgate at home with friends and then go to a top level stadium than sit in a dump just to eat hotdogs in the parking lot.

Why would anyone want to compare ANYTHING to some pie-in-the-sky plan that never got off the drawing board? Do you really want to compare Santa Clara to EVERY fictitious plan ever conceived? You can ONLY compare it to Monster Park. That's the facility we have today and any future stadium is going to be compared to it. Who cares what Lennar didn't get accomplished? I can easily live with the fact that Monster is going away, but it should be replaced with something better, not just something closer to team HQ.

Yeah, the team chose the site. They didn't build it. As I've also said before, jets likely won't be flying over the stadium during games. After 9/11, the Giants had ten times the traffic going towards NYC airports divert. They're called no-fly zones and for the length of a stadium, for security reasons, planes will need to not fly over the stadium. Airports a LOT larger than San Jose have done it before, I'm sure they will adjust. Also, given the huge investment lately in that airport, a few hundred thousand to build a few east-west runways for this purpose would be a drop in the bucket.

Now you're just making things up Wiz. The stadium is too close to the runway to divert all air traffic away from it. Add a "few EAST-WEST" runways? Are you serious? Do you need me to show you another satellite shot? Do you know the cost of land in that area? Please stick to the facts. Will they really try to divert international flights and reroute air-traffic . . . or will they simply say "NO BLIMP." I'm not an air-traffic controller and neither are you. The size of that problem remains to be seen but don't be too quick to dismiss it's relevance without knowing all the facts. I don't know enough to declare an emergency, but you don't know enough to declare that everything is rosy either.



All of the stadium traffic empties onto one of three roads. Those how go north along tasman will find an on-ramp within a half mile to the west I believe, and no more than 1.25 miles to the east. Meanwhile, if fans go south there are on-ramps to a parallel highway in similar fashion. There isn't just 1 large highway, but 2 and there are many on-ramps east or west for each within a small distance from the stadium lots. Currently Monster Park patrons must head W and NW off the peninsula and then N or S to one of 2 on-ramps. In Santa Clara, you have 3 directions to exit off onto for fans and twice the ramps and highways.

First of all, fans won't even need 3 miles to reach any on-ramp. I believe 4 ramps onto 2 major roadways are within 3 miles. Secondly, it's not so hard and terrible to turn lights yellow and emply a dozen policemen to usher traffic across Tasmann for home games. You really DONT ever find better options than Santa Clara for traffic. Multiple exits, any direction works, and the proximity to highways is great.


Yes, you're probably right. The roads are wide and the lights are . . . lights. Maybe it will only require a semi-massive traffic coordination effort. Okay, I can live with that.

[ManCans]

You're right that they're the best plans. That's why they're also unlikely. Actually, the best plans involve the city actually putting up 100M+ to finally support a team that has brought ten times that in name recognition and tourism over the past 50 years. But best plans are named that for a reason, they're ideal but not likely.:thinking:......:unsure:
Parking to me involves finding a place to park my vehicle. I don't see how the location of my car will affect the quality of the team of the field, taste of my food, coldness of my beer, or loudness and excitement of the crowd. The day I pull out a tape measure and base any part of the game experience upon the results I beg for someone to end my life. The majority of fans who come to games won't be tailgaters. Most of them will be fans who show up within an hour of kickoff and park in further lots and walks the entire 10 minutes to their seats or not drive cars at all.I think you'd feel differently if you couldn't find a parking space because convention-goers, amusement park-goers and tailgaters took them all up LONG before you got to the stadium. BTW, the team's parking plan calls for NO stadium parking on public streets on gameday. So if you're unable to park in one of the designated lots, you're SOL.

Meanwhile, the Hunter's Point plan calls for 19,500 dedicated parking spaces (more than the team's estimated parking requirements) around the stadium. Not to mention greater potential for overflow parking.
So you want the team to base its decision of a stadium location entirely upon the combined familiarity of season ticket holders to the proposed location? I don't see how your parking troubles relate? After all, it seems more to me like you have been to events with no parking control more than anything.Yeah, I have. And the circumstances were very similar to what the team is proposing in their parking plan.
You're such a pessmist aren't you? If someone throws a house party and ask you to park on the street do you show up with a tape measure and a guest list and worry if there is sufficient space before you need to park on the next city block?Actually, I'm quite the optimist, but also a realist. Just because I don't agree with you doesn't mean I'm a pessimst. And if the house party had 68,000 people showing up, I'd DEFINITELY be concerned about parking.
Who runs the stadium? The city stadium authority would. Who would run the convention center? The city. Seems to me like having the garages open on all of the possible dates is not a problem. Also, how do you deal with Great America? How many people ride rollercoasters when it's so cold outside you wear extra layers and 5 hours in a park seems more like windchill than a summer day? It is a summer industry you know and even preseason games don't get packed. I'm sure all whopping 3 or 4 home games a year when the park draws peak business that there will not be a problem.I'm not sure what Great America's volume is in September and October, but it's apparently enough to keep the park open on weekends during that time. I'm also sure the city would do it's best to avoid conflicts between convention center events and stadium events. But since the NFL doesn't release schedules until April, what's the convention center going to do? Not book any events until after the NFL releases schedules? Sorry, not going to happen.
You ever notice how you write 'could' so much? As in you're talking in hypotheticals. Heck a stadium in Santa Clara could crumble in an earthquake, we shouldn't build there! You know, parking at Hunter's Point could be very bad and force tens of thousands of cars to filter through tiny city streets trying to find the nearest highway. Fans could be so turned off by a field on a Super Fund site that even great parking will deter them. See, anyone can play that game. The point is you're focusing on extremes and negatives at the same time and speaking little of likelihood.I choose not to speak in absolutes, because I concede that I could be wrong. As of right now, it's all hypothetical. However, speaking of likelihood, I've been to several events at HP Pavilion, which is very similar to the 49ers proposed parking and traffic plan (with the exception that football requires much more parking, and generates far more traffic than any event at HPP). Despite access to three nearby highways/freeways, and wide roadways with traffic control, it often takes me at least an hour to get from parking lot to freeway. Now imagine that with double the amount of traffic trying to get to the same locations.

I've also mentioned that I've been to events with similar less-than-stellar parking controls (Greek Theater, PGA Tour events...), and ended up missing a significant portion because of parking issues. How am I not speaking of likelihood?
Head start? I highly call "removing environmental toxins" a head start. Removing potential healtht hazards seems more like a requirement than it is a perk, don't you think? After all, if Santa Clara had public health problems on its Great America parking lot, don't you think they'd be cleaning it up too?Now you're just being argumentative. Golf courses, housing developments, community centers, shopping malls, etc., have all been built on top of landfills, which contain all sorts of toxins (including highly poisonous methane gas). It's a non-issue.
Explain this to me. Take a lot of say, 4k cars and give them about 4 or 5 outlets. After all, parking lots don't empty onto roads blindly. They have natural entry and exit locations. Cars still need to wait to get out of their parking spot to get into then flow of traffic that goes to one of these exits onto a road. How exactly does a 2K car garage with 3 or 4 exits suffer more traffic? They've still got to migrate from their spot to an exit. If anything, the ratio of cars to exits is even better. Especially if some of those exits go right onto streets. How does traffic flow across 3 equally sized lots differ from a 3-car garage of equal parking area?Alright. After an event, all the roadways will be jammed with traffic. Regardless of how well the traffic controls are designed, the traffic will not flow like normal, non-event traffic. Even with abundant parking lot exit points, there will still be bottlenecks because the volume of cars on the roadway will restrict the flow of cars from the parking lot. Now take that same parking lot and triple the amount of cars trying to exit out onto the traffic-heavy roadways. It's going to be a tremendous bottleneck regardless of the amount of exit points, because the roadway area where cars are exiting doesn't increase with the volume of cars. It's simple physics.
Also, I thought you refused to park in a garage? A garage offers a short walk and the convience of a nice and easy to find spot that is covered. If it takes them 2 more minutes to exit, isn't that their business? After all, if you've got a really short walk and an easy to find spot, who begrudges a slightly longer garage exit? At Hunter's Point, I see fans wandering roads just to find their way to a highway a LOT further away to the closest on ramps than Santa Clara appeals to. So, 'time lost' in a garage is no better than 'time lost' trying to drive south in traffic to find the ramp you used to use by Candlestick. Meanwhile Santa Clara filters north or south to double laned roads that have multiple on ramps to a pair of major highways no further than 2 miles from the stadium.I won't park in that garage because I believe the amount of carbon monoxide generated from the bottleneck of cars waiting excessively long in a semi-enclosed space will cause a health hazard.
I agree. I care not for Lennar's "diffusion time". People who are more worried about the time to get out of a lot are ignoring the increase in time it takes to get home, period! Personally, I'd wait 10 more minutes in a garage if I could exit and by half a mile from a major highway. On the other hand with Hunter's Point, with 'ample on-site parking', how many people will exit into the water? They've all got to drive west and then it's all of those cars driving towards the nearest exit. Santa Clara gives multiple choices for exits, has wider roads north or south, and has a much better set of public transportation options.Now who's being the pessimist? :wink: Lennar's traffic studies have shown that the exit time from Hunter's Point will be similar to, if not better than, Santa Clara. I agree, because I've seen a well designed stadium traffic plan with a single exit point work very well (Arco Arena), and I've seen a poorly designed stadium traffic plan with mutliple exit points work poorly (HP Pavilion). I'm not being overly pessimistic, because a stadium located in Santa Clara would probably be a more convenient drive for me. However, I want to be sure when I drive to the stadium that I will be able to find parking without hassle.