Quote:
Originally Posted by The_Turf_Monster
Not with state and md sports authority money
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Money is fungible. They can put different money into it.
Look, the reality is the best case scenario for these investments is with respect to baseball and/or a combined basketball-hockey arena. In those cases you have something that will be used at least 80 times a year, plus a lot of other indoor events in the case of the arena. And yet even then, a lot of economists' research shows that the public funds aren't worth it.
That's why you see these things now packaged with mixed use, but you can do the mixed use without the sports arena and you get the same benefits. The mixed use stuff is just putting lipstick on the pig.
When you get past baseball and the combined arena, you get to things that aren't used a lot at all. A one-sport arena gets used 40 times a year plus some concerts. A football stadium 10 times a year. And compared to the public subsidies being thrown at them, it's ridiculous. You are basically paying someone to keep a large valuable parcel of land vacant most of the year.
Pimlico's the worst case scenario of all- it draws a big crowd 2 days a year-- the Preakness, and the day before the Preakness. That's it. And it takes up a very large parcel of incredibly valuable land. If it weren't for the ego value of the Preakness to Baltimore officials, they'd never do this at all. There's just no way the economics works out on any of this.
And in serving their egos, the officials are not serving their constituents. If I lived in Baltimore I'd be incredibly pissed off about all of this-- basically an incredible waste of tax revenue in a struggling city because some politicians will feel emasculated if Stronach moves the Preakness to Lone Star or Santa Anita.
