new college football stadium

[smazza]

only took 42 weeks to build

[smazza]

Introduction

On June 7, 2005, Stanford University's Board of Trustees gave preliminary approval for a major re-building of Stanford Stadium, the 85,500-seat facility that has been the home of Stanford Football since 1921.

The trustees approved a concept plan presented by the Department of Athletics that will modernize almost all facilities within the stadium, reduce the stadium’s capacity to 50,000 seats and bring spectators closer to the field. After approval by Santa Clara County, construction began immediately following the last home football game against Notre Dame on November 26. In December 2005, the Board of Trustees granted final approval for the project, which allowed for construction to continue through completion.

An early artist rendering.  

Building plans call for a number of changes including more comfortable seating; improved sightlines;

improved egress and ingress for circulation; renovated and increased number of restrooms, locker rooms and concession stands; a distributed sound system; additional matrix video board; a new Skybox; improved ADA accessibility; and seismic retrofitting.

The re-building of Stanford Stadium will cost approximately $90 million. The project is being funded by the Department of Athletics, Physical Education and Recreation (DAPER) Investment Fund and from friends of Stanford University who are passionate about the program and understand our vision for the stadium. As a result, the new stadium will be completed without incurring any long-term debt.

The new stadium will mark the beginning of a new era for Stanford Football. With support from fans, the University, and the Department of Athletics, the Cardinal football team is poised to regain its national prominence.

Master Plan

Initially sparked by a feud with UC Berkeley to see which school could complete a new football facility sooner, the construction of Stanford Stadium was accomplished in 1921 in just over four months at a cost of $200,000. For over eighty years this 85,500-seat facility has been as much a part of the Stanford tradition as the Cardinal itself. In addition to being the home of Stanford Football, the stadium has played host to events such as the Super Bowl, World Cup and Olympic Soccer. While Stanford Stadium has undergone numerous minor upgrades over the last eight decades, Stanford Athletics is now undertaking the single most important capital project in its history.

The new Stanford Stadium project is based on several objectives:

Address all public safety and ADA issues

Create a dynamic football experience for fans - "sell out stadium"

Reinforce Stanford's commitment to having a winning football team

- Provide enhanced conditions for student-athletes

- Utilitze the new facility as a recruiting tool

Improve spectator amenities

Establish annual revenue streams to support all Stanford varsity sports programs

The University has partnered with designer/architect Hoover and Associates for the stadium construction. Stanford has worked with Hoover on a number of previous projects including Roscoe Maples Pavilion (renovation), Arrillaga Family Sports Center, Arrillaga Center for Sports and Recreation, Boyd & Jill Smith Family Softball Stadium, and the Frances C. Arrillaga Alumni Center. Vance Brown Builders, Palo Alto, will oversee construction.

To avoid disruption of the operation of Stanford Stadium during the football season, all components of the construction will be undertaken in one phase. The goal is to complete renovation in time for the Stanford vs. Navy game September 16, 2006.

[smazza]

Construction Timeline

Starting November 2005, the following milestone events are projected to take place*:

November 19: The Big Game (Stanford vs Cal) - kickoff at 4:00pm. This will be the final Big Game competition between the Cardinal and Bears in the 84-year-old stadium before the New Stanford Stadium opens in Fall 2006.

November 23: Stanford Stadium closes to the public.

November 26: Stanford Football's 2005 season closer against Notre Dame - kickoff at 5:00pm. Stadium Tribute will take place during halftime. Stadium decommission will begin immediately following the Notre Dame game.

November 28: Excavation of existing Stanford Stadium. Construction is scheduled to take place six days a week (two, 8-hour shifts/day).

December 2005: Lower Bowl and new tunnel construction begins

January 2006: Reseating and new seating criteria announced. Public informational meetings begin

February 2006: Upper Bowl and Skybox construction begins

March 2006: Construction of Skybox steel framework

April 2006: Upper Bowl seat installation begins

July 2006: Field installation begins

September 2006: Final inspections

September 16, 2006: Grand Opening

* subject to change

[smazza]

Stanford Shrinking Football Stadium to Boost Ticket Sales

              E-MailPrint Save

By JONATHAN D. GLATER

Published: March 1, 2006

PALO ALTO, Calif.  The rationale behind Stanford University's $95 million project to shrink the campus football stadium is not intuitively obvious.

Skip to next paragraph

Enlarge This Image

Jim Wilson/The New York Times

Ray M. Purpur of Stanford discussing the renovation in January. Seating will fall to 50,000 from 85,000.

But athletic department officials think it will help the university make more money.

"It looks funny, but we hope to increase our income, twice at least," said Ray M. Purpur, senior associate athletic director at Stanford and a major fund-raiser for the project, which was begun almost immediately after Stanford played its last home football game in November. The project is to be completed for the fall season.

The idea, Mr. Purpur explained, is that shrinking the supply of seats  to 50,000 from about 85,000  will make people buy more season tickets. That way, they can be sure they can attend the games they want, like hugely popular rivalry games against the University of California.

Consultants who advise sports teams say there is method to the Stanford plan. Reducing capacity can increase sales, said Marc Ganis, president of Sportscorp Ltd., a Chicago sports consulting firm.

"When people feel like they wouldn't be able to get a ticket to any game they want to go to, they tend to get season tickets," he said, adding that it improves attendance over all.

But at Stanford, the idea of spending more than $100 million to reduce the size of the 85-year-old stadium for the team's five or six home games drew the ire of Henry E. Riggs, a 1957 Stanford graduate and a former vice president for development at the university. The alumni magazine printed a letter from him criticizing the economics of the project and in an opinion article he wrote for The Palo Alto Weekly, he asked, "Is there no end to the foolish extravagance lavished on big-time college football?"

Few graduates have joined Mr. Riggs in arguing against the project, which was originally budgeted for between $25 million and $85 million. One was Loren D. Smith, class of 1955, of Mountainside, N.J.

"My interest in it was why," Mr. Smith said. "It's not as though it's falling apart."

But other graduates said that the stadium was not comfortable, and that the field, separated from the stands by a running track, was too far away from spectators.

"It definitely needed to be remodeled," said Dr. Robert O. Dillman, class of 1969, the medical director of the Hoag Cancer Center in Newport Beach, Calif. "I was just surprised that in doing it they were going to downsize it that much."

The university has mounted Web cameras for Stanford football fans to monitor the renovation project (stanfordstadium.com). Construction work has proceeded for 16 hours a day, to make sure that the new stadium is ready in the fall.

The project has also stirred little controversy on campus, students and faculty members said, perhaps because not many seem to attend the home football games.

"I haven't heard any" discussion of the stadium, said Leah S. Sawyer, a junior on the school's track team. She said she had not heard the price tag attached to the renovation project, either. When told the amount, she said, "I can't imagine too many students would be excited" about spending that amount of money.

But several faculty members said graduates who donate to athletics would not have given money to rebuild any other part of the university, and so there was no downside to spending so much on the stadium.

"These people, their connection to the university is much more through athletics than through the academic" side, said Roger G. Noll, an economics professor at the university, referring to the graduates whose donations were financing the stadium project. He said he had heard few complaints from colleagues about the project, while he had heard concerns about the school's business endeavors, including real estate and intellectual property holdings.

At least one other school, Dartmouth College in Hanover, N.H., is weighing a similar plan to reduce stadium size. But for Dartmouth and Stanford, the example of Princeton, which reduced the size of its stadium to 27,800 from 45,000 in the 1990's, may offer a cautionary tale.

In the first seasons after the construction project in New Jersey, and after the price of a ticket was cut to $5, attendance soared, rising to more than 20,000 people a game from fewer than 10,000 a game in the old stadium, said Jerry Price, associate athletic director at the school.

By last season, attendance had fallen nearly to its old levels, he said.

"We had bad weather for a couple of games," he said.

A few Stanford graduates said low attendance at games  about 36,000 people attended each game last season, on average  will not be cured by a renovation. Last year the team won five games and lost six, and that is the problem, they say.

As Mr. Smith put it, "It's what's on the field that makes a difference."

[Big_Hairy_Bull]

Stanford Shrinking Football Stadium to Boost Ticket Sales

              E-MailPrint Save

By JONATHAN D. GLATER

Published: March 1, 2006

PALO ALTO, Calif.  The rationale behind Stanford University's $95 million project to shrink the campus football stadium is not intuitively obvious.

Skip to next paragraph

Enlarge This Image

Jim Wilson/The New York Times

Ray M. Purpur of Stanford discussing the renovation in January. Seating will fall to 50,000 from 85,000.

But athletic department officials think it will help the university make more money.

"It looks funny, but we hope to increase our income, twice at least," said Ray M. Purpur, senior associate athletic director at Stanford and a major fund-raiser for the project, which was begun almost immediately after Stanford played its last home football game in November. The project is to be completed for the fall season.

The idea, Mr. Purpur explained, is that shrinking the supply of seats  to 50,000 from about 85,000  will make people buy more season tickets. That way, they can be sure they can attend the games they want, like hugely popular rivalry games against the University of California.

Consultants who advise sports teams say there is method to the Stanford plan. Reducing capacity can increase sales, said Marc Ganis, president of Sportscorp Ltd., a Chicago sports consulting firm.

"When people feel like they wouldn't be able to get a ticket to any game they want to go to, they tend to get season tickets," he said, adding that it improves attendance over all.

But at Stanford, the idea of spending more than $100 million to reduce the size of the 85-year-old stadium for the team's five or six home games drew the ire of Henry E. Riggs, a 1957 Stanford graduate and a former vice president for development at the university. The alumni magazine printed a letter from him criticizing the economics of the project and in an opinion article he wrote for The Palo Alto Weekly, he asked, "Is there no end to the foolish extravagance lavished on big-time college football?"

Few graduates have joined Mr. Riggs in arguing against the project, which was originally budgeted for between $25 million and $85 million. One was Loren D. Smith, class of 1955, of Mountainside, N.J.

"My interest in it was why," Mr. Smith said. "It's not as though it's falling apart."

But other graduates said that the stadium was not comfortable, and that the field, separated from the stands by a running track, was too far away from spectators.

"It definitely needed to be remodeled," said Dr. Robert O. Dillman, class of 1969, the medical director of the Hoag Cancer Center in Newport Beach, Calif. "I was just surprised that in doing it they were going to downsize it that much."

The university has mounted Web cameras for Stanford football fans to monitor the renovation project (stanfordstadium.com). Construction work has proceeded for 16 hours a day, to make sure that the new stadium is ready in the fall.

The project has also stirred little controversy on campus, students and faculty members said, perhaps because not many seem to attend the home football games.

"I haven't heard any" discussion of the stadium, said Leah S. Sawyer, a junior on the school's track team. She said she had not heard the price tag attached to the renovation project, either. When told the amount, she said, "I can't imagine too many students would be excited" about spending that amount of money.

But several faculty members said graduates who donate to athletics would not have given money to rebuild any other part of the university, and so there was no downside to spending so much on the stadium.

"These people, their connection to the university is much more through athletics than through the academic" side, said Roger G. Noll, an economics professor at the university, referring to the graduates whose donations were financing the stadium project. He said he had heard few complaints from colleagues about the project, while he had heard concerns about the school's business endeavors, including real estate and intellectual property holdings.

At least one other school, Dartmouth College in Hanover, N.H., is weighing a similar plan to reduce stadium size. But for Dartmouth and Stanford, the example of Princeton, which reduced the size of its stadium to 27,800 from 45,000 in the 1990's, may offer a cautionary tale.

In the first seasons after the construction project in New Jersey, and after the price of a ticket was cut to $5, attendance soared, rising to more than 20,000 people a game from fewer than 10,000 a game in the old stadium, said Jerry Price, associate athletic director at the school.

By last season, attendance had fallen nearly to its old levels, he said.

"We had bad weather for a couple of games," he said.

A few Stanford graduates said low attendance at games  about 36,000 people attended each game last season, on average  will not be cured by a renovation. Last year the team won five games and lost six, and that is the problem, they say.

As Mr. Smith put it, "It's what's on the field that makes a difference."

Show us the results! Wasn't this completed already?

[Knight_Light]

Smazz likes to post old news.

Here's a look at Stanford's very cool new stadium.

http://www.stanfordstadium.com/

However, it certainly hasn't helped with Stanford's "on-the-field" performance this year (Stanford is 0-9!).

The record for another team that opened up a new stadium in 2006:

(1-7) Arizona Cardinals!

Bad year for Cardinal(s) to open up a new stadium.