By J Hutcherson - WASHINGTON, DC (Nov 8, 2011) US Soccer Players -- With all the talk about the District of Columbia's unwillingness to commit to a soccer-specific stadium somewhere within its borders, it's worth looking at what's currently happening in London. After the 2012 Olympics come to a close, London will be left with another massive stadium that right now doesn't have a reasonable future.
That's the Olympic Stadium that West Ham United, Tottenham, and Leyton Orient have been arguing over. As it will stand once it hosts the closing ceremonies, the London Olympic Stadium will hold 80,000 people and would be appropriate for track and field and soccer. Yet extending its life as a multipurpose stadium remains a contentious issue.
Spurs wanted the site, knocking down and rebuilding to create an appropriate soccer-specific stadium. West Ham was willing to keep the existing structure while reducing capacity to around 60,000. Leyton Orient aren't interested in the stadium itself, but are a little concerned with a much bigger club moving right down the street and taking away their already tiny support. Then there's track and field - called athletics in Britain - who would prefer the original post-Olympic plan that would create a 25k athletics venue without sharing with soccer.
You might recall that West Ham's plan won, in part because it didn't tear down a brand new stadium and retained the running track. West Ham, now a Championship club, are no longer interested in owning the Olympic Stadium. After a legal challenge, their bid came to an end on October 11th. They're now more than happy to be a tenant in the Olympic Stadium that could see continued use for athletics and potentially rugby. In other words, it's back to the multiple-use model.
Whether or not there's much of a draw for yet another high capacity stadium in greater London is a very good question. They've already got Arsenal's Emirates Stadium, Spurs are expected to build a nice new stadium of their own and so are Chelsea. Then there's the rugby-only Twickenham and of course Wembley.
The Anglo phrase would be 'spoiled for choice' in terms of anyone needing to stage an event in a stadium that holds more than 40,000. That's not what any MLS team short of Seattle needs. Instead, for MLS the target is closer to 20,000. With that in mind, there are lots of cities with venues in place.
Unfortunately for Major League Soccer, they have a history of having stadium issues in the wrong city. Though Chicago was the first team to go vagabond in search of a home field, the problems started in Tampa. Playing in an ageing National Football League facility and replacing it with a new NFL stadium didn't solve the problem of vast sections of empty seating for a team that was never much of a draw. The mini-version of Yankee Stadium across the street was too small and designed for baseball (both stopping points at the time). The University of South Florida hadn't become a Division 1 football school while the Mutiny was in business, and ended up opting to play their home games in that NFL stadium. By any measure, Tampa Bay had no options.
Chicago put that into practice when Soldier Field was being rebuilt, spending two seasons at a tiny college stadium in the far-flung suburbs. This wouldn't be the first temporary measure for an MLS team. Dallas would spend the 2003 season in a Texas-sized high school football stadium. Kansas City would later go the independent minor league baseball route, and the revived Earthquakes would trade the larger Spartan Stadium for Buck Shaw and a little over 10,000 seats.
Now it's DC's turn, facing the immediate future without a plan in their home market but with what appears to be the option of moving to a soccer-specific stadium in Baltimore. Compared to that, their greater District options are sparse. We can safely assume they won't be moving into the massively oversized FedEx Field, even if its used for prestige friendlies. The Nationals Stadium also isn't realistic in the modern era of purpose-built sports venues. The University of Maryland's Byrd Stadium and Annapolis's Navy - Marine Corps Memorial Stadium would both work in theory, but in practice there's no alcohol sales in college venues and Annapolis is a good half hour away from the District line.
As someone who attended minor league soccer games at Navy Stadium, it's an appropriate venue that's too far away. Howard's Greene Stadium is in the city, but it's just over 7,000 bleacher seats with a running track. Georgetown's Multi-Sport Field is too small by any standard, and though George Mason Stadium has been used for pro lacrosse it only seats 5k. There's a minor league baseball stadium in the near suburb of Bowie - just down the road from the proposed soccer stadium DC considered building in Prince George's County - but you would have to wonder how desperate DC would be to even entertain the Kansas City option. Same thing for the Atlantic League baseball stadium in Waldorf, Maryland or the one they're about to open in Reston, Virginia.
That's the quick version of why DC has stayed put all these years. They tried to build in what was expected to be an open area just across the Anacostia from DC proper, but it's always been about soccer-specificity. There's no college in need of a 20k-capacity stadium. Washington's NFL team had just broken ground on what would come to be known as FedEx Field when DC United kicked off their first season. The NFL team wasn't building with a first-year soccer team in mind.
What DC is facing isn't new for Major League Soccer, even if the statements explicit and implied from the League office tend to sound like this is an unheard of situation. We have an established club in need of a better venue. It's the same arguments West Ham, Spurs, and Chelsea are making in London. What's at question in London is appropriateness. For the District of Columbia, it's willingness.
Comments, questions, solutions to problems that have yet to present themselves. Please, tell me all about it.
