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Report: NYCFC close to landing $400 million stadium in Bronx

New York City FC

By FRANCO PANIZO

New York City FC have their head coach, and soon they could have the location for their soccer-specific stadium.

On the same night that Jason Kreis was officially announced as NYCFC’s first head coach, a report from the New York Post surfaced Tuesday that said the club was close to finalizing a deal for a 28,000-seat stadium in the Bronx just south of Yankee Stadium. The stadium is expected to cost $400 million, will be located in what is now an empty lot between the Major Deegan and East 153rd Street and is expected to open in 2018 or 2019.

While NYCFC is close to inking a deal, it still has to work out some more details with GAL Manufacturing, an elevator parts company. The deal will also include the not-for-profit Bronx Parking Development Company.

It is also reported that the expansion side will spend the first few years of its existence playing at Yankee Stadium.

The club will not move forward with the deal for the Bronx stadium without mayor-elect Bill de Blasio’s blessing and he has reportedly not yet reviewed the deal. NYCFC is expected to make pilot payments through a 35-year deal and guarantee bondholders revenues from suite sales, naming rights and more.

Under the proposed plan, NYCFC will fund construction of the stadium with city-backed tax exempt bonds and another report claims that New York City will give the club a 99-year lease.

New York City FC, who just appointed Jason Kreis as their first head coach, will begin play in MLS in 2015.

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What do you think of this reported deal to put a stadium in the Bronx? Like the location? Happy to know NYCFC will begin its play at Yankee Stadium?

Share your thoughts below.

Comments

  1. There are many more soccer fans in Queens, with all the central American and European communities. Bronx is not the best choice for building a core of neighborhood fans, sorry…

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  2. i think it’s awesome the plan is for a 28,000 seater. i’m not from NYC, so i won’t pretend to talk about the logistics of getting there, but this seems like a good deal.

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  3. excuse me there, does anybody know what happen to Baltimore soccer stadium study, tampa bay future retractable stadium, Detroit soccer stadium, cosmos master plan that makes more sense since nycfc stadium is more clear, new England sommerville stadium, dc renderings by now, vancity water front stadium.

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  4. Pump the brakes, people. This thing is just starting.

    first check out field of schemes to see the legal problems that need to be overcome

    http://www.fieldofschemes.com/2013/12/11/6405/bloomberg-mulling-100m-plus-in-tax-breaks-dubious-tax-exempt-bond-plan-for-bronx-soccer-stadium/

    Then check out the comment section of the articles in the post and daily news. People aren’t happy about this on its merits alone. They haven’t even learned about Mansour yet

    We can still get this done, but we need to have reasonable expectations about how hard this is going to be.

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  5. Everyone should contain their excitement. BDB hasn’t reviewed it yet, and his policy is usually “Bloomberg liked it? In that case, no.”

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  6. I live in the Bronx, 15 minutes away by train from Yankee Stadium – I’ll still be renewing my season tickets to RBA. Metro till I die. At least traveling to watch my boys wipe the Stadium with NYCFC will be that much easier during away matches.

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  7. The fact that any ownership group is willing to put this amount of money into MLS would have been unheard of 5 or ten years ago. cudos to don garber and mls. the only thing i would say is it is interesting how the rules on treatment of gay players/fans have been bent. ( in the shiek’s home country i am sure do the right this ad would be banned from the air) and the rules on expansion teams and stadium in place has been bent. but that said the money the international exposure and the fantsastic ownership group and coach can be nothing but good for this team and mls

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  8. Nice. I grew up in Jersey and was a MetroStars fan, but as a Westchester resident, I’ll take the Bronx any day.

    The thing about the commute to the Bronx – there are lots and lots of people who understand how to get there already because they go to Yankee games! Anybody who has ever travelled to Yankee Stadium for a baseball game knows exactly how difficult the travel is for them. So I think the travel situation is very different than travelling to RBA.

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    • So . . . even if, for a given fan, travel to the Bronx is actually more difficult than travel to RBA, it’s better because it’s more familiar?

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      • How difficult as in the spectrum not difficult as in a judgement. It’s a positive, not a negative. You need to read it again. People already understand the difficulty or ease of getting there.

  9. The Bronx? Looks like I’ve got my east coast team. And did anyone see that gif jimmy Conrad tweeted about petke and Kreis getting in that tiny scuffle? A good way to start up that New York rivalry I suppose

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  10. I’ll take this as good news, although the fact that De Blasio hasn’t even seen it yet tells me there is A LONG way to go. I’d certainly expect him to ask plenty of questions about any deal that involves a foreign oil gazillionaire.

    The sad thing to me is that Queens is the obvious location for this team. My long-term hope is that we end up with 3 teams in the NY/NJ area:

    – Red Bulls take Jersey and parts of downtown Manhattan.
    – NYCFC takes the rest of Manhattan, the Bronx, and Westchester/CT suburbanites
    – Cosmos take everything east of the East River 🙂

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      • Kinda sounds like Sharks vs. Jets. But ok. The hipsters in Brooklyn would love to get the Cosmos. The retro vibe, the hideous kit… all goes perfectly with a shaggy beard and old-man eyewear.

    • As a CT resident, I’ll still take the Red Bulls and the extra traveling. Supporting Citeh and the sheik is like supporting Jabba or any of the other Hutts

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      • I’m torn. They would be so close to me, a 15 minute subway ride vs close to two hours for RBA. I got very into NYRB this season and have to do my research on the Sheik before I give him my dollars.

  11. Works for me. Of course, I live 2700 miles away, but I grew up in the Bronx. Being by Yankee Stadium means they will capture Westchester and southern Connecticut, some north Jersey as well as people in Manhattan. My Nephew is already complaining about taking the subway from Brooklyn to get there, but he will… and he almost never goes out to RBA. I think this is the right place – and who knows? Maybe there will be third team some day in Brooklyn/Queens. The time will come when NYC can support three teams… not tomorrow, but eventually.

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  12. Oh, no — don’t they realize it will take well over an hour to get to this place by public transportation from many parts of Brooklyn and Long Island? And that the traffic can be so bad in the Bronx, especially if the Yankees are also in town? Even on public transportation, most people will have to switch trains at least once. Are people willing to travel so long in both directions?

    Or do these arguments only apply to Red Bull Arena?

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    • Long Island has its own club already. And public transportation hesitance only applies to Red Bull Arena because it requires taking the PATH, which is a strange and foreign concept to many New Yorkers. 153rd St would feature the 4 as well as the Metro North stopping literally right outside its door.

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      • The PATH excuse is so weak. PATH is exactly like a subway. It even uses the MetroCard. I grew up in Brooklyn, but sometimes the tendency to treat anything outside the five boroughs as the equivalent of the moon is so annoying.

      • 5, 10 , 15 mins, NY’er’s don’t want to go to RBA, Can’t youse get that in your thick F’ing skulls. No one going to the BX neither.

        BTW, this is far from a done deal. No way this gets done as it is currently reported. 35 yrs of $0 rent. & NYS bond issue. See NYDAILYNEWS.com
        People are already chirping, about this deal.

    • when the new Grand Central tunnel is finished it will be incredibly easy for Long Island folk to get the the Bronx. besides Brooklyn and LI people are already well familiar with the trip to Yankee Stadium and have no qualms about it.

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    • I people really complaining about an hour commute on public transportation? Holy crap the nearest team to me is 6 hours away in crappy RFK stadium. If only I could hop on the subway and go to a game an hour away.

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      • Yes, yes, yes. We are all familiar with the whole,”I live in the middle of nowhere,” jingle. The point is thar people in NYC DON’T live in the middle of nowhere. They live in the middle of the biggest metropolis in the country where there is feverish competition for the entertainment dollar. If its difficult to access, NYers have twenty other things they can do that are closer to home.

      • It seems to me that if you live in NYC and have 20 other things you can do then you’re going to soccer games because you want to, not because it’s just something to spend your entertainment dollar on so I’m not sure your argument really holds water. And if that’s the case then NYers really aren’t any different from soccer fans “in the middle of nowhere.” The only difference is one group seems to complain a lot about their commute which is often significantly shorter than the others’. Sorry but you might be tired of reading about people having to drive 6 hours to go to a game but some of us are equally tired of the NY complaints.

      • YOU’RE complaining. I’m just communicating the reality of the situation. It’s tough to argue with you if you really think that drawing fans from the middle of nowhere is the same as drawing fans from the largest metropolis in the nation. If you’re going to deny that demographic tendencies exist then you’re too far gone to reach.

    • It’s not that convenient for Staten Island, Queens, Brooklyn and LI but much more convenient for Westchester, Mid and upper Manhattan, Rockland, Southern Connecticut and even parts of North Jersey. No stadium can possibly be convenient to the whole Greater NYC area.

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    • Google maps:
      Atlantic Ave and Pacific BK to Yankee stadium: 39 minutes no transfers
      Atlantic Ave and Pacific BK to Red bull arena: 55 minutes 1 transfer (subway to path)

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      • Man, that doesn’t bode well for RBA. It’s really only more convenient if you’re downtown, Staten Island or Jersey.

  13. A cute farm team that will never be allowed to surpass the varsity team in Manchester.
    Built on the bloodiest blood money this league has ever seen.

    The league has screwed the NY market twice with these nonsense “franchises” yet they can’t figure out why they underperform.

    Dopes

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    • I fail to see how they will be a farm club, can you explain it, you seem to know a lot.

      Ok, actually you don’t seem to know anything, but I wanted to laugh at a response from a troll.

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      • They are Chivas USA with an appalling human rights record.

        Has Human Rights Watch ever issued a brutal report about Vergara?

        The Sheik will be an issue, especially with DiBlasio’s political base.

      • You don’t have to be a DiBlasio supporter (I don’t mind him but he wouldn’t have been my first choice) to be appalled by the Sheikh.

    • RBNY won the Shield after figuring out you need someone who knows MLS at the helm. NYCFC has done the same with Kreis. The underperforming argument is not really valid anymore.

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    • Cosmos bluffed…… tried to play hard-ball with a weak hand and lost. The sentimentalist in me wishes they had been smarter, or sold the rights to the name/logo to a better ownership group….. but they didn’t. In spite of all the skepticism, so far NYCFC has made some pretty solid decisions.

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      • A super team? That’s pretty hilarious. Yes, the team they run out there every week in front of 5,000 fans in a college stadium in Hempstead is sure super.

      • True. But in 8 – 10 years they will be out spending any MLS team and have super star players. Seems like a ridiculous thing to say now but its inevitable. MLS has not really changed much over the last 10 – 12 years in game attendance and tv interest – with the exception of Seattle. The new NASL has a much better structure for growth. Yes there is a risk but doesn’t opportunity always come with risk? I’ve been supporting MLS since 1996 and thought by now we would see most teams stocked with the likes of Ronaldo, Messi, ……or close to it. The owners have the money to support superstars but their hands are tied by the leagues “socialistic” philosophy.

      • Might want to do a little research on the definition of socialism before you parrot what seems to be an all too common misplaced accusation these days. I’m pretty sure you won’t find a whole lot about franchised corporations when you do. I’d bet McDonalds never thought they’d ever hear their business model being touted as an example of socialist ideals.

        Do you really want to do a comparison of NASL growth vs MLS over the last 10-12 years?? Be curious to see your investment portfolio if you see NASL as having a superior structure for growth. For starters, I’d point out that it is entirely possible for “structure” such as a salary cap or free agency rights to be be changed overnight while things like changing ownership groups with no cash flow and upgrading practically zero infrastructure/facilities etc on a 1st league level………………. not so much.

        Believe it or not…. I’d like Cosmos to succeed, I just think they’ve made it much more difficult than it had to be and some of these super team proclamations are pie in the sky unless something very dramatic changes in the US Soccer landscape. Cheers.

  14. Still hoping the greenpoint, brooklyn mention from a couple years ago magically pops back into the picture, but that’s not happening.

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      • You don’t have to switch trains from midtown (RBA), and there are a lot more areas to get on either of the trains headed there. And who lives in midtown? Not many people are heading back there after a game . . . they might head to Grand Central or Penn Station, which are a lot easier from the Bronx.

        The Path and the 4/5 or B are a lot different, this is easier for the masses. more institutional memory in going to the bronx, rather than taking the path to Red Bull, and waiting 10-15 mins to even get off the platform through the one gate!

      • This. You can take almost any train in Brooklyn to the Atlantic Terminal, hop on the 4/5 and you are there. Unlike:

        Taking a train to WTC
        Walking from the subway to the PATH and down the PATH station
        Waiting for PATH train
        PATH train to Harrison
        Off the Platform through the huddled masses
        15 minute walk to the stadium, around those big empty lots

        And I’m not including the “THIS TRAIN IS OUT OF SERVICE” at Journal Square on the way home.

      • From Brooklyn:

        Taking a train to Atlantic

        Transferring to 4/5 platform

        Waiting for 4 train (5 doesn’t go to Yankee stadium)

        4 train

        Off the Platform through the huddled masses

        15 minute walk to the stadium through a terrible neighborhood

        The only thing that I’ll give you is the current situation after the game returning to NYC is horrendous.

        The point I’m really trying to make is that the support in the area for MLS isn’t great and certainly not enough for two teams. The fact we’re debtaing train times etc shows this. You think people in the PNW or KC or other towns with rabid support for MLS are sitting there figuring out how many minutes it takes to get to the stadium? I doubt it.

      • Since you asked: Get in my car (public transport is a non-option in KC), drive 5 minutes to get to I-70. Drive on I-70 for 15 minutes. Figure 5-10 minutes from when I get to the parking to lot to when I actually get parked. Walk 15 minutes or so across the giant parking lot (since I don’t pay extra for the up-close parking). So, yeah, usually 45 minutes from my front door in midtown KC to my seat at Sporting Park, which it sounds like is shorter than the trip to RBA.

        I lived in Jersey once upon a time, and spent plenty of bridge and tunnel weekend nights in NYC, so I’m familiar with the transportation out there, and ultimately, I’m not real sure there’s anything that could be done to make a stadium a “short” trip out there. It just takes a long time to get places in New York.

      • I live in Springfield so it’s a good 2.5 or 3 hour trip each way for me to go to a KC game which pretty well and good eliminates the possibility of attending games during the week. For me to attend games I pretty much have to make a weekend trip out of it, so I don’t have a lot of sympathy for the New Yorkers who seem to complain about this a LOT. You have a 30-45 travel time? And you have to change trains at least once?!? Oh the horror!

        I really wish New Yorkers who want to complain would get a little context and come spend some time in the Midwest, where outside of a few major cities reliable public transportation is borderline non-existent, things are spread out for miles upon miles, and when a lot of us want to go to any kind of big event we have to get in our cars and drive several hours each way. So remember as much as you might not like things as they are for you they can always be worse.

      • Not impressed with your anecdote, sharkbait…

        People in New York expect convenience. They pay a premium for that convenience. You meanwhile are driving 3 hours for indoor plumbing, admit it…

      • I just hopstopped it. Even if you leave from MSG which is incredibly favorable to the PATH (34th St and Path is on 33rd, only a couple ave blacks away) you’re looking at an hour and 9 minutes versus 36 minutes to Yankee Stadium. If you leave from E 59th st it’s even more stark: 25 minutes to Yankee vs almost and hour and a half to RBA.

      • From MSG you can just take an NJ Transit train to Newark Penn which is 20 minutes, then it’s a 1-2 minute PATH ride to Harrison. Obviously E59th is closer to Yankee stadium but you can still take the Lexington Avenue line downtown and walk over to Path. Nowhere near an hour and a half.

        Obviously depends where in the city you live but I think, especially once the WTC path station and the underground walkways to Fulton Center are done, it’ll be more convenient to get to RBA from a lot of the city than Yankee stadium.

        Either way I think this experiment is set to fail because I don’t think the support exists in the area for two MLS teams.

      • You’re not counting fares (an extra $14 versus free if you have a monthly subway card) plus wait times (often 20-30 minutes for Penn Station train plus 10 minutes for PATH versus 3-5 minutes for the 4/5 train). You also have to factor in the transfer time, so not sure you’re saving much, if any, time there. I will have to google map it sometime. Bronx support will be interesting. It’s a very international area with lots of Hispanic and native Africans though Newark has some demographic similarities.

      • It would make more sense to play at Red Bull Arena.

        Hey, if Everton and Liverpool can even remotely discuss playing in a joint stadium permanently, RBNY and NYCFC can play in RBA for four years. Closer to home, the Gals and the Goats are dealing.

        The dirt infield and the distance from fan to field at Yankee Stadium will stink. Not the worst in MLS history but still bad for 2014.

        I could see RBNY not liking NYCFC infringing on their regional turf. But I’m sure the Don could smooth that over with his famous “figure it out as we go along” incentives.

      • I’m guessing you have a poor concept of NYC geography. The thing that NY soccer fans complain about the most is RBA being in New Jersey. For the most part, they say it’s too far away to be a practical venue. NYCFC is trying to capitalize on those NY fans, so there’s probably zero chance of them sharing RBA for any period of time.

      • Ian is correct. The whole goal of City is to get a New York team that plays in New York City. Yankee stadium will work for now, it is state of the art and as long as there is a promise of a soccer specific stadium in the Bronx then fans should buy in with out complaint. If you remember correctly, Sporting KC had to play in a baseball stadium for a few years until their beautiful park was built, so this isn’t unprecedented. (Scheduling around Yankee baseball games should be interesting to watch going forward)

      • Well, I’ve lived here for 23 years so…

        I get the complaints; there have been a ton over the years that the team has tried to solve. But they were alway replaced by new complaints. Before RBA, the complaint was Giants Stadium. There are already NY soccer fans that are complaining about this ownership group vowing not to support them.

        So they are building a 25k stadium but will play in their initial years in a 50k seat stadium? That will look good on TV! Can’t wait to see an errant pass roll through the dirt infield into a dugout. NBC must be thrilled.

        And as far as KC goes, EVERYONE hated that stadium if the comment threads on these sites are to be believed.

    • With MLS and MLB basically having the same season, I don’t see how this is feasible. Seems like a better arrangement would be for them to play at MetLife Stadium, which pretty much sits empty all summer.

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      • The crowed would look even more cavernous at MetLife, and I’m pretty sure the whole point of having New York “City” FC was to have the team in the actual city and not just another one in NJ.

      • That’s precisely the point of NYCFC, and how they distinguish themselves from RBNY. There’s no way they’d play in a stadium that’s not in the city proper. That said, I’d hate to be whoever has to reconcile an MLS schedule and an MLB schedule in the same stadium…

      • pfft, I would hate to be the groundskeeper. Depending on how the field is set up, the mound would have to be dug out and rebuilt all the time, which from experience is a dreadful to do more than once every year, or lay additional turf to cover the dirt in case of rain.

        If however they could fit the whole field within the outfield (which they might be able to, I am completely ignorant of whether it could), then most fans would be sitting a good distance from the field and in regular seats, not those plush couches behind home plate. Not something I would image the big money spenders in NY would like.

      • DC United and the Washington Nationals shared RFK for 2 or 3 seasons, it can be done. The difference being, of course, that there’s a stadium in NYCFC’s future, while in DC……..

      • Yeah, the Nats and United shared RFK for a while…and it sucked. Ask any DCU supporter. We were happy to see them leave.

    • Serious question. If they’re playing in Yankee stadium, does that mean they’ll be playing on a portion of the dirt infield? That would be total bush league IMO.

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      • I don’t see how this works during a regular season. Just seems to impractical and expensive. Sure they can do this for a big one time event game, like Man U vs MLS and the stadium will be sold out and a good TV audience to help pay. Schedule the Yankees to be out of town for a couple weeks. But on a week in week out basis for a partially pack stadium?

        I just don’t see it happening. I bet they end up playing on dirt like the Raiders…

      • RFK was designed as a football stadium and baseball stadium. Therefore the stands move around the stadium on wheels. I imagine this would make the conversion from baseball to football a lot easier. I never saw a baseball game or a soccer game there in the seasons that it was happening, so I don’t know how they did it. I have seen many soccer games there though in the last two years and the stands are far form the pitch.

      • well as a DC United fan who lived in DC during those years, and went to a ton of Nats and DC United games, i can tell you it isn’t that bad. for soccer games, everyone is on the sides and on the Barra Brava side, you are right on top of them pitch. the other side has more space because of the benches. i do agree it is a little insane how far the ends of the field are from the stands though. no lower level seats now.

        you do bring up a good point about the seats being set up with both sports in mind. obviously Yankee stadium does not have that. my point was more about how the Nats and DCU were able to work out scheduling just fine, so there is no reason to think NYY and NYCFC couldn’t do the same. and i just don’t think they would come up with this plan without an idea regarding covering up the dirt.

      • Cue the first player to trip over the grass cutout and tear a hamstring in 2015, followed by outrage by his team for having to play on that field.

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