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41 cities across North America bid for to serve as host cities for 2026 World Cup

The united North American trio bid is starting to take shape.

On Thursday, the United Bid Committee released the list of 41 cities across the United States, Mexico and Canada officially submitted bids to serve as Official Host Cities for the North American pending bid of the 2026 FIFA World Cup. Of which, the United Bid Committee (UBC) will trim down to shortlist of cities later this fall.

Three cities dropped their contention since July, when the UBC did its first wave of outreach for potential bidding cities, San Diego, Green Bay and Calgary.

“The Host Cities will help define the United Bid, United Bid Committee Executive Director John Kristick said. “Each will offer the best facilities and infrastructure to stage the world’s biggest single-event sporting competition, the FIFA World Cup, and together they will play a key role in the development of the sport in North America.

“We’re thrilled with the submissions that we have received, especially each city’s commitment to innovation and sustainability, and we look forward to bringing the best group of candidate host cities together for our official United Bid.”

It expected that only 20 to 25 cities will make the final cut, which should be submitted to FIFA by the UBC come March 16, 2018. And if the United Bid is selected to host the 2026 FIFA World Cup over Morocco’s bid, subject to FIFA’s specification, a total of 12 cities will be ultimately be named Official Host Cities for the 48-team tournament.

Here is the list of the 41 cities that are in contention at the moment:

City Stadium Capacity
Canada (6 cities)
Edmonton, Alberta Commonwealth Stadium 56,335
Montréal, Québec Stade Olympique 61,004
Ottawa, Ontario TD Place Stadium 24,341
Regina, Saskatchewan Mosaic Stadium 30,048
Toronto, Ontario BMO Field 28,026
Vancouver, British Columbia BC Place 55,165
Mexico (3 cities)
Guadalajara, Jalisco Estadio Chivas 45,364
Mexico City Estadio Azteca 87,000
Monterrey, Nuevo León Estadio Rayados 52,237
United States (32 cities)
Atlanta, GA Mercedes-Benz Stadium 75,000
Baltimore, MD M&T Bank Stadium 71,008
Birmingham, AL Legion Field 71,594
Boston, MA (Foxborough, MA) Gillette Stadium 65,892
Charlotte, NC Bank of America Stadium 75,400
Chicago, IL Soldier Field 61,500
Cincinnati, OH Paul Brown Stadium 65,515
Cleveland, OH FirstEnergy Stadium 68,710
Dallas, TX Cotton Bowl 92,100
Dallas, TX (Arlington, TX) AT&T Stadium 105,000
Denver, CO Sports Authority Field at Mile High 76,125
Detroit, MI Ford Field 65,000
Houston, TX NRG Stadium 71,500
Indianapolis, IN Lucas Oil Stadium 65,700
Jacksonville, FL EverBank Field 64,000
Kansas City, MO Arrowhead Stadium 76,416
Las Vegas, NV Raiders Stadium 72,000
Los Angeles, CA Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum 78,500
Los Angeles, CA (Inglewood, CA) LA Stadium at Hollywood Park TBD
Los Angeles, CA (Pasadena, CA) Rose Bowl 87,527
Miami, FL Hard Rock Stadium 65,767
Minneapolis, MN U.S. Bank Stadium 63,000
Nashville, TN Nissan Stadium 69,143
New Orleans, LA Mercedes-Benz Superdome 72,000
New York/New Jersey (East Rutherford, NJ) MetLife Stadium 82,500
Orlando, FL Camping World Stadium 65,000
Philadelphia, PA Lincoln Financial Field 69,328
Phoenix, AZ (Glendale, AZ) University of Phoenix Stadium 73,000
Pittsburgh, PA Heinz Field 68,400
Salt Lake City, UT Rice-Eccles Stadium 45,807
San Antonio, TX Alamodome 72,000
San Francisco/San Jose, CA (Santa Clara, CA) Levi’s Stadium 72,000
Seattle, WA CenturyLink Field 69,000
Tampa, FL Raymond James Stadium 73,309
Washington, DC (Landover, MD) FedEx Field 82,000

Comments

  1. Please rule out all stadiums where heat will be a problem. The ’94 WC was brutal for heat. Games are played in the middle of the day to capture the Euro TV market. This caused a lot of games to played in heat and worse, high humidity. The life was not only sucked out of many games, but by the end of the tournament, the championship game was a moribund affair played by two tired and heat exhausted teams. Priority should be given to indoor stadiums and those in more temperate parts of the country. Let’s learn from the mistake of giving Qatar the games in the summer ‘re winter or whenever they’ll be played.

    Reply
    • Its a valid point, but also an interesting debate. Soccer is very much an outdoor game. How do the organizers balance playing games at reasonable temps for more enetertaining play vs keeping it a “Pure experience”?
      Only reasonable spots for the final are LA, NYC and DC right?
      As a non- traditional soccer venue, and major homer pick, I’d hope the Superdome in New Orleans is pushing for consideration as a site.

      Reply

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