The New England Revolution had hopes for the latest plan to get a soccer-specific stadium, but they’ll unfortunately be left wanting as their joint proposal with UMass has reportedly fallen through.
Representative Nick Collins has stated that the proposal to build a professional soccer stadium in the UMass-owned Bayside area of Dorchester, MA will not move forward, reports the Dorchester Reporter. The plan to build a 20,000 seat soccer-specific facility is officially dead as negotiations have ceased between Revs owner Robert Kraft and school officials, as plans to develop the waterfront in concert with local officials will proceed instead.
“We have determined that a potential stadium at the Bayside site does not appear feasible at this point.” confirmed UMass spokesman Jeff Cournoyer.
“Now that this negotiation is over, I want to turn our focus toward maximizing the benefits of this unique waterfront property in our neighborhood,” Collins said. It is vital, he said, that “Dorchester residents are brought to the table to determine what is the best use of the property in best interests of UMass, its students, and its faculty.”
The proposal’s end marks another failure in the Revs quest to leave Gillette Stadium, located roughly an hour outside of Boston’s core. The team has been searching for a permanent soccer-specific home since 2006, with several high-profile discussions falling through over that time-span.
Robert Kraft paid for every cent of Gillette Stadium. Can’t really blame him too much for wanting to use it. It also can’t be forgotten how little the Revs matter in New England. Like any other place in the US, most people don’t care about sports and those that do follow the traditional American sports. Even if the Kraft’s paid for everything, there still probably wouldn’t be large scale support for the project within the community of the stadium site and the surrounding area
Sell the Revs to the Gillettes and have them play at Fenway.
Is this really surprising? What are Kraft’s incentives for building a stadium? He owns Gillette already and the Revs playing there gives him 17-20 +/- additional dates for the stadium to get used aside from a handful of NFL games and concerts.This also gets him more people to visit the businesses at Patriots Place. A new stadium close to Boston will cost $200 million at a minimum, most likely coming from his own pocket since I don’t see willingness to spend public funds. He has no reason to build a new stadium for his kid’s project.
Everything about that club is discount-oriented. I’m surprised they have any fan turnout to validate this tax write-off for Kraft.
This is a joke they haven’t been able to make this happen. anyone else beside kraft would be taking heat from the league. he gets special treatment from mls. put some pressure on them to get a stadium done since it is a requirement for any new franchises. I believe they are an original team in the league and still no soccer specific stadium.
Part of me agrees. The Timbers just put of $50 million of their own money to expand. Time to pony up Kraft.
Part of me realizes it is expensive to build stadiums.
The Timber got a stadium that the Nat team played in for qualifying and renovated it. So they have less in the game. As revenues grow…..if revenues continue to grow. These problems go away.
I don’t have that big of a problem with the football stadium sharing except for the lines, maybe the Revs stadium wasn’t build for soccer like the Sounders stadium was?
In the end like all the teams, the Revs fans need to quit whining, support, and the rest will follow. With the success they have had through the years, they should be drawing 45k like my Sounders and then a SSS would be out of the question for a while.
They have been in the league for all 22 season and are behind almost every other club regarding the stadium. They would be better off coming down to CT and playing at the Uconn football stadium than being out in Foxboro.
They need to get closer to Boston to start drawing the bigger crowds. Anyone from this area of New England knows the only reason to drive out there is to pass it going to the Cape or specifically drive an hour plus away from where everyone lives to attend a game.
Sure there are locals that will be disappointed in the club moving but this is the time for the Kraft family to put some $ into this team.
Anytime there’s this many roadblocks, it almost always means the owners are asking tax payers for too much.
Do you even understand the nature of a limited number of acceptable parcels in the Boston area as well as the difficulties with both residents and local government. It took almost 25 years to replace the original Boston Garden. The Krafts failed to build a stadium in Southie in ’97, so they are proceeding cautiously. Personally, I thought the Suffolk Downs location was the best location out of any proposed. The Bayside site has terrible traffic problems, especially with the rotary. Having 20K people there would just make it worse.