There’s a lot still to decide before the Columbus Crew’s move becomes anything close to official, but Precourt Sports Ventures has offered a glimpse into what soccer in Austin could look like.
PSV released a series of renderings on Thursday depicting a potential soccer-specific stadium in Austin. The location shown is McKalla Place, an empty lot in North Austin.
The renderings were created by Gensler, TBC and CAA ICON and come in the aftermath of a conceptual site plan released in April.
“The soccer park at McKalla Place offers an incredible opportunity to create a world class match-day experience in the urban core of Austin,” said Jonathan Emmett, principal and design director of the Gensler Sports Practice. “While influenced by great European venues, with intimate seating bowls that put fans right on top of the action, we are also drawing heavily on the incredibly diverse and vibrant local culture, to create a uniquely ‘Austin’ experience for MLS fans. The venue and match-day experience will incorporate strong local influences on food & beverage; live music and technology. Careful orientation and the design of the roof canopy will ensure ample shading while strategically placed open corners will allow for cooling breezes.
“The soccer park will provide the local community with a network of amenities and landscaped spaces, in and around the venue, that will be active on gamedays and non gamedays alike. Austinites have a strong connection to the outdoors and recreation, the soccer park will provide access to great landscaped spaces and trails to an area of the city that is underserved in this respect.”
PSV has previously stated that it would privately finance a $200 million stadium in Austin at the appropriate site should the move be finalized. As things stand, that remains a battle due to an ongoing lawsuit brought on by Attorney General Mike DeWine and the city of Columbus.
Here’s a closer look at the Austin renderings:
Looks like a pretty cheap build which is fine, but as drawn this stadium doesn’t exactly represent a big commitment.
I still don’t understand the difference between Columbus and Austin (other than 1 is in Texas and the other Ohio). Both are state capitals. Both have a primary competitor sport of college football in the late summer, fall and winter – Columbus has Ohio State (105,00 each saturday) Austin has UT (90,000 each saturday). Both have the same approximate metro area population of 1 million residents.
Columbus has fan support and tradition in MLS. Austin has – problems finding a location for a stadium and positive population growth?
Austin has better business metrics.
Austin also barely supports Texas football for 6-7 games each season and didn’t sell out the Erwin Center when Kevin Durant played basketball there, even though he clearly had the potential to be an all time great. Austin has never been, and will probably never be a sports town, but if Garber and Precourt force this, hopefully Austin proves me wrong. If the move happens, I’d expect them to sell a bunch or corporate seats, and to play in front of a half empty stadium like the other Texas teams.
wow, haven’t seen anything this distastefully done in mls since jesse marsch told captain dax mccarty he’s being traded.
my two cents: it has to be done like san jose/houston. the franchise can move to austin but not the crew brand.
the crew brand has to stay in columbus. the crew can drop down to the usl/second division in columbus, but the crew and columbus are one and the same and can never be separated.
marsch: dude, guess what your plans are for this afternoon. you’re getting on a plane. you don’t work here anymore.
mccarty: what?
Absolutely disgraceful!
“Hey guys, let’s go picnic at the soccer park. We can sit right next to the biofiltration pond.”
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Aftermath is absolutely the correct word to describe what happened after the release of the site plan. Btw the site only has room for 1k cars on it, with no parking garages anywhere near the site.
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Looks like they ran out of money to finish cladding the roof too….
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Save The Crew!!
Welcome to the Trump Troll Farm Era, where the PR method even before a move is decided or approved, is to dump gas on the campfire and release renderings of a stadium in the wrong city.
The stadium that is no where near close to having a site, financing, collaboration, and does not look like it will built anytime soon?
Releasing this a day or two after announcing Cincinnati’s expansion?
Gag.