Dr. York might deserve thanks {moving 49ers out of San Francisco}

San Francisco Chronicle ^ | 11/16/6 | Gwen Knapp

[SmithL]

Before John York absorbs one more cheap hit over the dissolution of San Francisco's Olympic dream, let's consider the possibility that the 49ers' owner did an enormous favor for the city. When his wavering commitment to a new stadium at Candlestick Point unraveled the bid for the 2016 Olympics, he might have saved San Francisco from a vanity project that often leaves ugly blemishes on a community's bottom line.

A year after the Athens Olympics, the ledger still showed a pool of red ink deep enough to support platform diving. Estimates from Australia set the debt for the Sydney Games at $32 million a year until at least a decade after the event. Atlanta didn't run up a huge debt, but it didn't make money, either, and its failures as a host did nothing to advance the city's image as an international destination.

The Los Angeles Games of 1984 established a model of financial success that was supposed to define the modern, private-sector Olympics and purge memories of the $1 billion debt that would haunt Montreal for generations after it staged the '76 Summer Games. (Three years before, the mayor of Montreal had said: "The Olympics can no more have a deficit than a man can have a baby.")

But after Peter Ueberroth's miracle in L.A., only Seoul truly cashed in. In 1996, the International Olympic Committee responded to Atlanta's crass homage to Coke and McDonald's by killing the private-financing model and demanding some form of public spending for all future Games.

Of course, the Olympics can be successful without strictly turning a profit for the hosts. The real benefit of hosting the Games lies in the infrastructure upgrades that tend to be expedited in a manner that may be impossible without the impending arrival of the ultimate global event.

[ssaftler]

It is amazing how much the Bay Airheads have their knickers in a twist over the 40-whiners moving about 25 miles down the peninsula to Santa Clara. Just think, in 6 years, if you want to go see a 49ers game, you can:

1) Take a commuter train from downtown San Francisco that I guarantee will take you within walking distance of the new stadium, or

2) Have your choice of about 4 or 5 nice big freeways to get to the stadium from most other parts of the Bay Area, with multiple entrances in a relatively safe area of town.

Now, your public transportation consist of taking a bus that crawls with all of the traffic on, essentially, ONE road leading to the stadium, unless you want to chance driving through the projects. And Lord have mercy on your soul if you get lost in those same projects AFTER the game.

And people think that the Giants left the 'Stick just because of the wind and fog there in the summer! If you go to the area around AT&T Park in SF, there are lots of restaurants that have sprung up in the neighborhood, Muni runs trolleys (which hook up almost seemlessly to BART) that stop right in front of the stadium, and for those coming up from the south, there is an exit from the main freeway within a few minutes of the parking.

[TommyDale]

Yep.

[RayChuang88]

And people think that the Giants left the 'Stick just because of the wind and fog there in the summer! If you go to the area around AT&T Park in SF, there are lots of restaurants that have sprung up in the neighborhood, Muni runs trolleys (which hook up almost seemlessly to BART) that stop right in front of the stadium, and for those coming up from the south, there is an exit from the main freeway within a few minutes of the parking.

AT&T Park is actually one of the most transit-friendly ballparks because within two blocks of the ballpark you get:

1. Red & White ferry service to Oakland, Vallejo and Marin County.

2. SF MUNI trolley service that goes up the Embarcardero for direct access to BART's Embarcardero Station.

3. Caltrain's main San Francisco station.

4. Direct road access to Interstate 280 south.

Small wonder why the neighborhood around AT&T Park has totally revived lately....