Dallas Cowboys choose Fair Park for new stadium(but how big a tax hike?)

Channel 8(Dallas) | 4/29/04 | Dandy Don

[Diddle E. Squat]

Breaking News! Well at least according to channel 8. Gloria Compost breathlessly announced that the Dallas Cowboys have finally officially named Fair Park their choice for building the new stadium and Jerry's World complex. Still no decision on financing, local state reps are looking into extending the car/hotel taxes to cover the Fair Park site(which may or may not be allowed under current convoluted law.) The timing may or may not be tied to the BCS debating this week about adding a 5th bowl to the mix, and any new stadium would put the Cotton Bowl in the running.

IIRC, any tax increase will have to go before Dallas County voters.

[Diddle E. Squat]

No article yet, just announced on TV.

[mylife]

Now can they clean up fair park and make dallas a proper town?

How will they handle traffic in the area?

Will My car be stolen while I drop $200 dollars on a game?

[sinkspur]

Now can they clean up fair park and make dallas a proper town?

That's one question.

The next one is: did they get Queen Laura Miller's OK? She was not at all sold on this, this morning, on a radio talk show.

[lavrenti]

Fix up the Cotton Bowl, and move them back there.

Jeez. Fair Park. What is the second choice, I wonder?

[mylife]

I havent been involved in this dallas planning in the slightest, but despite my snide remarks this is a better plan than the trinity river thing. bur I see some obstacles.

To do thisa you really have to adress the old infrastucture of the area .

Heck that needs adressing any how

[SoCal Pubbie]

What, prey tell, is the "Jerry's World complex"?

[Diddle E. Squat]

Well, if Jones is serious about all the periphy uses and size of complex he intends to build, than it should go along way towards cleaning up the area immediately adjacent to Fair Park, at least a connection to Deep Ellum(of course that's a dicey area these days, and will be until they decide to get serious about the bums, crime, and a merit-based police chief.) So in some ways this might not be such a bad plan, getting 2 projects (stadium and Fair Park stabilization/reconnection) for the price of one. Then again, very, very little of the promised development around Victory or the Ballpark has taken place. So I'm still against this, but will at least see what all the details are. If the Patriots can build their own stadium, so too can the Cowboys.

Then again, it might be nice to go to a Red River Shootout without paid parking on the lawn of a crackhouse...

[mylife]

fair park is such a disaster....I dont want to take my kid there and have to park in a crummy neighborhood infront of a scummy strip joint, then have to make your wat though god knows what to have the "privelege" of Paying a packet to see the boys.


Dallas planning is horrible

[sinkspur]

To do thisa you really have to adress the old infrastucture of the area .

The "infrastructure" of the area is drug-dealer-pimp-steal-anything-that's-not-nailed-down. Park your car in a yard there and go to the State Fair, and you may have wheels when you claim your car.

Wanna know what Cowboy games will be like around Walton-Walker? A gridlocked nightmare.

[lavrenti]

Well, they may clear out Fair Park wide and deep before that stadium is completed.

However, I can think of five possible sites better accessed than Fair Park.

[Indie]

Will My car be stolen while I drop $200 dollars on a game?

Precisely why I have not been to the state fair [except while a cop] for years, and would never attend ANY event in this area. The ONLY thing I will go to this area for..EVER..is Henderson's Fried Chicken at Oakland and Hatcher :)))..but not the Cowboys...and neither will many in Tarrant County.

[mylife]

So in some ways this might not be such a bad plan


Yes I see the potential, but how wil this not get bogged down in racial issues when it comes to displacing the "old neighborhood"

I would really like to see some planning around here, and fair park could have been a jewel had it not been for lack of foresight.

perhaps they can fix it. Im skeptical of any planning dallas does

[Diddle E. Squat]

Mixed use complex of office, retail, housing, practice fields, Dallas Cowgirl's museum, entertainment, etc. $1 billion+ plan, but less than 1/2 of that is for the stadium itself.

The location is the the State Fair complex a couple of miles east of downtown Dallas, which is nearly surrounded by rough neighborhoods, including the region's worst just to the south. Fair Park is a collection of historic architecture, museums, exhibit space, concert venue, and the original Cotton Bowl, which is falling apart. There would be real benefits to Dallas to finally revitalize the park, gentrify the surrounding area, and connect it back to downtown(its already come back a good bit, most of the way in between is a formerly seedy now hip bar district called Deep Ellum), but of course it takes money, and they want to do it from taxpayer pockets. Still, this proposal is more of an investment that MIGHT generate enough redevelopment to make it cheaper than trying to fix up Fair Park without the stadium proposal.

[mylife]

The "infrastructure" of the area is drug-dealer-pimp-steal-anything-that's-not-nailed-down. Park your car in a yard there and go to the State Fair, and you may have wheels when you claim your car.

Wanna know what Cowboy games will be like around Walton-Walker? A gridlocked nightmare.

You nailed it! I fly to cleveland to see a losing team in a losing city before I will tolerate that crap

[toupsie]

As long as God can watch his favorite football team, its ok with me. That's why Texas Stadium never had a roof. :)

[1L]

It's what they picked as their FIRST choice, but not only choice, as reported. Only an idiot would think that Jerry would limit his choices, as he will play one city against the other and go to whereever place maximizes his pocketbook.

It will remain in Irving/Las Colinas, unless it goes to another burb like Grand Prairie. In fact, there's little question in my mind about that. Dallas doesn't have the ability to raise the revenue like Irving does through occupancy taxes, and Jerry does not want to get involved with the lunatics on the Dallas City council. The Irving city council will follow Jerry around like a dog.

[1L]

Texas Stadium has a roof. It just has a big hole in it because 1) God wanted to watch his team prior to Jerry taking over; 2) they ran out of funding to complete the roof when it was built; 3) you got to admit its one of a kind; 4) they wanted to keep their options open when they built it to plant grass if the players didn't like the turf.

[mylife]

Jerry does not want to get involved with the lunatics on the Dallas City council.

Boy you got that right!

Dallas city council is the worst government I have encountered in mylife

[PAR35]

I'll answer two of the three.

How will they handle traffic in the area?

There will be fewer folks than on a big weekend day at the fair, and they are going to build a rail line connecting Fair Park to Deep Ellum and the West End.

Will My car be stolen while I drop $200 dollars on a game?

Not if you ride the train.

[Diddle E. Squat]

Yeah, I hear you on the poor planning, but Laura Miller doesn't seem too afraid to barge through a lot of the typical corruption garbage(she doesn't seem to be on the take the way Ron Kirk and his wife were.) I think she's done a great job with the Trinity River plan, which for the first time I believe actually finally will get done, and done as close to right as realistically can be done.

John Wiley Price has been mouthing off, but some other so-called black leaders in that area recognize that this is probably by far the closest they'll get to a Fair Park renovation with spillover effect. Scuttlebutt is that a lot of them are already on board. But until we see the financing details, I'm skeptical of if it will really be worth it. If Victory hasn't been able to leverage the investments into development, Fair Park would seem to be 3 times as diffult(though actually some of Victory is going to break ground this year, so maybe it was somewhat of a recession delay.)