Rebuilding Place in the Urban Space

"A community’s physical form, rather than its land uses, is its most intrinsic and enduring characteristic." [Katz, EPA] This blog focuses on place and placemaking and all that makes it work--historic preservation, urban design, transportation, asset-based community development, arts & cultural development, commercial district revitalization, tourism & destination development, and quality of life advocacy--along with doses of civic engagement and good governance watchdogging.

Tuesday, August 02, 2022

Proposal to build new basketball arena in Downtown Philadelphia

The northeast corner of 11th & Market Streets. The square block between 10th and 11th and Market and Filbert is the site of a proposal to build a new 76ers arena in the Fashion District space over SEPTA's Jefferson Station. Photo: Tom Gralish, Philadelphia Inquirer.

The 76ers propose a new arena downtown, on the site of the "Fashion District" mall ("The Sixers want to build a new $1.3 billion arena in Center City").  

An article in the Philadelphia Inquirer makes the point that the "fashion" initiative had no legs because of white flight and a change in the industry in terms of fast fashion ("White flight and fast fashion meant Market Street never got the attention it deserved. Could the 76ers change that?").  From the article:

The new arena would prove a few things: First, in this town, fashion will never be the game changer sports is. We like to think of ourselves as stylish, but the truth is Philadelphians are more likely to rally around James Harden than around haute couture. More importantly, it will test whether the city really can provide the infrastructure, investment, and urban planning solutions necessary for Center City to realize its full potential.

It will also would prove that it takes an influx of people from outside of the city for Philadelphians — especially those who live in underrepresented communities — to get the amenities we deserve in what’s supposed to be our downtown.

I do think she's right about "white flight" and downtown retail more generally.  For the most part, suburbanites shopping needs are met by options in the suburbs.  

They don't need to shop in the city, and/or they aren't buying such exclusive items frequently enough to go shop in the city.  Although the article points out that some of the stores there, like Century 21 and Ulta, were popular with actual city residents.

It's why Friendship Heights in DC isn't doing so great retail-wise ("Friendship Heights and the production of retail decay") and why DC can't really develop a strong retail center in the core. 

I do believe that basketball and hockey arenas should be located downtown and that they can contribute positively to economic development.

It took me too long to admit that, partly because even though downtown arenas can be "a good thing," they are still oversold and don't accomplish as much as is touted.  That's the point behind this blog entry:

-- "Framework of characteristics that support successful community development in association with the development of professional sports facilities"

which is aimed at identifying the characteristics that make for an arena that is more successful for the local community.

Also see:

-- "Revisiting "Framework of characteristics that support successful community development in association with the development of professional sports facilities" and the Tampa Bay Rays baseball team + Phoenix Coyotes hockey"

Frankly, there are plenty of in-city arenas and stadiums that don't have the kind of economic effect that is touted.  So the point should be to shape the project to get the best possible results.  

But you still need a wider ranging plan, because an arena or stadium is only one element of what should be a "transformational projects action plan."

-- "Why can't the "Bilbao Effect" be reproduced? | Bilbao as an example of Transformational Projects Action Planning," 2017
-- "Downtown Edmonton cultural facilities development as an example of "Transformational Projects Action Planning"," 2018

Nonetheless, such facilities can reposition downtowns, attract new audiences, contribute to economic development, and ideally leverage existing transit in a way to shift trips from cars.

A big element is the size of the city and transit.  Smaller market cities tend to have weak transit cities, and the majority of patrons drive to the arena or stadium, and this seems to reduce their propensity to patronize local establishments.

Interestingly, a different PI article ("Philly’s next mayor should boost city’s recovery, say biz leaders. ‘We need somebody that smiles.’."), saying the city needs a mayor who is a cheerleader, mentions the arena proposal and uses DC's Capital One Arena as an example of why a downtown arena project is important to Philadelphia:

“Just go to 16th and Market Streets,” Pearlstein said. “That used to be like the 50-yard line at lunchtime. But now Market Street has a long road to recovery.”

The possibility of a new 76ers arena in Center City “could drive midafternoon traffic on East Market Street, which has struggled even with the Fashion District,” Cooper said.

Much like the Capital One Arena in Washington, D.C., a Sixers stadium on Market between 10th and 11th Streets could “create enough gravity to attract restaurants, offices, and residential buildings, which followed the building of the arena. But we still need improved transit,” Usdan said.

Sports patrons don't spend on non-sports retail.  But such facilities can only do so much, especially because they support such a narrow range of "retail" that the spillover benefits are not as significant as people believe (see It's Hardly Sportin': Stadiums, Neighborhoods and the New Chicago, about how the Wrigleyville commercial district changed to a nightlife district from a mixed use retail district, after the Chicago Cubs stadium added lights and night baseball.)

What if teams aren't so great, with poor attendance?  Plus, what happens when the teams start failing and attendance drops off.  

For example, the Washington Nationals baseball team, now that it's tanking a couple years after winning the World Series, is suffering severe attendance falloff--the team is now 19th of 30 in average attendance.  That has to be hurting all the eating and drinking establishments that have opened around in the Navy Yard area.

Similarly, the NBA and MLB All Star Games and the NFL Super Bowl, when it comes down to it, don't have much effect on the local economy either, especially non-food retail.  This is because much of the money expended on travel and lodging ends up in the pockets of companies that aren't locally based.

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Academic writings.  I hate to admit that I never did much of a literature search when I began development the "framework characteristics" pieces, starting first with Sacramento in 2014 ("An arena subsidy project I'd probably favor: Sacramento").  Some of the work supports my argument.  Some is till more positivist than critical-analytical. 

-- "Sports Facilities as Urban Redevelopment Catalysts," Journal of the American Planning Association (2004) 
-- "In Defense of New Sports Stadiums, Ballparks and Arenas," Marquette Sports Law Journal (2000)
-- "Arena-Anchored Urban Development Projects and the Visitor Economy," Frontiers in Sports and Active Living (2022)
-- "Does the arena matter? Comparing redevelopment outcomes in central Dallas tax increment financing districts," Land Use Policy (2021)
-- "Role of Sports Facilities in the Process of Revitalization of Brownfields," IOP Conference Series Materials Science and Engineering (2017)

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Economic impact of individual spending by sports patrons.  When I first got involved in urban revitalization, wrt the H Street NE neighborhood in DC ("The community development approach and the revitalization of DC's H Street corridor: congruent or oppositional approaches?," 2013), one of my earliest writings was about cultural assets, given the then presence of the Children's Museum, the fallow Atlas Theater, and the then developing H Street Playhouse (it moved, now it's the Anacostia Playhouse).  

I touted the spending multiplier compiled by Americans for the Arts, but making the point that spending was likely to be less because it wouldn't involve overnight stays.  

-- Arts & Economic Prosperity 6: The Economic Impact of Spending by Nonprofit Arts and Culture Organizations and Their Audiences, Americans for the Arts

Plus, later I learned that children-based cultural visitation, like going to museums, generates very little additional spending.

Anyway, it would be interesting to drill down and generate a more detailed understanding of sports patron spending.  Is there a difference between people who get to the venue by transit versus driving?  Families versus individuals? Season ticket holders versus occasional attendees?  In-city versus metropolitan area versus out-of-the area in terms of domicile?  How much spending is captured by the team/arena versus off-site venues. Etc.

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11 Comments:

At 12:00 PM, Anonymous charlie said...

Also the bears in Chicago are looking for new stadiums.

Also see this:

https://www.statnews.com/2022/08/02/cities-lobbying-for-arpa-h-but-why/


 
At 9:53 AM, Blogger Richard Layman said...

Yeah, I saw that about the Bears. They are really committed to moving to the suburbs. Since that's the case, it's a shame that Richard Daley wrecked the stadium from the standpoint of historic preservation, losing its recognition as an intact historic site.people

2. Didn't see the Stat article. Thanks. Very interesting.

I've made a similar point before, that there is a difference between "doing" and "coordinating" and agencies that coordinate don't have the kind of spillover benefit that people think (eg FDA). Eg, with Obamacare, DC was saying that it would make the city a leading place for health research. But at that level, it's just contracts, not doing.

From the article:

Even if those projects prove transformational, experts say, it’s unlikely to change life in the agency’s host city.

“It’s the location of the performer, not the funder, that matters,” said Bhaven Sampat, a Columbia University professor who studies the politics and economics of government-funded research.

In other words: If the agency awards a contract to a company based in San Francisco, the economic impact will be felt there — not in the city where an ARPA-H employee handles the paperwork.

Even the agency’s workforce might not do much to bolster the local economy or create scientific prestige. DARPA, the Pentagon science agency that ARPA-H is modeled after, only employs about 200 people. ARPA-H, with a budget one-third the size of its sibling agency, will likely be even smaller.

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This gets to the point I make about there being a difference between "building a local economy" and "economic development." The latter just focuses on top numbers, the gross grain number, not the specifics.

This is a big thing of course with big sports events. Big top numbers, but when you go super micro, the local impact is a lot less.

The article talks about "the Halo effect" in that it can help. That's the same thing with the sports events. I do think, in an existing science based area, it does help some. It's one more asset, in a string of them. But it's not the same as a big lab.

And even then, we learned with the Pfizer closure in Ann Arbor, and the resuscitation of the bioscience sector there, that big company labs do a lot, but as part of a big company, many key functions happen in other cities, and smaller companies may keep more of those functions on site, generating more employment.

Again, really great article.

 
At 9:58 AM, Blogger Richard Layman said...

"What we know about the Sixers arena proposal’s impact on East Market"

https://www.inquirer.com/business/sixers-arena-greyhound-fashion-district-filbert-street-20220802.html


Includes rendering.

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Am copying the related Stat News stuff into the comments in the Pfizer entry.

 
At 10:26 AM, Blogger Richard Layman said...

Back to biotech...

https://www.dallasnews.com/business/health-care/2022/07/11/dallas-fort-worths-biotech-boom-pushes-it-into-top-20-metros-for-life-sciences/

"Dallas-Fort Worth’s biotech boom pushes it into top 20 metros for life sciences"

Nice clickable map.

DC #5, Baltimore #14.

Detroit, which probably includes Ann Arbor, #13

 
At 11:10 AM, Blogger Richard Layman said...

https://www.inquirer.com/real-estate/commercial/sixers-fashion-district-adelman-apartment-development-multipurpose-20220808.html

"The Sixers’ ambitions for Market Street go well beyond building a sports arena"

The 18,500-seat arena at 11th and Market will serve as the anchor for a new entertainment district that will be studded with restaurants, bars, shops and, eventually, apartment towers.

Really good discussion of the issues.

 
At 1:03 PM, Blogger Richard Layman said...

In Philadelphia, a new threat looms over Chinatown

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/08/24/chinatown-philadelphia-basketball-arena-threat/

Having to repeatedly fight for your community’s right to exist can exact an emotional toll. But over the past 50 years, the residents of Philadelphia’s Chinatown have had to do just that. We have watched our neighborhood get bisected by a highway, dug up for a commuter rail tunnel and invaded by a convention center that led to the destruction of hundreds of homes. More recently, we have had to organize to fend off a federal prison, a baseball stadium and a casino.

But now a new threat looms: a proposed $1.3 billion, 18,500-seat basketball arena mere steps from our doors.

The new home for the Philadelphia 76ers would replace a portion of the struggling Fashion District mall next door to Chinatown. The plan for the rest of the mall is to turn it into “a world class sports & entertainment hub to complement the arena.” So, the developers insist, they are just replacing one mall and entertainment complex with another. But this anodyne refrain hardly tells the whole story. The reality is that Chinatowns across the country have been decimated by sports arenas: the Kingdome in Seattle, Busch Memorial Stadium in St. Louis, the Capital One Arena in D.C.

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the article inaccurately uses the DC example. It's true that "Chinatown" was impacted by the arena, sort of. But it had already been on the decline for decades, partly because of suburban outmigration. But also, comparably, because of the construction of the Convention Center at 9th and H Streets. This was really the final blow.

Plus, Metrorail. For decades WMATA held the land development rights over the station, at the SW corner of the 7th and H Streets NW intersection. It wasn't until early 2000/2002 when construction commenced, and office, housing, and typical (non Chinese) retail was constructed. That had more impact than the Arena too.

But again, with almost no Chinese residents, and a very much thriving Asian "town" community thriving in Fairfax County (Annandale), DC's Chinatown's days were numbered.

It's hard to be a Chinatown with no Chinese.

I don't know the status of Chinatown in Philadelphia, but they clearly need to do a "stabilization" plan in the face of the change, focused on retaining residents. Having residents makes a Chinatown viable.

 
At 2:07 PM, Blogger Richard Layman said...

This writer makes the point that downtown arenas work in the other cities that the 76ers compete with, and add value to the center city.

https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/commentary/sixers-76sixers-arena-downtown-chinatown-nba-support-20230221.html

A downtown arena for the Sixers can be a Philly thing, too


Why can’t we make progress? In part because we aren’t willing to embrace change. That’s where “it could never work here” comes in. It paints positive change as something that happens in other cities. In Philadelphia, apparently, things can only get worse.

It is no surprise that the Sixers, a team with a fan base that trends toward younger and city-dwelling supporters, would want to join so many of their competitors. Unlike NFL or baseball stadiums, downtown arenas are standard operating procedure in basketball. Every single one of the Sixers’ fellow Eastern Conference franchises has their own arena downtown. The Sixers have even pledged to build their $1.3 billion project without asking Philadelphia taxpayers to contribute. That’s refreshing, considering the city is still paying off bonds for Lincoln Financial Field and Citizens Bank Park.

For many Philadelphians, however, the proposal seems to border on sacrilege. The traffic will be miserable! What about parking? What about my favorite stores in the Fashion District? SEPTA won’t be able to handle the volume!

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Solution hard core TDM. Use the arena to jump start SEPTA.

 
At 10:51 PM, Blogger Richard Layman said...

Inga Saffron, urban design writer for the Philadelphia Inquirer, argues the proposed arena will have seriously negative effect on Jefferson Station, which connects SEPTA Rail to three heavy rail transit lines.

https://www.inquirer.com/real-estate/commercial/sixers-arena-jefferson-station-septa-market-east-20230323.html

Off track? A Sixers arena at 11th and Market would compromise Jefferson Station.

Chinatown isn’t the only hurdle facing a Sixers arena on Market Street. SEPTA sent the team back to the drawing board after seeing how the proposal would affect its second-busiest station.

 
At 3:24 PM, Blogger Richard Layman said...

https://www.inquirer.com/politics/philadelphia/sixers-arena-design-advocacy-group-opposed-east-market-street-20230823.html

A large Philly-based group of architects and designers just came out against the 76ers’ arena plan
The Design Advocacy Group wrote that the proposed arena at 10th and Market Streets would fail to “integrate itself into the fabric of the city.”

 
At 9:51 PM, Blogger Richard Layman said...

https://www.inquirer.com/news/philadelphia/inq2/76ers-arena-philadelphia-center-city-parking-traffic-septa-20240319.html

What a 76ers arena in Center City would mean for parking, foot traffic, and SEPTA

1. Economic impact
The proposed arena site is on Market Street, between 10th and 11th Streets, and would replace a third of the Fashion District mall. The arena development team has promoted the downtown location as a way to increase consumer spending and economic growth. But Michael Leeds, a professor studying economics of sports at Temple University, said that those spillover effects tend to be small.

“A lot of the spending that goes on is captured by the team, not by the city,” Leeds said. “Buying a hot dog or spending money on tickets is not going to go very far in terms of creating jobs or creating income.”

2. What’s the plan for pedestrian traffic control?
The development team has planned for multiple entry and exit points on all sides of the arena to help distribute foot traffic. “It's specifically based on locations of transit stations and garages and spreading that around based on where [fans are],” said Alex Kafenbaum, senior vice president and head of development of Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment, which owns the Sixers.

3. Parking vs. transit
The development team estimates that 40% of fans will drive to the new arena – a stark drop from the now 75% who drive to the Wells Fargo Center. Their estimates assume that 40% of fans will take public transit, but Leeds of Temple University questions whether the Sixers will get “a complete reversal of behavior." Under the Sixers’ assumption of 40% of fans driving to games, roughly 3,000 cars will need parking spots. There are 15 public parking garages within a quarter-mile radius and 14 more public parking garages within a half-mile radius. The 29 garages within a 10-minute walk have more than 5,600 available spots for fans who want to drive, according to the Sixers’ revised plans. People will have the option to prepay for a spot when purchasing a ticket. Mark Nicastre, a spokesperson for the Sixers on arena matters, said that the development team’s partnership with Parkway Corp. will “positively impact traffic flow for the games, so people aren't just circling for spots.”

4. How would traffic be impacted?
However, parking is not the only issue impacted by additional cars in Center City, Leeds said. “If you're talking about driving on local streets to [find parking], it's going to be a mess.”

Unlike the Wells Fargo Center, with easy access to highways, the new arena would be surrounded by roads with three or fewer lanes and 25 mph speed limits. A Sixers’ traffic impact study estimates four nearby intersections – the Vine Street off-ramp, Eighth and Race, 12th and Filbert, and 10th and Market – would experience long delays.

Fans commuting to games can overlap with evening rush-hour traffic when congestion is already high. For example, on Friday, Feb. 23 – when the 76ers played a home game against the Cavaliers – there was a “noticeable increase in traffic congestion” on the highways around the Wells Fargo Center between 4 and 6:30 p.m. compared to Feb. 2, a non-game Friday, according to Kyle Jackson, principal data scientist at HERE Technologies. “[There was] 491% more congestion than usual during the hours before tipoff,” Jackson said.

 
At 9:52 PM, Blogger Richard Layman said...

5. How would rideshare drop-offs and pickups work?
The arena is slated to have three designated rideshare zones in spots a few blocks around the arena: on 12th Street between Arch and Filbert, Chestnut Street between 10th and 11th Streets, and on Filbert Street between Eighth and Ninth Streets. This has increased from an initial two after Uber recommended another.

According to Kafenbaum, each zone is expected to hold 10 to 20 cars. Finding the space to hold that many cars and the crowds waiting for their rides in Center City’s dense corridors might be a challenge, but Kafenbaum was confident that proximity to restaurants and bars in Center City would lead people to come earlier and stay later. “That helps with the distribution of that load,” he said.

6. Would there be any road closures on game days?
The development team is planning to close one lane of traffic on both 10th and 11th Streets for one hour post-events. In previous plans, both lanes of traffic on 10th and 11th Streets were going to be closed with an initial analysis showing that temporarily closing those streets would reduce congestion. However, after receiving community concerns around limited access to emergency services – notably the Thomas Jefferson University Hospital and the House of Dragons fire station – the development team revised their plans.

7. How would you get to the arena by public transit?
76 Place will sit on top of the regional rail’s Jefferson Station. It will also be close to stops on SEPTA’s L (Market-Frankford) and B (Broad Street) lines, as well as PATCO, trolley lines, and bus routes. The Sixers plan to include the cost of transit in ticket prices for season ticket holders during the first year. They hope this encourages at least 40% of fans to take public transit instead of driving. This would more than triple the percentage currently taking mass transit – about 13% – to and from the Wells Fargo Center, according to a Comcast Spectacor official.

A SEPTA media relations spokesperson said that there is sufficient capacity on their existing services to accommodate potential riders traveling to and from events at the proposed arena. However, it’s unclear how suburban fans will take to regional trains that only run hourly post-games.

 

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