City dreams big about new arena's future
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Just a week after a deal to finance a new arena was reached, the salivating has begun.
Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl, a sports fan, wants to lure the National Hockey League All-Star Game and the NCAA men's basketball tournament to the venue.
The Penguins want all that, plus the NHL draft and the "Frozen Four," the NCAA's hockey tournament.
The Greater Pittsburgh Convention & Visitors Bureau adds religious events and even barbershop quartet gatherings to that wish list.
If it seems a little cart-before-the-horse, event planners say it's really not. A $290 million state-backed financing plan has won team approval, and while little matters like completing a lease, designing the facility, and building it remain, cities have to plan ahead to get the big events.
The arena is not expected to open before late 2009. But as sometimes-contentious arena talks wrapped up a week ago, the mayor told NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman that he wanted to bring the league's showcase game to town.
"Being that we're putting the investment in and are going to have really a state-of-the-art facility, what better way to highlight that on a national level than through an All-Star Game?" the mayor asked yesterday.
The Penguins raised the issue with Mr. Bettman even earlier, writing to him around six months ago on the subject, said team spokesman Tom McMillan.
The team "wrote a letter that said basically that if we get a new arena, we'd definitely, definitely, definitely like to host the All-Star Game," he said.
League officials "know what we have," he said. "They know the fan interest here. And we have star players."
A new arena and enthusiastic mayor may be the clinchers, Mr. McMillan said. "The mayor coming out and saying that [he wants the game here] can only help. And the fact that Pittsburgh did so well with the [2006 Major League Baseball] All-Star Game can only help."
The city last hosted the NHL All-Star Game in 1990. The game is to be played in Atlanta in 2008, Montreal in 2009, and won't occur in 2010, because it is not held in years during which there is a winter Olympiad.
Glendale, Ariz., where the Phoenix Coyotes play in a 3-year-old building, may have the inside track on 2011. It was slated to get the game in 2006 before the league decided not to hold it because of the conflict with the Olympic Games, in which many of the league's stars play.
There is no timeline for naming a host city for 2011 or 2012, according to NHL spokesman Frank Brown.
Mr. McMillan said the NHL Board of Governors will at some point request statements of interest from cities with hockey teams, and when it does, "we will be part of the bidding process."
The game occurs in mid-winter, when Downtown hotels are half-empty, according to Don Andrezjwski, director of sales and marketing at the DoubleTree Hotel, Downtown.
"With the All-Star Game here, it would be a sold-out weekend, no doubt," he said. That means business for cab drivers, waitresses, bartenders, maids and even the truck drivers that bring food to local restaurants.
The city had no estimate of the economic impact of last year's baseball All-Star Game on the local economy or the tax take.
Allegheny County Chief Executive Dan Onorato said that event "brought thousands of visitors, millions of dollars and national attention to our region and enabled us to showcase PNC Park and our burgeoning North Shore and Downtown neighborhoods." He said the hockey event would similarly showcase the Hill District and Uptown, where the arena and hoped-for spin-off development would be built.
Mellon Arena hosted early rounds of the NCAA men's basketball tournament in 1997 and 2002. The building isn't up to current standards for the top college sporting events and some concerts, said Bob Imperata, executive vice president of the convention bureau.
With a new arena, the city could make a play for part of the 2011 men's tournament, or maybe the women's Final Four.
He said his organization was on the phone with prospective convention holders that prefer arenas over convention centers as soon as a deal was struck. Events like the Barbershop Harmony Convention are suddenly within the city's grasp.
At that 10,000-person event, barbershop quartets perform. "They need a permanent stage," Mr. Imperata said. "The acoustics are very, very important to them, as you might expect."
He may try to land that event for 2014 or beyond.
Some religious groups hold events in arenas, he said.
The Penguins ownership, which will have a central role in booking events at the new arena, would love to take a stab at getting the U.S. Figure Skating Championships, said Mr. McMillan. The coming arena, he said, "creates a whirlwind of possibilities."
"We have that window, a five-year window, for example, of the building being new, being fresh, being the place to be," Mr. Ravenstahl said. "That's why we want to push so hard as quickly as we can to make some good things happen."
First Published March 20, 2007 12:00 am
