Angels tell Anaheim they're opting out of their lease on Angel Stadium

[Still MIGHTY]

Having lived/went to school in Long Beach (Go Dirtbags), despite how cool a waterfront stadium could be, I think traffic and parking would be an absolute NIGHTMARE.

 

There is a LA Metro line (Blue Line) that ends not terribly far from the site, so that could help a little, and it would connect the Angels with the rest of Los Angeles that Arte Moreno so dearly craves. (Although parking at the stations above the terminus isn't terribly plentiful or they're in Compton.) But as admiral said, it's Southern California. People can't not drive their cars. There are those parking structures nearby, but also having used those, they'd have to be expanded and it could cause a great congestion.

 

And I can only imagine that Shoreline Drive on/off ramp to the 710. It's currently a construction hell as it is right there as they modify/enhance/repair those roads as it turns into the Port of Long Beach and is overloaded with 18-wheelers.

 

Plus, as mentioned, you build this and you're essentially killing off the Long Beach Grand Prix. Also using that site/demolishing the arena for parking would also put a major kink in the Long Beach portion of the 2028 LA Olympics:

 

 

That area with the water polo pool and the BMX facility is the site they're initially putting forth in this Angels offer. Handball would take place in the arena in the bottom right.

 

But yes, just look at that area right there, and you say, damn, that would be a beautiful spot to put a stadium. It's a fine initial idea. But there's a lonnnnnnnnggggggggg way to go with this stuff. Anaheim still looks like the preferred spot to stay, and things like this are just barely twinkles in some Mayor's eye at this point.

[WSU151]

I think Arte said recently he wasn’t a fan of parking garages...something along the lines of “It sucks when you’re on the 4th level and waiting forever to get out”. 

 

Ahh here it is: https://www.latimes.com/sports/angels/la-sp-angels-spring-training-20190218-story.html?outputType=amp

[GDAWG]

The Angels will probably resolve their stadium issues before the A's and Rays do. 

[The_Admiral]

My guess is that they're in Anaheim to stay and that Angel Stadium will continue to undergo Ship of Theseus-level renovations. The Long Beach plan just feels like too much of a stretch.

[FiddySicks]

I just wonder how valuable the piece of land Angels Stadium is sitting on when Disney is pretty much constantly looking to expand. It might be in the cities best interest to let them move, actually. The Angels have a lot of financial heft to throw around, and a pretty solid set of home dates in which to earn money. But how does that compare to a Disney park that operates 365 days a year? California Adventure has been a pretty big success for Disney (At least I think it has), and the space they’re in now is getting pretty crowded. 

 

EDIT: After researching it some more, the thought I had that’s a California Adventure is a success may not be quite right. It still pulls in money like crazy (as everything Disney does), but they’ve also poured over a billion dollars into fixing some of the original mistakes. 

 

This might make that Angels Stadium property even more valuable, though. Especially with the fairly recent addition of the Star Wars properties and licenses. 

[kimball]

51 minutes ago, Bucfan56 said:

I just wonder how valuable the piece of land Angels Stadium is sitting on when Disney is pretty much constantly looking to expand. It might be in the cities best interest to let them move, actually. The Angels have a lot of financial heft to throw around, and a pretty solid set of home dates in which to earn money. But how does that compare to a Disney park that operates 365 days a year? California Adventure has been a pretty big success for Disney (At least I think it has), and the space they’re in now is getting pretty crowded. 

 

EDIT: After researching it some more, the thought I had that’s a California Adventure is a success may not be quite right. It still pulls in money like crazy (as everything Disney does), but they’ve also poured over a billion dollars into fixing some of the original mistakes. 

 

This might make that Angels Stadium property even more valuable, though. Especially with the fairly recent addition of the Star Wars properties and licenses. 

 

And, there has been rumors of a third Anaheim Disney Park for years. That’s a whole different story and discussion. But, that area would be a good location for a third park. With that all said, I just don’t see the Angels moving. Look how difficult it is to get any arena or stadium deal done in California.

[Cosmic]

3 hours ago, Bucfan56 said:

EDIT: After researching it some more, the thought I had that’s a California Adventure is a success may not be quite right. It still pulls in money like crazy (as everything Disney does), but they’ve also poured over a billion dollars into fixing some of the original mistakes. 

 

This might make that Angels Stadium property even more valuable, though. Especially with the fairly recent addition of the Star Wars properties and licenses. 

No analogy is perfect, but DCA 1.0 was like the fish stick jersey of the theme park world. It was notoriously built on the cheap, and reinvented a concept that didn't need reinventing. The money they spent fixing it was plausibly what should have been spent initially + reasonable expansion that could have happened even if the park was successful. IMO the most money to be made from the stadium land is to sell the bulk of the land to Disney, while leaving some outparcels for third parties to bid on for hotels. The only problem would be getting the third-party hotels in a fortuitous spot, rather than next to the horse barn.

[WSU151]

I don't think the Angel Stadium site is large enough for a third Disney park. Yes there's a crapload of parking spaces, but Disney would need to save them for its own parking. 

 

The stadium footprint would be good enough for maybe three or four rides, plus all the shops, restaurants, hotels, and other crap that a Disney park regularly has. Plus, with the site on the other side of I-5 and not adjacent to Disneyland, it'd be pretty awkward,

[Cosmic]

10 minutes ago, WSU151 said:

I don't think the Angel Stadium site is large enough for a third Disney park. Yes there's a crapload of parking spaces, but Disney would need to save them for its own parking. 

 

The stadium footprint would be good enough for maybe three or four rides, plus all the shops, restaurants, hotels, and other crap that a Disney park regularly has. Plus, with the site on the other side of I-5 and not adjacent to Disneyland, it'd be pretty awkward,

http://wikimapia.org/#lang=en&lat=33.805504&lon=-117.899137&z=15

 

You could absolutely fit another park with that sea of surface parking surrounding the stadium. Connecting it to the rest of the Disney resort area and dealing with the city would be the questions. Disney has already shown that parking garages are a viable option for them, so parking can go up instead of out.

[LMU]

4 hours ago, Cosmic said:

No analogy is perfect, but DCA 1.0 was like the fish stick jersey of the theme park world. It was notoriously built on the cheap, and reinvented a concept that didn't need reinventing. The money they spent fixing it was plausibly what should have been spent initially + reasonable expansion that could have happened even if the park was successful. IMO the most money to be made from the stadium land is to sell the bulk of the land to Disney, while leaving some outparcels for third parties to bid on for hotels. The only problem would be getting the third-party hotels in a fortuitous spot, rather than next to the horse barn.

California Adventure also made the mistake of blowing off its loyal local customer base. There really wasn’t anything to draw Californians there more than once when all the park did was served as a dumbed down Chamber of Commerce version of the state without any real Disney connection. 

[pmoehrin]

10 hours ago, Bucfan56 said:

I just wonder how valuable the piece of land Angels Stadium is sitting on when Disney is pretty much constantly looking to expand. It might be in the cities best interest to let them move, actually. 

 

 

That's basically what the city told the team during the lease negotiations and the Angels threw a fit over it.

 

A Disney expansion is just one option of what you could do with that land. You look at what's around there on a map, you could justify building almost anything there.

 

If the Angels leave, whether it be Disney or somebody else, the city of Anaheim is not going to be at a loss for finding potential developers.

[monkeypower]

Maybe this is more of discussion for the Theme Park thread, but I always found the Angel Stadium location to be a weird spot for Disney expansion. I think it's too far from Disneyland for it to be like a third park in the Disneyland resort but yet too close for it to be a completely different thing.

 

(Maybe it could be like Disney World with the multiple parks spread out, I've never been there, but I think it would at least be slightly different because all those are located on the same compound and not in the middle of a city.)

[kimball]

I'll actually be right by Angel Stadium this weekend, I'm curious now to see how big the location is in person with this perspective. 

 

Even with that said ... I just don't see Disney really wanting to build right by the freeway unless it was more shopping, hotels and restaurants. 

[The_Admiral]

The Angel Stadium property, parking lots and all, seems to be about 160 acres as per Google Maps. (Wrigley Field is about 10.5, if you were wondering.)

[pmoehrin]

23 minutes ago, kimball said:

Even with that said ... I just don't see Disney really wanting to build right by the freeway unless it was more shopping, hotels and restaurants. 

2

 

That's how I would recommend using the land if I were in Disney's shoes.

 

If they were going to incorporate the park with that land, my guess is they would have done it when they owned the Angels. Instead, they operated them as separate entities, and I would assume there were good reasons for that.

 

They would probably have to buy up a lot of the surrounding land to use it as a theme park, but that doesn't mean there aren't at least half a dozen other potential projects for the area that Disney could utilize in conjunction with the park.

[LMU]

The property is definitely big enough for a third park.  The distance and that a freeway separates it from the other parks significantly complicates that.  Not sure if CalTrans would allow a monorail to go over the 5.

 

[Still MIGHTY]

16 minutes ago, kimball said:

I'll actually be right by Angel Stadium this weekend, I'm curious now to see how big the location is in person with this perspective. 

 

Even with that said ... I just don't see Disney really wanting to build right by the freeway unless it was more shopping, hotels and restaurants. 

 

The Disneyland property literally backs up against the 5 freeway.

 

13 hours ago, Bucfan56 said:

This might make that Angels Stadium property even more valuable, though. Especially with the fairly recent addition of the Star Wars properties and licenses. 

 

Except that Disneyland opens Star Wars Land (*ahem* Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge) this June. Already done. Would've been a fine idea, otherwise. Get on a "space" shuttle to go to the "other planet" that is the separate park. (Although, the logistics, ugh. Think about loading these shuttles at night's end, then having to get on the parking lot tram, and then driving out. Yikes.)

 

Anyways, all in all, sure there is probably more money to be had by selling the land potentially to Disney. However, I would think there'd be a greater loss to the "caché" that Anaheim has at present. Anaheim already has Disney as a main attraction, but if you lose Major League Baseball and just add more Disney, that doesn't really do anything for the city's profile. If anything, it does lower it that notch of being another town that lost a big league team (See: St. Louis, NFL).

 

Anaheim's priority, and the Angels' too, I think, are to keep the Angels in Anaheim.

[SFGiants58]

1 minute ago, Still MIGHTY said:

 

Anyways, all in all, sure there is probably more money to be had by selling the land potentially to Disney. However, I would think there'd be a greater loss to the "caché" that Anaheim has at present. Anaheim already has Disney as a main attraction, but if you lose Major League Baseball and just add more Disney, that doesn't really do anything for the city's profile. If anything, it does lower it that notch of being another town that lost a big league team (See: St. Louis, NFL).

 

Anaheim's priority, and the Angels' too, I think, are to keep the Angels in Anaheim.

 

I would agree. Theseus’ Ship the stadium a bit more, while also forcing the team to re-adopt the “Anaheim” city name. Force an end to Arte’s obsession with trying to extent beyond the Orange Curtain. It is, after all, the Anaheim  Angels who won it all in 2002, while the Los Angeles Angels’ big claim to fame is wasting Mike Trout’s early career.

[The_Admiral]

I don't think it would hurt Anaheim's reputation if the Angels were to leave, but I also don't think there's anywhere better for them to go. Do you think they could wind up building a new stadium in the parking lot if the old bones of Anaheim Stadium are deemed to be beyond help? You look at a satellite view of the region and there really aren't many >100-acre lots waiting to be developed.

[Still MIGHTY]

5 minutes ago, the admiral said:

I don't think it would hurt Anaheim's reputation if the Angels were to leave, but I also don't think there's anywhere better for them to go. Do you think they could wind up building a new stadium in the parking lot if the old bones of Anaheim Stadium are deemed to be beyond help? You look at a satellite view of the region and there really aren't many >100-acre lots waiting to be developed.

 

Back in days between the failed NFL expansion of 2002 and the return of the Rams/Raiders/Chargers, there was a nascent plan to try and build a football stadium on the Angels parking lot. So it's indeed an option. (Although, less of an option if they fill the parking lot with developed retail/restaurant space.) I don't think its an option for this go-around of negotiations, but it could be an avenue in the not so far future.

 

It's not like the "old bones" of the stadium are crumbling or anything. The foundations are sound. However, any major renovation would be the third such major renovation in the stadium's 53-year history. (Enclosing for the Rams in the late 70s, Opening up back up in the late 90s.) There's only so many times you can dress up/down a stadium.

 

The issue, of course, would be funding. And this is California. And everyone here sees what Kroenke is doing in Inglewood. So unless Arte goes for it on his own dime (HA!) the foundation of Angel Stadium will stay where it stands.