AFTER a two-decade absence, the NFL is coming back to Los Angeles.
NFL owners voted 30-2 on Tuesday, Jan. 12 to ratify the relocation application of the St. Louis Rams from Missouri to Southern California.
For the 2016 season, the Rams will play at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum while a new stadium for the team is built in Inglewood.
“We look forward to returning to Los Angeles and building a world-class NFL entertainment district in Inglewood,” Rams owner Stan Kroenke said in a statement. The new stadium will be privately funded without taxpayer dollars.
The return of the Rams, which formerly played in Los Angeles from 1946 to 1994, puts to rest years of attempts to bring the NFL back to the country’s second largest market and is projected to bring economic gain to the city.
The San Diego Chargers and Oakland Raiders were also looking into moving to Los Angeles and previously proposed a joint venture for a $1.7 billion stadium project in Carson. The plan was backed by the NFL’s six-owner committee on Los Angeles opportunities, but ultimately lost to Kroenke’s proposed $1.8 billion stadium in Inglewood.
Along with the relocation, NFL owners also voted to give the Chargers the option to join as the second team in Los Angeles, a decision that must be made within a year. Should the Chargers decline a partnership with the Rams, the Raiders will be offered the option to do so and will have to make a decision within a year.
Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said the NFL’s decision confirms “that this is a town that nobody can afford to pass up.”
“It also confirms our strategy over the past 20 years, as painful as it was, that you can bring a sports team without having to spend taxpayer money on it,” Garcetti said, according to the Los Angeles Times.
Economic gains
Construction for the proposed Inglewood project – located on the former Hollywood Park racetrack – is underway and is expected to be completed in 2019. It will create 40,000 jobs, including construction and ongoing operations, said a spokesman for Hollywood Park Land Co., which owns the property, the Los Angeles Daily News reported. He added that while it will cost $1.86 billion to build the stadium, the entire project will cost closer to $3 billion.
The stadium will be a multi-use facility that will include 890,000 square feet of retail space, 780,000 square feet for office use, 2,500 residential units, a 6,000-square-foot performing arts center and a 300-room hotel, according to the Daily News.
Real estate in areas surrounding the stadium may also receive a boost.
Raphael Bostic, interim director of the USC Lusk Center for Real Estate, told the Daily News that the boost in commercial and residential property values will depend on how the project performs.
“If it translates into a vibrant destination place, it would not only benefit the city, it would also become a regional draw like Old Pasadena,” he said.
Others, however, believe the economic projections are overstated.
“The local sports bars will probably rock, but most direct spending at the stadium stays at the stadium,” John Vrooman, a sports economists at Vanderbilt University, told the Daily News in an email. “The injection of new cash flow into the local economy is negligible because it’s coming at the expense of local spending someplace else. The indirect spin-offs are also small because most of the spending leaks out of the economy like a sieve and so the urban/regional multipliers are usually zero, zip … nada.”
He added that impact studies for such venues usually ignore the negative costs of congestion and decline in economic activity in other areas in the region, and that employment at stadiums consists of typically “low wage and seasonal jobs which are not exactly the best drivers of economic development.”
Gain for Los Angeles, loss for St. Louis
As Los Angeles prepares for the return of the NFL, the victory for the city comes as a loss for St. Louis.
Less than a day after the Rams relocation was approved, St. Louis Mayor Francis Slay said he had no interest in coordinating with the NFL in the future.
“The NFL ignored the facts, the loyalty of St. Louis fans, who supported the team through far more downs than ups, and the NFL ignored a strong market and viable plan for a new stadium,” Slay said in a statement. “I am proud of our effort and what St. Louis was able to accomplish in an extraordinarily short period of time. I thank everyone who worked so diligently on this project, especially the Governor’s Task Force.”
Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon expressed a similar sentiment.
“It is troubling that the league would allow for the relocation of a team when the home market has worked in good faith and presented a strong and viable proposal,” he said, according to ESPN. “We will review the NFL’s decision thoroughly before determining what next steps to take.”
Kroenke defended his decision, and in an interview with the Times, he talked about his final pitch to owners of the league and his vision for the stadium.
“If we didn’t have the perspective of 40 years of doing this, I don’t think any reasonable, rational person would ever do this,” Kroenke told the LA Times. “But because we look at it a certain way, we’ve been through so many of these projects, and we’re long-term investors. That’s why we did what we did and stuck our neck out that far.”
He also discussed the emotional relocation process, describing leaving St. Louis as “bittersweet,” the Times reported.
“I grew up in Missouri, and there’s a lot of wonderful people in St. Louis and Missouri. I’ll always feel that way about Missouri,” he said.
Carson heartbroken
The decision of NFL owners to relocate the Rams to Inglewood has left many Carson business owners heartbroken. In April 2015, Carson City Council unanimously approved a proposed NFL stadium that would have been shared by the Chargers and Raiders.
“It would have been amazing having those opportunities, having so many people to come to the city of Carson,” said Norwood Clark, owner of Carson restaurant Darrow’s New Orleans Grill, according to ABC7.
However, city officials said the bidding process demonstrated that opportunities exist in the city of Carson, and that the city is now known nationally and internationally.
“Whether it’s the NFL, or an outlet mall, or a massive mix-use residential project, our residents know that finally something is going to be built because it’s finally shovel ready,” said Carson Mayor Albert Robles, according to ABC7.
He added that he is excited that the NFL will be back in Los Angeles.
“The good thing is that we are going to have professional football here in Southern California. Our 20-year drought is coming to an end,” he said, according to ABC7.
Inglewood stadium could boost LA’s bid for the 2024 Olympics
Another benefit the return of football to Los Angeles brings to the city is that it could make the city a more attractive host for the 2024 Summer Olympics.
At the moment, the city’s 2024 proposal involves $500 million in upgrades to the Coliseum, which hosted the opening and closing ceremonies for track in 1932 and 1984.
“LA 2024 has the luxury of selecting the best choices for the Olympic and Paralympic Games, not building them from scratch,”committee chairman Casey Wasserman said in a statement. “And the new NFL stadium represents an opportunity to add to the array of high-quality venues we already have in our Games Plan.”
