Token

I'll have a first impressions review of the design soon, but for now I'll let this cute little souvenir speak for itself:

Sorry folks, this one's not for sale or trade.

A's-Cisco official press release

Link:

OAKLAND, Calif. -- Oakland Athletics owner and managing partner Lew Wolff announced today the A's have reached an agreement to purchase a 143-acre parcel from Cisco Systems with the intent of constructing a baseball park in the City of Fremont.

The state-of-the-art baseball-only stadium will be named Cisco Field as part of a 30-year naming rights agreement, which is valued at $4,000,000 million annually, with the potential for annual increases based on inflation. This naming rights agreement is transferable at any time. As part of the naming rights deal, Cisco will be granted an undisclosed amount of guaranteed print, radio and television exposure.

360 Architecture, with offices in Kansas City, Mo., Columbus, OH and San Francisco, and Gensler, with offices worldwide, will serve as the primary design companies for the ballpark.
Cisco Field will be located in Fremont, which is approximately 20 miles to the south of McAfee Coliseum, five miles north of the Santa Clara County line and 12 miles from downtown San Jose. With a population of over 210,000 people and an area of 92-square miles, Fremont is the fourth most populous city in the Bay Area and California's fifth largest city in area. The ballpark site is proposed to be located on the west side of Interstate 880 off the Auto Mall Parkway.

The partnership with Cisco also includes a broad marketing and business agreement which will underscore the A's commitment to create a unique fan experience by leveraging state-of-the-art network technology throughout the ballpark and franchise operation. As a result, Cisco Field will be one of the most technologically advanced stadiums in the world and will demonstrate the positive role technology can play in sport, entertainment and connecting communities. Cisco's technology will be used to enhance every facet of the stadium, from ticketing and concessions to management of game day operations.

The partnership allows Cisco to utilize the facility for corporate and community events and to create a Cisco Customer Solutions Center at the ballpark in an effort to showcase the use of networking technology in a stadium. Cisco becomes the "Official Technology Partner of the A's and Cisco Field" and the A's will deploy Cisco technology to serve the needs of Cisco Field and the baseball village.

Groundbreaking on the project will commence once the A's gain approval from the City of Fremont, Alameda County and other government agencies.
The estimated cost of the ballpark is between $400-500 million (excluding land) with construction time taking between 24-36 months.

The anticipated funding for the ballpark will be a combination of private equity and the application of the value of land use entitlements that will be generated by the activities of the ballpark and the adjacent ballpark village developments. The public assistance sought will be in the form of processing the development activity in the most efficient manner possible, the agreement that benefits generated solely by the development will in part or in total be used to facilitate the development program in a manner that will not impose on general fund or bonding issues on local government and other aspects of public-private cooperation that will stand the test of public acceptance.

"Today marks the beginning of a new era in A's baseball in the Bay Area," said Wolff. "Cisco Field will become a destination attraction that will be enjoyed by baseball fans throughout the Bay Area and beyond for generations to come. The location of the ballpark will able us to significantly expand our market place while giving our fans a unique experience at what promises to be one of the most exciting venues in the country. We thank Cisco Systems for the will and ability to make this new standard in fan and sponsor experience a reality. We have a number of rivers to cross, but once the value of what Cisco and the A's are committed to accomplish is clear to the citizens of Fremont and Alameda County, we are confident our plans will add to the economic, social and community base of the region we serve."

"The A's are more than just a great baseball team, they are a symbol of the Bay Area, and Cisco is proud to play a role in ensuring they continue to call it home," said Cisco President and CEO John Chambers. "Technology is changing every aspect of our life experiences and for Cisco, this is an opportunity to harness the power of our own innovative technologies to create a truly unique experience that transcends sports, connects communities and takes the fan experience to a whole new level.

"Cisco intends to be aggressive in ensuring the entire Bay Area community, particularly younger fans, have the opportunity to enjoy the A's experience. We have a vision for how to make Cisco Field the model for all sports franchises," he concluded.

"This announcement of a new ball park for the Oakland Athletics ensures the long-term stability of the club in the Bay Area," said Major League Baseball Commissioner Allan H. (Bud) Selig. "I congratulate Lew Wolff of the Athletics and John Chambers of Cisco for developing a partnership that will benefit the community as well as the A's and Cisco.

"As the landscape of baseball economics has changed dramatically in recent years, the importance of new ballparks that maximize the fan experience and expand club revenues, enabling the home team to remain competitive, can not be understated."

Up to date information on the progress of Cisco Field can be obtained on the team's official website Oaklandathletics.com. The Cisco Field link will include an overview of the project, artist renderings, videos, a virtual tour and ballpark facts and figures. Fans may also offer their suggestions regarding any aspect of Cisco Field through a special feedback section. Fans suggestions will be compiled on a weekly basis and forwarded to A's management.

The A's will continue to operate under its current lease agreement at McAfee Coliseum through the 2010 season, with the addition of three one-year club options through the 2013 season. Opened in 1966 and home of the A's since 1968, the Coliseum is the eighth oldest ballpark in the Major Leagues behind Fenway Park (1912), Wrigley Field (1916), Yankee Stadium (1923), RFK Stadium (1961), Dodger Stadium (1962), Shea Stadium (1964) and Angel Stadium (1966), although both Yankee Stadium and Angel Stadium have undergone significant renovations over the years. The Coliseum is one of only four multi-purpose stadiums in the Major Leagues, including Dolphin Stadium in Miami, The Metrodome in Minneapolis and Rogers Centre in Toronto.

One of the American League's original franchises, the Athletics have won nine World Series championships and have captured 15 American League pennants. Only the New York Yankees (26) and St. Louis Cardinals (10) have won more World Series championships than the A's. Since 1968, the A's have captured four World Series titles, six American League pennants, 14 AL West Division titles and one AL Wild Card. The A's are one of the most community-minded teams in all of sports as the organization continues to support numerous charitable organizations in an effort to improve the quality of life of people throughout the Bay Area.

Headquartered in San Jose, Calif., Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO) is the worldwide leader in networking for the Internet. Information about Cisco can be found at http://www.cisco.com/. For ongoing news, please go to newsroom.cisco.com.

Announcement coming Tuesday

From the A's press release:

Oakland A's Owner and Managing Partner Lew Wolff will be making a major announcement tomorrow at 11:30 a.m. PT regarding the team's quest for a new ballpark in the Bay Area.

The announcement will be available live on oaklandathletics.com at 11:30 a.m. PT. FSN Bay Area will also show the broadcast.

From Cisco's press release:

Oakland Athletics and Cisco Systems To Host Press Conference

Who: Oakland Athletics and Cisco

What: The Oakland Athletics and Cisco will host a press conference for a special announcement.

Where:
Cisco's Executive Briefing Center
300 Tasman Drive, San Jose, CA (Building 10)
408-526-4000

When:
Tuesday, November 14, 2006
11:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. PT
Doors open at 10:30 a.m. for TV camera set-up

Public can view the press conference live on FSN or via live webcast at www.oaklandathletics.com. A replay will be available following the event at www.oaklandathletics.com

Update: I have a credential, but unforseen circumstances will force me to be unable to attend. I'll be streaming along with many of you.

A caveat, Olympics are dead, Santa Clara update

The sheer number of articles covering the A's-Cisco deal can cause anyone to miss a few not-so-minor details, including yours truly. The biggest one comes from Barry Witt's 11/9 article (emphasis added in bold italics):

Lew Wolff has said he would fund part of the expected ballpark's expected $400 million or more price tag through profits that would be created if the city agrees to convert Cisco's industrial-zoned land to housing uses. He gave no details of that plan to council members Wednesday, but in a September discussion with the Mercury News editorial board, he suggested those profits would be given to the city, with the understanding the city would become an investor in the ballpark.

As outlined by Wolff, the city would "reinvest the money in a ballpark, provided you guys build it, you guys take care of any overruns, and you guys run it with no obligation on our part for operational deficits."

"The city can continue to have the ownership, or the percentage they put into it," he said. "If they put in" $200 million "and we put in 200, it's 50-50."

In past interviews Wolff suggested that the city would end up owning the ballpark, and I wondered how that could happen on private land with private financing. Now it's starting to make sense. Once you start talking overruns and deficits you get into dangerous territory. Witt clarified the context in the quote. Wolff is speaking as a voice of the city, with "you guys" being the A's.

Elephants in Oakland interviewed Field of Schemes author Neil deMause about the A's Fremont overtures.

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The effort to get the Olympics to the Bay Area in 2016 is already over before they could get started. The bid's anchor venue was supposed to be the new Candlestick Point stadium, but now that the Yorks have declared the project too expensive and have moved their focus to Santa Clara, the bid has blown up.

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A source familiar with the discussions between Santa Clara and both the Quakes and the 49ers told me that the two projects are in fact not competing for the same land next to Great America. The 49ers are looking at the Great America parking lot while the Quakes may end up using another site nearby. There's plenty of open space in Santa Clara to do both as long as they aren't co-located.

Wolff vs. York: The Battle for Santa Clara

Rumors about the A's-Cisco partnership and the team's possible move to Fremont took less than 48 hours to be overshadowed by another team's announcement: The 49ers were giving up on San Francisco and were leaning towards a Santa Clara home near their training facilities and Great America.

49ers owner John York and his staff hastily arranged a press conference for Thursday at the Santa Clara Hilton. During the press conference, York proceeded to bore the media to tears with explanations about why the Niners' plans for a huge football-retail-housing complex at Candlestick Point wouldn't work. He even used a slide presentation, which went over like gangbusters as I was listening to his spiel on KNBR. Not surprisingly, many members of the media accepted York's supposed trials and tribulations as a rationale for heading down the Peninsula. Shortly afterward, the media picked up on the fact that York failed to explain how the stadium was going to be financed.

Now that talks are back on with San Francisco, it's unclear whether the Santa Clara announcement was real or merely a threat to SF pols. It's probably a little of both, but elsewhere lies a third way for the Niners. And unlike the first two explanations, this one actually looks smart.

Wednesday also marked the opening of the A's/Quakes South Bay office on the ground floor of the Fairmont San Jose. Lew Wolff was there to exhort the amassed soccer fans, who so far are ecstatic about having truly local ownership that wants to build a proper home for Earthquakes 4.0. Sites being considered include Diridon South, the Santa Clara County Fairgrounds, and SJSU South Campus near Spartan Stadium.

The dark horse candidate is Santa Clara. That site just happens to be the same one that the 49ers are targeting for their stadium.

• Is it possible for separate football and soccer venues to exist on that land? No. There isn't enough land for both unless you want people to park in Sunnyvale.
  
• Is it possible for football and soccer to share a venue? No. A typical NFL stadium seats 60-65,000, has 100-200 luxury suites, and 5-10,000 club seats. A model MLS soccer specific stadium (SSS) holds only 20-25,000 and has a fraction of a NFL stadium's suites and club seats. Wolff's three-year option with MLS calls for a SSS to be built for the Quakes. A shared situation with the A's or 49ers will not work, the Quakes have to be the marquee tenant.
  

I've heard that Wolff has had some pretty fruitful initial discussions with Santa Clara pols. For York, that's bad news because the Plan B (Candlestick Point is Plan A) is Santa Clara. What happens when Plan B gets eliminated? You lose leverage, that's what. On the other hand, Wolff has had well scoped Plans A, B, and C (which city you affix to A-C may be dictated by what you believe Wolff's motives are) and has so far come out looking pretty clean. That just goes to show how despite the similar situations (difficult cities to get a stadium deal done) it's all about execution. The main things going for York at this point are that his 49ers are a ton more valuable than the Quakes and the Niners (as long time residents) have a good relationship with Santa Clara. By making the announcement, York has effectively taken Santa Clara off the table for the Quakes indefinitely. It doesn't matter at this point whether or not it can be paid for. As long as attention is focused on the Niners he doesn't have to do anything else.

Where I come from they call that a cockblock. For once in your tenure as owner, Mr. York, well played. Well played indeed.

Transit Solution #1: Start with a spur

Fixation on BART has made it seem like the other transportation solution in the area, good old-fashioned rail, has been ignored. That's easy to do since the Capitol Corridor and ACE systems are less than twenty years old and neither is as visible as BART in the East Bay. Trains can help fill the gap that not having BART creates, but only if it's done in a smart way to maintains the convenience that BART riders enjoy.

Capitol Corridor is a commuter service that runs between Auburn/Sacramento and Oakland/San Jose. It was launched in 1991 and has grown impressively ever since. Capital improvements used to reduce congestion on the rails it shares with Union Pacific, Amtrak, and ACE have allowed CC to increase its schedule to 32 trains per weekday and 22 trains per Sat/Sun/Holiday. Despite the fact that CC has to share rails with other passenger and freight services, its on time performance is 85%. Compare that to BART, whose on time performance is 91% with much greater schedule frequency but also a completely separated guideway that it doesn't (and can't) share with anyone else.

11 Bay Area stations are along the Capitol Corridor, from Fairfield to San Jose. Union City's station is being planned, though today's report of funding problems for the Dumbarton Rail project makes Union City's development less certain. The original Pacific Commons plan called for a station to be built at the end of Auto Mall Parkway, over one mile from the project development area. Should the "A's Town" project move forward, formal discussions about the Pacific Commons station will commence. Keith Wolff has reportedly been in contact with Capitol Corridor (among multiple transit agencies) about the possibilities.

Here's the aerial photo from last April showing the BART WSX extension, station, and routes from Warm Springs to Pacific Commons. Note the location of the ACE/Amtrak station.

Even though the station is unencumbered by a freeway or other obstacles, it's still over a mile away from PC. This is because much of the land is either protected preserve or is earmarked for other uses, such as a public park next to the planned station. From here there are two options:

• Keep the station where it was originally planned. This will incur less capital cost, but the ongoing need for shuttles from the station to PC may cost more in the long run. By shuttle, I mean either buses or some form of rail transit.
• Add a short 3/4 mile, double-tracked rail spur that terminates within the project boundaries. Getting the fans right to the doorstep eliminates the need for a mode switch or transfer. This convenience this provides would go a long way towards convincing fans that rail is a preferable method of travel. Below is a close-up.

Having a separate terminal station has other advantages. It creates queueing areas for special event trains, so special A's trains coming from either Sacramento or San Jose/Gilroy could end their routes at the station. Existing track can be freed up for use by regular service trains and unrelated uses such as freight. The cost of the station would be $10-25 million depending on how elaborate it is (multiple platforms, station buildout).

Since some of the preserve space would be affected by building the spur, other project land would have to be reclaimed as new preserve area. I'm guessing around 9-10 acres. Here's another photo of the area that includes a train station overlay and a bus depot.

What about BART? As you can see from the table below, there are two existing stations from which serve both BART and CC. Richmond's location at the end of a line makes it useless as a transfer station, so only the Coliseum station can function in that manner. Should the Union City station come online that'll create three. If you're worried about having BART and CC sync, the two groups should have incentive. As I wrote yesterday, BART faces a sizable loss in ridership without a good solution for A's fans. This allows them to create a smooth, single transfer solution for many East Bay and San Francisco fans.

It also doesn't hurt that BART runs Capitol Corridor on behalf of the CCJPA. Even more incentive to get them working together, no? And how's this for impact: Should Capitol Corridor recover only 10% of those displaced BART riders I wrote about yesterday, CC's ridership would go up about 10%.

I'd like to see Translink get into the solution, but I'm not holding my breath. CC conductors are going to use bar code scanners at some point in the future, might as well get them to read smart cards as well. Travel times for the BART and CC are comparable (CC slightly slower), and CC fares when applying multiride discounts are also comparable. Times shown include a 6 minute jaunt from an established Fremont BART or Amtrak station to Warm Springs or Pacific Commons, respectively. The key will be to make that transfer as painless as possible, and that's the challenge. That's where Translink comes in.

Tri-Valley fans aren't served by Capitol Corridor. ACE goes to Dublin, Livermore, and out to Tracy and beyond, but let's see how their service ramps up before we start looking to ACE as a solution. As it is now, ACE only runs 8 trains per day - only on weekdays.

Who gets hurt more - A's or BART?

One couple of housekeeping note first: The long dormant "Scoreboard" feature on the sidebar has been redone with a different question, "Does the outlet/media figure support the A's-Pacific Commons ballpark plan?" The question and the associated reactions may change as details are revealed. I've linked the columns by Gwen Knapp, Ray Ratto, Carl Steward, Mark Purdy, and Dave Newhouse so far.

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With all of the talk about not having BART to service the Pacific Commons site, I decided to look into this further. We all know that no BART will equate to some indeterminate loss of A's fans, but their substitutes may end up being South Bay fans. That's not something I can quantify at this point, but it's a reasonable assumption.

What about the effect on BART? Unlike the A's, there's no easy substitution for BART if A's fans don't ride it. Some fans may take BART & MUNI to Giants games, but it's most likely that BART will suffer a ridership loss. The question is: How big?

Let's start with actual BART ridership. According to the 2005 Annual Report, BART's fiscal year ridership was usually under 100 million one-way trips or "exits" as they call them. The average ticket price was around $2.50.

Using the 15-25% BART riders-as-attendees figure cited previously, I produced the table below. It uses a sliding scale in which with larger crowds, a higher percentage of fans use BART. The total attendees using BART was 528,750, which may be overestimating things a bit (it works out to 25% of all A's fans) but for now we'll go with it for the sake of argument. The following table shows how much A's fan trips to the Coliseum factor into total BART ridership.

1% may not sound like much, but it's actually disproportionately high compared to the actual effect the A's have on the local economy, which is more in the neighborhood of less than 0.1% of the Bay Area's Gross Regional Product. Credit goes to A's fans who utilize BART so well. 1 million rides means that A's-related BART usage is actually heavier than all of the annual activity on some low usage stations such as Castro Valley or San Bruno.

Let's use the worst case scenario for BART, in which no Warm Springs extension is built. Fans who no longer use BART for A's games simply wouldn't use BART at all for baseball, not even for Giants games. That includes a shuttle scenario to Pacific Commons, which I personally don't think will work when coming from the existing Fremont BART station because of its cost and limited use. If we assign a $3 value for each one-way trip, the lost revenue would come to over $3 million per year. For a public transit agency that has trouble making ends meet, $3 million in lost revenue is nothing to sneeze at. The only thing that helps BART is that they're pretty heavily subsidized, so the hurt won't be too bad. Still, it could mean job cuts, higher fares, or other ugly solutions to this market change.

Contrast this with the A's situation. In the model below, those same BART riding fans would be split into two groups: those who would drive to Fremont, and those who would stay home. The split is an even 50-50. I haven't done any surveys or seen any numbers to back this assertion, but it's a reasonable starting point. The "$ per fan" figure comes from two sources: an average ticket price of $25 per game, and $10 of concessions. If that 50% that would still attend drives instead, you get roughly 1000 additional cars per game, whose parking revenue would offset the loss somewhat.

Obviously, the money the A's would lose on paper dwarfs what BART would lose. However, there's a big difference between the two in that the A's have other sources of revenue (besides the parking) to offset this loss. The team's also expected to perform well at the gate for at least the first two years (numerous sellouts) so the attendance/concessions revenue would be maxed out anyway. That two year stint (perhaps longer) may end up being the waiting period required before BART finally comes to Warm Springs.

As for BART, they'll take a decent hit. It's not even close to enough to justify the cost of building WSX by itself, but it could contribute to revised ridership numbers that could boost the cases for both the WSX and San Jose extensions (the current numbers are admittedly dubious). Alameda County Supervisor Scott Haggerty, who has championed the A's-to-Fremont cause, is also a MTC commissioner who controls much of the regional transit money. He has the power to push funding in the right direction.

Tomorrow I'll present a scenario in which BART would be used to the ballpark. Implemented correctly, there's an opportunity to keep many of those lost BART riders and keep the costs low.

BREAKING NEWS: Call it "Cisco Field"

Update 11:27 p.m. - Trib reports that the Alameda County Board of Supervisors has approved the Coliseum lease extension, finalizing the A's stay in Oakland through at least 2010.

Also, according to Chron the 49ers have given up on staying in San Francisco. Santa Clara may be next. I hope that the Yorks aren't trying to game the city into giving them a big handout, because it's not happening.

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Update 10:07 p.m. - Chron's Patrick Hoge has more details:

Unlike many stadiums surrounded by parking, this one would be swathed in shopping, Wasserman said. Ballpark patrons would park elsewhere and be shuttled in, he said.

Now that's an unusual idea. If people coming on transit have to take a shuttle, why not have everyone? It's baseball with the inconvenience of waiting for a bus to an airport long term parking lot.

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Barry Witt has the scoop again: Cisco and the A's have sealed their part of the deal. Among the highlights:

Wolff, who declined to speak to reporters today, told council members the development would be something like San Jose's Santana Row -- featuring condominiums stacked above street-level retail -- with the major addition of a high-tech ballpark filled with Cisco-produced infrastructure.

The Santana Row comparison is a bit ironic since Wolff was a known critic of the plan when it was initially proposed in San Jose several years ago. A downtown advocate, he felt that Santana Row would effectively sink any chance for retail in downtown San Jose (which it did - restaurants and clubs are only half of the retail picture). Once Santana Row showed remarkable success, Wolff acknowledged it. Now it's Wolff who will attempt to create something along that scale in Fremont.

In a previous comment thread, Bleacher Dave posed the idea that Fremont officials might be upset by having the initial press conference/presentation at Cisco's San Jose headquarters than in Fremont. I don't think this is a big deal at all. How else are Wolff and John Chambers going to dazzle the media if not in front of gigantic video screens at Cisco?

Election wrap

Tuesday's midterm elections didn't have any issues that directly affected the A's, but some legislation passed that impacts the market enough to make ownership notice.

• In Sacramento, voters soundly defeated Measures Q & R, which would have raised and allocated money for a new Downtown Sac arena for the Kings. Over the last month, both items became doomed when the Kings pulled their support of the measures due to disagreements over deal terms, particularly parking agreements.
• Propositions 1A and 1B passed by their necessary margins, paving the way for needed transportation infrastructure improvements all over the state. The Bay Area could receive up to $4.5 billion of Prop 1B's $19.9 billion total. $1.3 billion of the regional money will go towards mass transit, but let's be realistic about what that means - $1.3 billion doesn't go that far when considering the number of large projects out there. Some small but not insignificant amount will help with the BART Warm Springs extension and maybe even with planning for the San Jose extension, but the money can't pay for everything.
• San Jose's new mayor will be Democrat Chuck Reed. A fiscal conservative, Reed is not the go-to guy if anyone's looking to facilitate a sweetheart deal for the A's in downtown San Jose. Reed did vote for the ballpark EIR study and I came away from several meetings thinking the Reed would go with the downtown site if that's all the A's wanted, but as we now know from the larger scope of the A's plans, the site itself won't be enough.
• Proposition 90, the eminent domain compensation measure, was defeated. A similar measure passed in Oregon two years ago and resulted in billions of dollars of compensation claims against local and state governments. Prop 90 wouldn't have been relevant in the Fremont Pacific Commons situation, but should that fail and the A's look elsewhere, it could come to the forefront.

More on transportation later today.

Selig to visit next week, announcement coming?

Update (10:22 PM) - Matier and Ross chime in. I've now heard 35,000, 40,000, and now 36,000 as the capacity. Ray Ratto also makes sure that Fremont knows its place in the pecking order.

Update (3:05 PM) - Paul T. Rosynsky and Chris De Benedetti report that the press conference could take place at Cisco headquarters in San Jose. And MLB spokesman Richard Levin chimed in on the city name issue:

"There are no rules on the books (regarding names),'' said Richard Levin, spokesman for Major League Baseball. "It is something the commissioner would have to deal with.''

Cue the commish.

Update (2:48 PM) - Barry Witt reports that Lew Wolff will meet with Fremont City Council members this week to give them a sneak peek at the Pacific Commons development plans.

KCBS sports reporter and one-time fill-in radio play-by-play man Steve Bitker has learned that "the Oakland Athletics will soon announce plans to move the club to Fremont, and build a new stadium complex there." In addition, MLB commish Bud Selig will fly in next week, probably to give it his blessing. Selig and the MLB office have been uncharacteristically quiet regarding the A's efforts. That's a sharp contrast from the Marlins' situation, which appears to have MLB instead of the team negotiating directly with the pols.

With the expectation that Cisco officials will also be present, Fremont may be the place for the announcement. The forecast for November 14: Scattered showers. Apropos?

Bitker's scoop is an interesting one. As a tenured Bay Area media guy and former A's employee he's got tons of access to local sports franchises, but he has "inside baseball" going the other way too. His wife, Alice Lai-Bitker, just happens to be Alameda County District 3 Supervisor.

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In other news, the San Jose Earthquakes/Oakland A's South Bay office will officially open this Wednesday, November 6. Check out Soccer Silicon Valley for more details.

MLB to Vegas is dead, says Goodman

Not much has been heard from the Vegas camp for several months. In SI writer Ian Thomsen's Inside the NBA column, flamboyant mayor Oscar Goodman talks about Sin City's prospects for a pro sports franchise, namely a NBA team such as the Kings. While commissioner David Stern's stance on not allowing a team in Vegas until the city's casinos take NBA games off the books hasn't changed, Goodman will keep trying, starting with selling the experience of the sure-hit 2007 All Star Weekend.

What about baseball? I'll let the following blurb speak for itself (quotes attributed to Goodman):

On Major League Baseball, which two years ago appeared to be the frontrunner to move a team to Las Vegas:

"It died. I spoke to (baseball commissioner Bud) Selig because the Marlins had come out to see me and I wanted to pursue that. They called me and they said that Selig didn't want them talking to me. I called (the commissioner's office) up and verified that, and I wasn't about to make an enemy. I've had (NFL commissioner Paul) Tagliabue that I've had to contend with, so I didn't want to make an enemy out of Selig too.''

So much for the Vegas conspiracy. Oooh, here's one: Selig was really saying that in not allowing the Marlins to talk to Goodman, he's reserving the A's to pursue Vegas. R-i-i-i-ght.

Coliseum, BART, and other news

Oakland's City Council unanimously approved the A's lease extension at the Coliseum. The Alameda County Board of Supervisors is next.

The Federal Transit Administration approved the Warm Springs BART extension's environmental impact statement. According to the article, the project is $145 million short of its funding target. Rising costs may push that figure above $200 million. WSX is still not considered viable unless the San Jose extension is also approved. The approval will allow for right-of-way acquisition and power line rerouting.

Hennepin County (MN) is proceeding with eminent domain proceedings against existing landowners at the projected downtown Minneapolis ballpark site.

St. Louis and the Cards unveiled its vision of the Ballpark Village to be built next to the new Busch Stadium.

Meet the new flagship, KIFR

The A's announced that CBS station KIFR-106.9 (Free FM) will be the FM flagship starting next season. Many had been rooting for this move for a while, especially because around this time last year KIFR boosted its signal from a paltry 3 kW to 80 kW. Before you start running around claiming the A's are torching the blowtorch, keep in mind that AM signal properties are better for night coverage and KNBR's status as a clear channel station puts it in an enviable position regardless of signal strength.

Still, this is a huge improvement since KIFR's North Bay reach will be much better than what was coming out of the two Peninsula-based stations, KYCY-1550 and KNTS-1220. It remains to be seen how much CBS will stick with the youth-oriented format. Does this set the stage for a change to sports talk? Or youth-geared sports talk? Hopefully KIFR will be a better promotional vehicle than the A's have had on radio the last few years.

There's one nice little side benefit to having an FM station - Comcast digital cable carries it. Except, inexplicably, KIFR. At least that's the case in the South Bay.

A suggestion: Build the museum ASAP

Last week I drove by Pacific Commons and went to Brandin Court, where a front company for Maritz-Wolff bought much of the cul-de-sac. I noticed that one of the buildings was vacant, so I decided to do a little research. The building's address is 5070 Brandin Ct. (assessor's map in PDF), and according to this listing it has over 53,000 square feet of space.

According to the listing the building is "Under New Ownership" and has "Exterior and Interior Renovations in Progress" even though I didn't see any cars out front. It has an anonymously blah exterior, as would be expected of most Silicon Valley office parks. As a structure designed to hold both office and light industrial/manufacturing operations, much of the building does not have windows.

The Fremont office market is not hurting too badly at this point, so the owners should be able to find a tenant at some point if they haven't already. If/when the land deal for the rest of Pacific Commons is done, there's a particularly novel application just waiting if no tenant comes:

Use the building as a tentative site for a baseball museum.

Why not? Yes, ownership would undoubtedly lose money at first, but it's an extremely good way to build a rapport with existing and future fans. I went to the Baseball as America exhibit at the Oakland Museum of California last year, and as impressed as I was with the collection, I also came away asking myself, "Why isn't there a local baseball museum?" Sure, the A's have been criminal for not adequately touting their history, but the Giants don't have a museum either even though they're constantly talking about their own history. In fact, not only is there no baseball museum in California, there's nothing west of the Rockies. The Hispanic Heritage Baseball Museum had been trying to get a home in San Francisco since 2002 but little has come of their efforts (Citgo is working with the HoF on a Latin American traveling show). Are you as surprised as I am that no baseball museum exists nearby? The Bay Area Sports Hall of Fame is well-intentioned but its plaques and monuments are spread out all over the Bay Area.

In March it was reported that a baseball museum would be part of the A's Pacific Commons development. That little heralded nugget may be the best part of the package because it would present the A's a unique opportunity to finally acknowledge the franchise's rich, 106-year history (38 years in Oakland) with something tactile and permanent. 5070 Brandin Court would of course be a temporary home until a proper museum could be built closer to the ballpark. In the meantime, the intervening years could be used for fundraising efforts, to gather collections, and to focus the scope of the museum properly. Consider the possible categories:

• A's franchise history
• The old Pacific Coast League
• Bay Area baseball legends and notables
• WWII and its effect on baseball
• Broadcasting wing with nods to Bill King, Lon Simmons, Bill Rigney, et al
• How technology has changed baseball and how we experience baseball
• Sabremetrics
• The usual kids exhibit - "Physics of a curveball" and other topics
• Existing Cooperstown exhibits

If you visited Baseball as America you'll see that some of these ideas were covered by the collection shown, so I'm not exactly covering new ground. But wouldn't it be nice to have something permanent and at the same time more expansive? The only limitation is the amount of depth that the A's want covered. Some intriguing issues:

• How is the steroids era treated?
• Is the museum A's-only?
• Do the A's attempt to work with the Giants?

The Rangers operate their "Legends of the Game" museum as an all-encompassing collection rather than one that trumpets the team's history (admittedly, the Rangers/Senators history is not that rich). Having a museum open well before anything else would be a fantastic way to get people into the Pacific Commons area early. Not only would they see A's tradition on display, but ownership could have a development sales office next door (if anyone's interested in buying a condo). I'd be willing to help out (with the museum, that is).

Cisco at the ballpark, in your home, etc...

There's a lot of mystery surrounding Cisco's intentions regarding the ballpark. Now that the Arena in Oakland has been renamed "Oracle" would a new ballpark be named simply "Cisco"? Cisco Field? Cisco Park? Cisco Grounds? Cisco Yard(s)? Cisco Athletics Park? There's the remote possibility that Cisco won't be involved in the naming rights - but if Mark Purdy is right, Cisco is in it deep.

The innards of the ballpark will serve as a major showcase of Cisco technologies. While most acknowledge Cisco's role as a manufacturer of infrastructure products such as routers and switches, Cisco has been making inroads into the home market with its Linksys brand of networking gear and last year's purchase of set top box manufacturer Scientific Atlanta. They've also gone extremely high end when yesterday Cisco unveiled their six-figure video conferencing product, TeleConference. The Bentley-Rolls version has three huge, 1080p (full HD) screens on one side of a table while "you and your team" are on the other side of the table. This will be a trial balloon for eventually cheaper, consumer-focused video conferencing and VoIP (Voice over IP) telephony products.

How could this stuff be featured in a ballpark? I'm no marketing whiz, but besides the obvious high tech touches such as WiFi and in-seat ordering, there's potential for other interesting uses:

• Alternate Broadcasts. Do you think you can do a better job than the A's current TV play-by-play men, Tim Roye and Glen Kuiper? How about using a special booth set up to stream your version of play-by-play and commentary to a select audience? Want to have a broadcast entirely from the bleachers? It would be possible. Broadcast pros would no doubt wince at the idea, but it's a novel way to hit a niche audience (and prove how difficult the job really is).
• "TiVo" at your seat. A fan could bring or rent an iPod-like device (with WiFi and a bigger screen, of course) that would have the entire game broadcast streamed and archived to it. Want to see that controversial replay they won't show on the big screen? No problem. Interested to see if The Gambler had pine tar on his left hand when he stunk up the joint in his last regular season start against the Blue Jays (hmmm, look at that picture)? It's available instantly from MLB.TV's archives.

Cisco CEO John Chambers brought up technology in a ballpark setting in a speech at Oracle's OpenWorld on Tuesday:

The individual would gain entry to the ballpark via an e-ticket on their smart phone. Digital signs inside the ballpark, if authorized by the smart phone, could display advertising tailored to the person's likes. Once in the game, the individual could use their wireless-enabled ultramobile PC to keep score on the device's electronic scorecard or hit its instant replay icon to view a contentious play.

Restaurants at the ballpark could use Cisco's newly announced TelePresence videoconferencing system to show the game on huge screens and allow diners to contact remote friends to watch along with them.

Cisco is partnering with AT&T on TeleConference, and the cable market has been turned upside down since the Governator signed AB 2987, which opens the doors for all sorts of competition in the cable TV market - including phone companies that sponsored the bill.

A video of the Cisco's presentation at OpenWorld is available at cnet. The preso is awash in A's logos and imagery, enough to make me think that they might try some of this stuff out in the Coliseum first.

New CBA equals minor changes

Details were announced on the new five-year deal struck between MLB and MLBPA. Some important points:

• As expected, contraction did not rear its ugly head.
• There was no major revamp of the amateur draft to include certain foreign players.
• A reduced form of free agent loss compensation remains in place. Type A free agents will now be the top 20% of their position (down from top 30%), and Type B will be 21-40% of their position (down from 31-50%). Type C free agents no longer mandate compensation. Upshot: The A's will get something out of losing Barry Zito.
• The luxury tax levels stay the same, but the tax threshold has increased to $148 million next year with 4.7% annual increases throughout the life of the CBA. Unless the Red Sox or Mets really went crazy, the only team that would consistently hit the threshold would be the Yankees.
• Citing the increase of non-local revenue leaguewide, the revenue sharing formula has changed, with each team set to contribute 31% (down from 34%) of their net local revenues minus "actual stadium expenses" (i.e. rent or debt service).
• League minimum salary increases from $327,000 to $380,000, with $10,000 increases thereafter.
• Drug policy remains the same and now officially runs concurrent with the CBA. Selig will cite his "blood test study" until he retires.
• The questionable rule that gives World Series home field advantage to the league that wins the All Star Game remains intact.

The new CBA should not change much things for the A's since they only undergo incremental payroll raises. It'll be interesting to see what happens with the Yanks because their radio deal with WCBS has just expired.

Deconstructing the Coliseum, Part II: Stadium Height

In the first installment of this series, I wrote about how the round multipurpose bowl shape was ill-suited for baseball. This time, the discussion topic is height. In this case, I can proudly say that the Coliseum has far more positives than negatives. There's much that works well in the Coliseum when it comes to vertical circulation. The few negative aspects stem from the fact that the venue was built decades before the implementation of ADA rules. Unfortunately, much of what works for the Coliseum can't be used in new ballparks because of specific feature requirements.

You may have noticed that the drawings I posted on Thursday did not show the eastside stands, or "Mt. Davis" as it's typically called. Since the addition was built almost solely for football, it's nearly pointless to use it as part of the discussion. However, Mt. Davis provides a good reference point as it showcases huge differences between how ballparks and football stadia are designed.

Mt. Davis has a lot more in common with Gillette Stadium or Heinz Field than any ballpark, past or present. There are three levels of luxury suites, all having seats safely encased in climate controlled spaces. The plaza or mezzanine level is an exclusive club seating area. Cantilevered decks or overhangs are largely non-existent. The first row of the upper deck on Mt. Davis is roughly the same height as the top row of the upper deck in the original bowl. I've always wondered why the Raiders never placed sherpas at the base of each upper deck tunnel.

One thing rarely discussed about the Coliseum is how easy it is to travel between the three decks in the original seating bowl. Plaza level seats can be reached using either the lower or upper concourses. The upper concourse also serves the View level. Anyone sitting in the upper deck could get to the lower deck in 5 minutes by simply descending a few sets of stairs. Undoubtedly, this encouraged the informal seat trade-up policy so frequently used by upper deck dwellers (and conversely reviled by ownership). This practice was so frowned upon that at least one modern stadium, New Comiskey Park (US Cellular Field), was designed to segregate fans by seating level. Recently, teams and architects have started to see the value in allowing fans to circulate more throughout a concourse - the better to expose fans to concessions. Vertical circulation is still somewhat difficult due to exclusive club and suite levels, though in the concept I'm working on their may be a solution to that dilemma - that's for another time.

The next several graphics show both the Coliseum (in color) and the concept (outlines) in profile. Two perspectives are used: behind the plate, and behind third base.

As shown in the previous set of drawings, the two models are comparable behind the plate. While the concept's seats are closer to the field horizontally, the closure of the View level makes the Coliseum's seats closer overall. Now see what happens at the hot corner:

Once again, the horizontal distance plays a huge factor. The total distance to the top row of the concept's upper deck is 213 feet, while the top row of the Coliseum's plaza level is 221 feet from third base. Worse, the overhang from the luxury suites is so bad that fans at the top of the plaza level have virtually no view of the sky. The following table compares various distances.

The overhang problem isn't limited to Plaza level seats. The back four rows of the Field level are pretty bad too, especially if you're down the foul lines a bit, say Section 106 or 128. You have to contend with the overhang and the auxiliary scoreboard, which drops another 2 feet from the bottom of the Plaza level. If you're seated in those sections it's not that bad, but stand up and suddenly everything changes. These days, a couple of changes have been made to stadium design to help. Fan complaints about these overhangs force a few extra vertical feet into the plan, but ADA design guidelines mandate more vertical space. This is because wheelchair-bound fans are supposed to be able to have a clear line of sight over standing fans two rows ahead of them. The way to do this is to elevate the wheelchair rows an extra 18-30 inches above the row in front of them. If you've ever sat in the Coliseum's bleachers, you'll see those aluminum platforms in most of the wheelchair rows. This was done exactly for the reason cited above. It can be said that the original bowl's wheelchair seating placement would not work in a modern day stadium design.

All of this may sound like nitpicking, but it all conspires to add the equivalent of one or two stories onto the height of the stadium. Inevitably, the fans who pay the biggest price are the ones in the nosebleed sections.

Speaking of nosebleeds, whoever decided that the first row should be wide enough for circulation deserves a tongue lashing. It's one thing to to have a rail as an obstruction, but traffic should not be another. That's probably another reason why the View level was closed. I remember seeing staff that were directed to sell the seats above row 4 first because they had fewer obstructions. I can't think of another stadium in the country in which the first row is also used for circulation, and I've been to dozens of them.

Suiteholders pay a price too, though it's not as steep. In the Coliseum's case, suites in the original bowl are inferior to most other Bay Area venues' suites. They don't have separate restrooms. They're cramped. They don't have their own entries, concourses, or elevators. Problem is, if you design a separate concourse into the plan, that easy vertical circulation is eliminated. Then again, maybe that's what they want...

The Coliseum may have plenty of warts, but it's fantastic when it comes to height conservation and vertical circulation. The seats aren't too steep. It's easy to move between levels. Sadly, it doesn't work well in today's MLB. Don't expect this to carry over into the new ballpark.

Killion pleads for Magowan to cash in & Warriors + Oracle = deal

The type of column written by Ann Killion in today's Merc was bound to happen sooner or later. Colleague Mark Purdy had been pushing in this general direction. Both are now arguing that the Giants should relinquish territorial rights for the health of the franchise, or else they won't get anything if/when the A's move to Fremont and effectively encroach on the South Bay.

Killion asked Wolff about territorial rights while both were in Detroit for the ALCS last week:

Wolff completely dismissed any lingering idea of moving the A's to San Jose -- a step that would require a deal with the Giants over territorial rights.

``That's over,'' Wolff said. ``Dead. Over. I'm not going to waste one more ounce of energy on it.''

And that statement is important, whether you believe Wolff or not. The A's have been in full-on sales mode regarding the new ballpark/village concept for some time now. At this point details are very important, especially the site. While San Jose may be more desirable for some in the Valley, the obstacles are enormous and it's possible that the financing plan being applied to the Fremont site can't work in San Jose without major modifications and delays.

Supposedly, the rub is that the Giants in the post-Bonds era could be in such dire financial straits that they may be looking for a bailout of sorts. Don't believe it. While Bay Area fans can argue for days about Brian Sabean's competency as Giants GM, the Giants will get enough players or stars to bring out a minimum of interested fans. A $75-85 million payroll allows for this - see Seattle for proof. That doesn't mean the Giants will be good, but they will at least have one overpriced slugger and probably one overpaid arm. Who knows, they may get rid of Sabean and overpay for a GM.

The idea that the Giants are going to be hemorrhaging money for the next decade is ludicrous. Let's remember some key facts about their operations:

• They may have $20 million in debt service every year, but they can write off about $5-7 million of that thanks to MLB's stadium operations expenses deduction.
• They're past the sixth year of their tenancy at China Basin, and officials have admitted that they can pull in 34,000 per game and still remain financially healthy. Below that, and they'd have to slash payroll a bit. Use this as a guide: each drop of 1,000 per game equates to $2.5 million in revenue. Even if they were to keep the entire amount (which they don't thanks to revenue sharing) that amount wouldn't even pay for a marginal player. If the G-men were to average less than 25,000 per game, then I'd be concerned. I don't see this happening.
  
• Thanks to vested interests in both KTVU and KNBR, the Giants can hide ad revenue and local broadcast rights fees. In 2003, a season after the Giants went to the World Series, they reported non-gate revenue of $78 million. The A's reported $75 million. Who's kidding whom?
  
• If it really does become dire straits for the Giants, they can do what the A's have been doing for years: suck on the teat of revenue sharing, if only temporarily.
  

Besides, even if the two teams actually got to the point of discussing the actual value of territorial rights, where would they begin? An immediate one-time cash infusion won't help since the Giants apparently can't pay off the debt early. Why would A's ownership want to buy the proverbial cow (territorial rights) if they can get the milk for free? Fremont creates a very compelling revenue trifecta for the A's:

• They could secure better bond interest rates because revenue streams to secure the bonds would not be tied solely to stadium revenue (the Giants struggled with this initially). Entitlements would pick up a majority if not all of the cost.
• Through some clever organizational setup (hiding revenue), the A's could still have the aforementioned stadium expenses deduction even though their stadium-related debt load would be near zero.
• Not having to pay the Giants while having similar access to Valley companies equates to increased dividends for the owners - ahem - or increased payroll.
  

Both the A's and Giants would have interesting advantages in the Bay Area market if everything stayed status quo. The Giants would have the vertical integration that comes with media ownership stakes, while the A's would have little debt on a brand new stadium. Without delving too deeply into the numbers, I'd say that's a Wash.

---

The Warriors and the Coliseum JPA have finally hooked a big one for their naming rights deal: Redwood Shores database giant Oracle. Two interesting things about the deal: 1) It's only 10 years long, and 2) the venue will be simply called "The Oracle" with no apparent reference to Oakland. 10 years is a virtual blink of the eye in naming rights terms, and it doesn't cover the remaining balance on the expected naming rights fee contribution to the arena renovation's debt service. Perhaps there's an option that could be exercised by Oracle. Regarding the name, I suppose it's "fitting" that if the team doesn't have Oakland in the name, the venue doesn't have to either.

Deconstructing the Coliseum, Part I: The Bowl Shape

This is the first article of a new series called "Deconstructing the Coliseum." The purpose is not to trash it or spit on it, for the Coliseum has served its purpose admirably over the years. Instead, my goal is to educate readers of this site on what to potentially expect from a new ballpark, and how it compares with the current situation and other ballparks as well. The first part of this task is explaining where the Coliseum succeeds and fails.

The idea came from my re-reading Philip Bess's excellent paean to urban ballparks, City Baseball Magic. Bess, an accomplished architect, professor, and noted baseball architecture critic, put together an alternative plan to the new Comiskey Park (a.k.a. US Cellular Field) called Armour Field. Armour Field harkened back to the first ballpark building boom in the early 20th century and had many similarities to Manhattan's long departed Polo Grounds. As part of the plan, he compared Armour Field's dimensions and layout to the HOK-planned Comiskey, which itself was an updated version of Kansas City's Kauffman (née Royals) Stadium, considered the hallmark of baseball stadium design during the late 80's. (Oh how things change!) While Comiskey was hailed when it first opened, it only took a year before its gleam was eclipsed by the first true Neoclassic ballpark, Camden Yards. In the intervening years, Comiskey was rightly bashed for its steep and recessed upper deck and its three levels of suites and club seats. It was also criticized for its initially symmetrical dimensions, which I personally didn't have a problem with because at least they weren't contrived. In the intervening years, Comiskey has under gone renovations, chief among them the lopping off of the top eight rows of seats - a nod to increasing scarcity and the vertigo-inducing scary nosebleed rows up there.

Prior to my re-reading City Baseball Magic, I had been working on a new ballpark model. Since we lack a specific ballpark model other than the high-concept drawings shown in August 2005, I figured I'd put my own together to create a similar alternative concept. Like the Wolff-360 plan, it has:

• 35,000 seats
• 40 luxury suites and 40 mini (4-6 person) suites
• Expansive club area
• Hotel/Apartments
• Party Suites
• Two decks (sort of)
• Increased intimacy

Bess's book got me to overlay my concept over the Coliseum. What I found was rather surprising. While we all know that the Coliseum's round shape is not ideal for baseball, this overlay really illustrates the problem. But first, let's take a look at the baseline - the Coliseum footprint.

Like the old cookie-cutter stadia, the Coliseum is based on a series of concentric circles, the smallest of which is a 400-foot ring where the field meets the first row of seats. Using 400 feet as a guide makes sense because a football field is 360 feet long, while a baseball field's dimensions are 330-400 feet excluding foul territory. The give-and-take required penalizes spectators of either sport in a multitude of ways, many of which I'll get into later.

The Green area represents the field and its quirky dimensions. Yellow represents the lower deck (Field level), Red the mezzanine (Plaza level), and Blue the upper deck (now closed View level). Yes, it is to scale (approximately), and it's based on estimates and measurements I've made in the bowl over the last several years.

Now let's strip it back to just the lower deck and overlay the first deck of my (unnamed) concept:

Take a look at the how many seats are in the green area. You may be asking where the rest of the lower deck seats are. The next graphic shows the rest of those seats.

In this case, the concept is still far superior to the Coliseum because of the shortened distance to the field. Even the small area where the Coliseum has closer seats, the backstop, was only created because of a design quirk that caused the "notch" in the bowl. This affirms the notion that those sections behind the plate (x15-x19) are some of the best in baseball. Unfortunately, everything else pales in comparison.

Next, let's compare at the upper tiers.

This has the concept's upper deck overlaid with the closed View level. Notice how the concept's upper deck actually fits within most of the front rim of the View level. In the seats down the line, this translates to fans being as much as 70 feet closer, more than the distance between pitcher and hitter. Since the View level is closed, it may make sense to use the Plaza level in the comparison instead. The next graphic shows what such a comparison looks like.

Here, the concept is also better though the differences aren't as vast. But that's still remarkable considering the fact that the Plaza level was never built to be used as an upper deck. It sheds light on the compromises made when using a circular stadium design.

I remember taking some friends to an opening night game a decade ago. We sat in the third or fourth row of section 323. It was one friend's first time at the Coliseum, and the first comment he made was, "Man, are we far." Far, indeed.

Tomorrow, I'll cover height as it relates to the Coliseum.

Expect to go over budget

Over the weekend, DC area architect Roger K. Lewis wrote a column for the Washington Post that serves as a primer for the ballpark construction process - in this case the Nats' new park. The piece does not cover political squabbles or the financing component. Nevertheless, it's a short, handy thumbnail sketch what should be expected to occur once shovels hit dirt.

The main points to cover:

Project size or scope increases. This results from changing needs, shifting market or financial conditions, or more stringent regulatory requirements.

When this is applied to the A's-Pacific Commons situation, it's easy to see that this will be the biggest factor. The relatively smaller size of the ballpark should make that component cheaper to construction, but once you add adjacent projects such as the hotel/condo building, museum, and other features, the price tag goes up quickly. Perhaps one of the goals is to have each of these units, including the ballpark, act as autonomous, self-running entities, which are to be funded and operated separately. The danger in this approach is that if one of these units doesn't "pencil out" initially, construction could be delayed until that unit evolves into something more feasible.

Field testing reveals unanticipated site conditions. Soil borings may disclose organic fill, clay, rock or groundwater. Undocumented utilities, structures or residual toxic chemicals may lurk below the surface. Hidden structural problems may be uncovered in buildings being renovated. Always expensive to remedy, unforeseen site problems may seriously delay a project and can blow the budget.

This shouldn't be a problem at Pacific Commons as a thorough EIR has already been written and much of it (relative to pre-existing conditions) should be applicable to the new project. The only thing being done on the site is the construction of a flood control culvert to replace a filled-in channel, and that was part of the original project.

Building material price escalation exceeds predictions. Project budgets are sensitive to the cost of basic building materials -- wood, concrete, steel, aluminum -- that are market commodities. Inflation affecting a building's major components -- mechanical, plumbing, electrical and lighting systems -- also can wreck a budget, as can rising costs for exterior wall assemblies, windows and doors, interior partitions, ceilings and flooring.

It's difficult to forecast the prices of steel and concrete 3-4 years from now, but at least this project will avoid the materials shortage that hit nationwide after Hurricane Katrina. With a ballpark, just about anything can be redesigned with an emphasis on value engineering, from the facade to the seats to the restroom fixtures or the scoreboards. The net result of value engineering, when done in excess, is the appearance of cheap materials or cutting corners, as was apparently the case in the new Busch Stadium.

The construction labor market heats up. The law of supply and demand governs the building industry. When contractors are flush with work and skilled labor is in short supply, prices rise. When construction slows and contractors are hungry, prices fall. Because project planning and design can last years after initial budget adoption, a busier construction market inevitably increases costs.

This is another factor that's difficult to forecast. The housing slowdown forecast for the East and South Bay for the next few years could keep the labor market friendly, but it could also make the financing mechanism (sale of entitlements) more difficult to execute. Though we're in a down period, new home sales all over the Bay Area are still good, which could mitigate things a bit. As far as big projects, there are high rises planned in both downtown Oakland and downtown San Jose. If the legal issues clear up, the Estuary/O29 project will be huge. A large amount of the SF Mission Bay project will be winding up by the end of the decade. Some of the larger tech companies will be building bigger and bigger campuses. And there's no telling how much infill housing will be started in the Bay Area.

But what of the "other" required stuff, such as parking? It may be advantageous to keep a ground lease for land destined for parking, but what form will the facility take? Garages are much more expensive to build than simply paved surface lots, and they may have limited use for the cost. On the other hand, surface parking tends to be an extremely inefficient use of land - even in a place where the developers may have up to 160 acres at their disposal. Which approach wins, and who pays for it?