I live four
blocks from the Verizon Center in a building that did not exist when I
graduated from college in 2003.
There are three
new apartment buildings going up within two blocks of where I live as I type
this. It has been shocking to return to this area after spending close to a
decade getting my career started in Connecticut and living for four years in
Hartford. I spent many a Friday night happy hour walking past a sad, empty
relic formerly known as the Hartford Civic Center.
When I moved back
to D.C. in summer of 2011, my aunt, who has lived here for years, suggested I
look for apartment in the Chinatown area near the Verizon Center. I laughed it
off.
“Chinatown?” I
asked incredulously. “There’s no way I’m living there.”
That’s because my
vision of the area was from my college days, 1999 through 2003, when the
building was still in its infancy. I went to Caps games, I saw Michael Jordan
play and I lost my shit when
the Rock won the WWF Title – but I never hung around after. Why would I?
There was nothing to do. There wasn’t much to see. The best word for it was seedy.
I came for the game. Then I left.
A decade later,
everything has changed. There are new restaurants and stores and places to live
opening up on a seemingly daily basis. The parking lot across from my building
– normally vacant – is now packed to capacity on weekends here.
Advocating for a
new arena is usually a surefire way to get people mad at you. It’s no secret
that professional sports teams have been using cities like ATM machines for new
stadiums. For the most part, these stadiums are complete wastes that suck money
from municipalities that should be going to schools and infrastructure.
We have been
bombarded by bad ideas.
The Braves’ excursion to Cobb
County is only the latest fiasco. The problem with many of these situations
in large cities is that the current stadium is perfectly acceptable. The team
“needs” a new stadium simply to make more money. Did the Jets and Giants really
need a billion dollar stadium? Did the Yankees really need a recreation of
their ballpark? Would the Vikings have gotten a new arena without holding the
city hostage and threatening to leave?
Let’s be honest –
the NFL is never going to put a team in Los Angeles because it provides them
all the leverage in the world when teams hold cities hostage. Without a
team to threaten them, L.A. has been pretty staunchly against forking over
9 figures for a football stadium.
But what if your
city doesn’t have an arena that is up to standard?
In 2008, while
working for the Hartford Business Journal, I interviewed
officials from Kansas City and Omaha after they had built brand new
arenas without a professional sports team.
"There are so many more expectations in terms
of amenities from performers, athletes and spectators," said Shania Tate
Ross, with the Sprint Center. "You can't compete if you don't have the
most updated arena."
The arena debate
in Hartford was going strong then and it continues today. Most of the debate
centers on whether a new arena would lure
the Hartford Whalers back. It is the pipe dream to end all pipe dreams. I
hear the “Let’s Go Whalers” chants from UConn
football games echoing in my ears as I type now.
Hartford needs an
arena for so much more than a hockey team.
Most importantly,
the city needs to be revitalized. Since I moved to Hartford in January 2008,
all I have heard and read about is how Hartford is coming back. There is a lot
of talk from politicians. There is always optimism shown by the local chamber
groups and economic development folks. But the talk is largely empty because
Hartford doesn’t have anything tangible to point at.
A shiny, new
arena? Now we’re talking.
I am in no way
suggesting that a new arena is going to makeover downtown Hartford overnight –
it took nearly a decade for the area surrounding the Verizon Center to change.
But it would be a
start. Hartford has potential. No, it’ll never be 1986 again, no matter how
hard old-timers in Connecticut wish it to be. That doesn’t mean Hartford cannot
be a great city again.
I was always an
advocate of Hartford when I lived there. It was better than people expected.
But those people, like my parents and other suburbanites, never made it down
there. Once they had an excuse – even if it was just visit me – their opinions
changed. There weren’t enough of those excuses.
When people go to
Hartford now for an event – even if they appreciate the city – they are
confronted with one of the worst arenas in the country. The XL Center is old,
decrepit, small and lacking. It needs to go and a renovation won’t work.
Hartford needs to
blow up the XL Center. It needs to build a better arena. It has needed to for
20 years and counting.
Will it ever
happen?
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