mbradleyc wrote:That was always a stupid idea. The Panther Arena and the Auditorium (yeah, Theater, whatever) have to stay. They are important venues.
The Bucks arena is going exactly where it belongs. The end.
I wouldn't go so far to call them important venues. Panther arena is lucky to have the Admirals (and they could still play in the new arena). UWM was previously talking about building their own arena on campus. The Wave are hardly a reason to keep the Panther Arena open.
The theater is doing better but do you know the amount of money invested in a building that is hardly used? I am thinking they could have left the theater too.
Obviously it will cost LED more money to get those sites/properties. They would probably have to build a smaller arena to cover the teams who lost the Panther Arena (which could have been in talks previously).
But now you move everything closer together and make downtown more dense. Granted it is only 2 blocks away from the current site but things become more walkable. You are able to connect the arena the convention center easily. The city has much more leverage and could propose LED help build out the convention center. Then Milwaukee draws conventions of thousands week after week during the summer and other random weekends. Fall/Winter/Spring is for Marquette, Bucks and Admirals. Larger hotels will be built, retail and restaurants/bars will go up because of the increased tourism/conventions. That district would truly be used year round.
It would be a harder hurdle to get over but I still think that is the best site. LED would have to dig deeper into their pockets and take more time to get approval. It is way too late now though.
