urbanSTL

Xing,



You know as well as I do that actual distance has nothing to do with mental distance when it comes to events happening in Illinois for those that live in St. Louis County.



You're trying to convince the wrong person that it's a good idea for a location. Tell that to St. Louis County residents who won't be crossing the river to see those games.

"The St. Louis 5-0" - perfect.

STL to get Women's professional soccer team, also led by Jeff Cooper...



http://sports.yahoo.com/sow/news?slug=a ... &type=lgns



http://soccernet.espn.go.com/columns/st ... us&cc=5901

^

Soccer Park.



Now this is a team that should really go by the name the Red Foxes/Redd Foxxes.

From CNNSI.com:

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2007/w ... urn/1.html



MLS wants to add two more teams by the 2010 season, which would mean another franchise in each conference. If the league's preference of a guy like Wolff is any indicator, that would put two movements in the driver's seat:



• One by the owners of the New York Mets, who obviously have the cash and the infrastructure to add a second team in the Big Apple. The New York Times reported that Fred Wilpon and his staff are exploring the idea, and league sources tell me they're taking this one very seriously.



• One in the Pacific Northwest. The league sold the regional rights to Michael Keston, another L.A.-based real estate developer with a similar pedigree to Wolff. He's expected to choose this summer between Seattle or Portland, Ore., as a viable place to build a team. (Or MLS could live dangerously and go with an intriguing consortium in Las Vegas and its proposal for a $500 million roofed stadium in Sin City.)





This could be bad news for the MLS movement here, at least for the short-term future, but it would give Cooper plenty of time to get his stadium/soccer park built, right?

Could happen, but somewhat doubtful that MLS will put another team in NY before addressing other markets, particularly with the Red Bulls' average attendance among the league's worst.



I think we have a pretty good shot -- see the article currently on the front page of the Illinois Business Journal http://www.ibjonline.com/ for an update on emerging plans for a large-scale, mixed-use, new-urbanism development centered around an MLS stadium. Very interesting.

ricke002 wrote:From CNNSI.com:

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2007/w ... urn/1.html



MLS wants to add two more teams by the 2010 season, which would mean another franchise in each conference. If the league's preference of a guy like Wolff is any indicator, that would put two movements in the driver's seat:



• One by the owners of the New York Mets, who obviously have the cash and the infrastructure to add a second team in the Big Apple. The New York Times reported that Fred Wilpon and his staff are exploring the idea, and league sources tell me they're taking this one very seriously.



• One in the Pacific Northwest. The league sold the regional rights to Michael Keston, another L.A.-based real estate developer with a similar pedigree to Wolff. He's expected to choose this summer between Seattle or Portland, Ore., as a viable place to build a team. (Or MLS could live dangerously and go with an intriguing consortium in Las Vegas and its proposal for a $500 million roofed stadium in Sin City.)





This could be bad news for the MLS movement here, at least for the short-term future, but it would give Cooper plenty of time to get his stadium/soccer park built, right?

After doing some very basic research, Hermann Stadium seats roughly 6500. The Dick's Stadium that hosted the MLS all-star game seats roughly 18500. How hard would it be to triple capacity at Hermann, make some other upgrades and bring MLS to SLU. I am all for any project to bring MLS here, but I like the idea of having it all downtown/midtown. With a some work, Hermann could be transformed into an MLS venue and SLU could profit from the investment. I think the views from the field and location in general would make for a great atmosphere. I wish Biondi would look at this as a possibility and do a feasibility study. If not at Hermann, I put 100% support behind the Collinsville project. I think MLS will be big someday and I think St. Louis should be part of it.

^ That sure would trump the Collinsville location. Too bad the investor is from the metro east. There is also no room for youth fields near SLU.

bpe235 wrote:There is also no room for youth fields near SLU.

Seriously? There's room for a dozen fields ON campus!



Really though - great location - basketball parking could double for MLS - easy to get to - maybe bring in some $$ for SLU . . . but who wants to cooperate and create something great when you can just do your own thing?

Grover wrote:

bpe235 wrote:There is also no room for youth fields near SLU.

Seriously? There's room for a dozen fields ON campus!

Yeah! Couldn't Fr. Biondi sacrifice some of those parking lots and urban plazas?

STLeric posted this over on SSP:

Exciting news for St. Louis soccer(football ) fans.



http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/new...E?OpenDocument



http://www.stlouissoccerunited.com/c...page/Itemid,1/

And my reply:

I'm excited that MLS may be coming to the Saint Louis area, but Collinsville? It's a tad far east IMHO. Eyeballing it from google maps, Collinsville is almost as far east from the city as Chesterfield is west. Considering that the vast majority of the Saint Louis Metro is west of the Mighty Miss, it seems a bit improvident to put the "Saint Louis" team there. Should we take what we can get?



The StL Soccer United page is damn sexy though, isn't it?

Discuss.



(EDIT: According to MapQuest, Collinsville is 15.76 miles from StL, while Chesterfield is 21.64 miles from the city [keep in mind though, that you've got to shave off about seven to eight miles from the Chesterfield figure, b/c mapquest makes you drive to downtown before it says you're in "Saint Louis."])



(EDIT the second: looks like people are talking about this in the Metro East forum).

steve wrote:STLeric posted this over on SSP:

Exciting news for St. Louis soccer(football ) fans.



http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/new...E?OpenDocument



http://www.stlouissoccerunited.com/c...page/Itemid,1/

And my reply:

I'm excited that MLS may be coming to the Saint Louis area, but Collinsville? It's a tad far east IMHO. Eyeballing it from google maps, Collinsville is almost as far east from the city as Chesterfield is west. Considering that the vast majority of the Saint Louis Metro is west of the Mighty Miss, it seems a bit improvident to put the "Saint Louis" team there. Should we take what we can get?



The StL Soccer United page is damn sexy though, isn't it?

Discuss.

I think you'll find this topic pretty well hashed out in the prior posts on this topic. The consensus seems to be that while a Missouri site would be terrific, the Collinsville site is probably good as we can hope for given the fact that Cooper is from Illinois and wants to invest in an Illinois team. And actually, upon further reflection, the site isn't all that bad for several reasons, including: (1) easy access to major interstates, (2) a ten-to-fifteen minute drive from downtown in weekend traffic, (3) the fact that there is enough space to build a number of youth soccer fields on the complex, not to mention retail, residential, and business components that make the necessary infastructure investments economically feasible, and (4) the net positive effect Illinois investment has in the area by helping to reestablish downtown as the region's center.



With regard to the Collinsville location being just as far as Chesterfield, perhaps your computer monitor needs cleaning. Google Maps calculates distance and drive time from downtown to the proposed stadium location at approximately 11 miles and 15 minutes respectively. Chesterfield is almost twice as far (approximately 21 miles from downtown) and takes twice as long (around a half hour) to reach.



The plans announced today exceeded my expectations.

I am so pumped about this project. I always thought Real St. Louis would be good name (assuming we'd get Real St. Lake) but ------- St. Louis United?



f-n tight!



And the artwork? I'd die for that logo!haha. It is so tight, yo.





Soccer unites people. St. Louis needs unity to become a top notch city, right?



St. Louis United!





.........where can I buy tickets!!!???



:hyper:

I think Little Egyptian noted in the original post is that there's speculation of the team being called the Knights. Indicating that "United" is more marketing...or something.

There are many teams in Englan's Premier League that are "United" not just Manchester United. There are also many FC's and AC's internationally as well.

In case you haven't seen the logo or the organization's site, here it is:



http://www.stlouissoccerunited.com/



By the way, the logo is AWESOME!!!