urbanSTL

By enormous event, I assume that means 1/8 of the dome seating at best. That is actually pretty big for the dome nowadays.



I searched for the events scheduled for the dome in February 2019 that killed St. Louis's Alliance for American Football league entry. I found 3 events in February 2019 -- The Boat Show, an Ultimate Frisbee Event, and a United Methodist convention.
I doubt if any of these use more than a tiny fraction of the permanent seats in the dome.

I was wondering how the league was able to get the Mercedes Benz Dome in Atlanta in February 2019, right after the Super Bowl there. Turns out they aren't going there -- at least for now. Instead they are using the 24K seat outdoor Georgia State University stadium. All the stadia they are using are outdoors in the South, or the Alamodome. The Liberty Bowl in Memphis might be a bit chilly in February.

BTW, they list Mike Martz as the head coach of the San Diego team.

I meant it more that it's enormous for Downtown as a whole, not just the Dome. While DCI and BOA might not fill the stadium all that much (comparatively speaking), they each still bring 10,000+ people to the city/region. For BOA that 10,000+ is also spread out over two days of competition. Many of those people (for both events) will have to be housed in hotels in the region and some will shop/dine at local places, and some may even see some sights. All in all it's a pretty decent amount of money coming in to the local economy.

These are great opportunities to leave lasting, positive impressions with lots of out-of-towners.

Trololzilla wrote: ↑

Jul 16, 2018

DCI Midwestern Championship was last night. Pretty good turnout too; almost every seat available for sale was filled, I just didn't really have a good vantage point to really check it out as I was on the Club Level. Fantastic event, as expected (again, I cannot recommend it highly enough), and it went off without any major issues and everyone was enjoying the event, the venue, and the locale as far as I could tell. Had tons of guests from all over Missouri alone (including many from the KC area) and many, many more from out of state. I would expect a similar or better turnout for next year, and honestly wouldn't be at all surprised if it gets extended beyond the initial 3-year commitment.

I would echo that sentiment. I was there, and it was a great turnout. Lower-level concourse was packed. Not quite as many people in the seats as some of the marching band competitions in the fall, but I suspect that's because only a very small percentage of the performers in DCI are from the local area. It really is a great event, and it brings in more out-of-towners than those unfamiliar with the activity might expect. I saw some of them exploring downtown the following morning on my walk to work.

It was good to see the Dome in use again. It seemed better maintained than I had feared. I even snuck up to the top level (which was closed except to press) during intermission, and, other than being eerily empty, it looked fine. I was half expecting to be walking through cobwebs since I'm not sure when the last event that needed that space was.

^ that looks like a lot of fun. i hope they were at least a little impressed with their time outside the dome as well.

shadrach wrote: ↑

Jul 25, 2018

I just hope there was 20 minutes of football played at the halfway point in this event.

Heh! And every high school football team in the state has to compete for a chance to get into that halftime show. (And that's when everyone goes to the concession stands.) Nice!

Trololzilla wrote: ↑

Aug 27, 2018

Oof:
'There aren't a lot of people': St. Louis’ convention business falls 20%

As someone pointed out somewhere else, most large conventions are typically scheduled at least 3-4 years in advance. This might be an echo effect of the Ferguson agitation.

Hopefully three brand new boutique hotels within a 10 minute walk of the convention center will be a bit of an attraction for Conventions as well.
I've heard that some conventions are concerned with the lack of downtown hotel rooms. Can anyone confirm? I think that the three new hotels still won't compensate for Millennium. And during some of the biggest conventions (FIRST, whatever that pyramid scheme company was), some visitors were staying at hotels in downtown Clayton and taking the Metro.

I think the fact that they haven't expand the ballroom space nor have come up plan to incorporate/improve the space between the convention hall & dome itself is impacting their ability to attract in a very competitive market. At a minimum they should have figured out how to buy out and control the private garage right smack in the middle of everything

Can't help to think that the county/Stenger's focus on Blues practice facility and being the county hoping to be next youth sports meccas instead of the convention space doesn't help. The city not much help either when you consider the focus on trying to keep the Rams and then a MLS stadium. In other words, politicians doing a good job of not doing anything to the determent to CVC.

An expansion and renovations are planned. Price tag could approach $350 Million. The announcement will be at 2:30 today

Happy to see the county and city working together on this. It seems like that has been happening more often lately.

^ I wonder with the new properties in possession if they made a deal with the owner of the parking garage tucked in the convention center. This seems like a no brainer to swap ownership of parking garages, knock the one down that is tucked in between everything and add on the much needed ballroom space while you work through the rest of the upgrades

On the closure of 9th street:
Obviously, an expansion to the east would have been highly preferable, removing the garage and the lot behind The Laurel. Fortunately this is always a possibility in the future.

I understand that this was pretty unavoidable. I prefer this over the expansion north of the dome that they proposed several years ago. But if they're going to close 9th, I'd really like to see 10th street become 2-way. Preferably 11th as well and preferably as far south as Market. South of Market, the entrances to 40 work pretty well with 1-ways and frankly don't have the pedestrian numbers to make a reversion necessary.

aprice wrote: ↑

Oct 03, 2018

On the closure of 9th street:
Obviously, an expansion to the east would have been highly preferable, removing the garage and the lot behind The Laurel. Fortunately this is always a possibility in the future.

I understand that this was pretty unavoidable. I prefer this over the expansion north of the dome that they proposed several years ago. But if they're going to close 9th, I'd really like to see 10th street become 2-way. Preferably 11th as well and preferably as far south as Market. South of Market, the entrances to 40 work pretty well with 1-ways and frankly don't have the pedestrian numbers to make a reversion necessary.

With 9th street proposed to close, wouldn't that alter the newly presented plans for the N/S metrolink route?

I'd be really surprised if we don't get a brand new Holiday Inn out of this proposal. A parcel that has almost exclusive rights to the plaza and the hall. Even with the new hotels going in Downtown, I think they could double the number of rooms with that location.