Posted on 07/26/2016 2:15:46 PM PDT by Sopater
Friday's grand opening of U.S. Bank Stadium, the $1.1 billion new home of the National Football League's Minnesota Vikings, was marred by a bit of vandalism. The façade of the new stadium was damaged last week when a vandal tossed a rock through one of the hundreds of glass panels that cover every inch of the stadium's exterior.
The result: a hole big enough for a small human to crawl through, according to the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. The 10-foot-by-five-foot exterior glass panel was smashed, though an interior panel did not break.
The newspaper said stadium security suspect the rock responsible for the damage was part of a "pile of decorative rock" located adjacent to the stadium's north side.
You have to wonder about the wisdom of leaving "piles of decorative rock" next to billion-dollar rendition of a Jawa sandcrawler covered in glass. It makes a very inviting target if you find it pleasant to break something from time to time, or if you're frustrated by the expense of the publicly funded stadium and want to make Austrian economic parables come to life.
That's because U.S. Bank Stadium, like many of today's taxpayer-funded professional playgrounds, is itself a giant testament to the enduring power of the broken windows fallacy.
Minnesota taxpayers fronted $348 million for the stadium, thanks to legislation signed in 2012 by Gov. Mark Dayton. The same bill required Minneapolis to fund an additional $150 million for the stadium, which the city did by increasing hospitality taxes.
Like the broken window in Bastiat's parable—which points out that economic activity redirected from one "unseen" purpose to another "seen" one, as in when a broken window is repeaired, does not produce a net positive in economic activity—new stadiums don't generate new economic activity, they merely redirect it.
In other words: What could have been done with those millions of dollars had they remained in the hands of Minnesota families and businesses? We'll never know.
But we do know that the stadium is unlikely to generate net economic benefits for the Twin Cities.
"Sports facilities attract neither tourists nor new industry," concluded economists Andrew Zimbalist and Roger G. Noll at the Brookings Institute in a report published nearly two decades ago, as cities across the country were embarking on a stadium-building binge. "A new sports facility has an extremely small (perhaps even negative) effect on overall economic activity and employment."
At the end of the 2010 season, the average public bill for the 121 professional sports stadiums in the United States was $259 million, according to research from the University of Michigan. The same study found that taxpayers lost $31 billion in net economic costs for stadium construction.
A 2012 analysis by Bloomberg found that taxpayers were on the hook for more than $4 billion in bond payments for professional sports stadiums built since 1996.
Yet local governments keep committing big bucks to stadium projects.
In Hartford, Connecticut, local officials have blown through $63 million on a publicly financed stadium and still don't have anything to show for it. In Cobb County, Georgia, county officials had to raise taxes to keep public parks open after spending $400 million on a new stadium for baseball's Atlanta Braves.
The list goes on and on. And on.
Incredibly, the Vikings say it will take up to two months to replace the damaged window at U.S Bank Stadium, since all the glass panels were custom-made. There's no word on how much those massive, custom-made glass panels will cost to replace, but they probably won't be cheap.
Just add that to the tab. Taxpayers in Minnesota are already paying for $16 million in cost overruns (though the Vikings have generously offered to cover $4 million worth) at U.S. Bank Stadium.
At least the glaziers will have work.
I’m sure Braves researched the zip codes of their fans and it turned out most of them are from north of Atlanta. So that’s why they’re building a new stadium in Cobb County.
Since Lambeau Field was renovated, it has attracted more tourists. That translates into more money for the mom and pop sports bars and restaurants surrounding the stadium.
I agree though, that taxpayers shouldn't be responsible for paying for new stadiums. It was Jesse Ventura who said "If they can afford to pay players millions of dollars a year, then they can afford to build their own stadiums."
Tornados are not unknown in that area.
Polycarbonate (Lexan) is used for bulletproof glass. Sometimes just thick sheets of Lexan, other times a sandwich of glass and Lexan.
Well, there ya go.
THANKS.
I’d be suspicious of every owner of glass replacement shops in the city.
Hmmmm.....it DOES look like a Jawa sand crawler.....
http://amgagg.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/gallery2.jpg
The overlords decided that a new stadium would be built. And nothing — certainly not the will of The People — was going to stand in the way. So the stadium was built, and the taxpayers got the bill for it. And will continue to in perpetuity ... until the next liberal elitist decides to tear IT down and build another monument to Louis XVI.
I heard an ex-sailor in 1968 tell of transparent aluminum armor. He saw it in use on a warship of the time.
Nope, polycarbonate. Other than Star Trek variations:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulletproof_glass
Non-sports caring about me that likes history a lot took the Lambeau tour a few years back looking for a break from the Oshkosh airshow.
I learned a bit, the two guides I had were great people, and I spent a little money in Green Bay on lunch, some fuel, and at the railroad museum.
No pro sports team here but USC will spare no expense for the precious sports-chickens. I get sick of hearing universities crying poor while paying big bucks to coaches and building top of the line facilities for ball players when other stuff that is more useful doesn’t get the attention.
Disclaimer I despise “big sports” pro and college.
Curiously, the stadiums “need to be replaced” about the time
that the bonds are paid off for the previous one.
Anyway, little nobody blue collar guys might have had the notion
to lay in some spare panels while the place was being built.
The titled, big desk, college educated power brokers knew that was
not needed.
.
We shall see how Cobb County does on its promised ROI.
Also, now that the ferals know about the glass, expect many more incidents.
Decades of evidence pointing to not only a zero economic impact, but a negative one with tax funded stadiums.
Yes, but Lambeau is more of a pilgrimage stop, and can’t really compare to something new.
Fitting, since the burka women of Minnesota look like Jawas.
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