Mariners question new arena in SoDo neighborhood

The Seattle Mariners say they aren’t just fans of Seattle
baseball – they’re fans of all sports and are in
favor of bringing the NBA back to the Emerald City.

But, the proposed location of an arena that would house an NBA and NHL team seems
to be a point of contention for the residents of Safeco
Field.

In a three-page letter sent to Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn,
King County Executive Dow Constantine and members of the
Seattle City and King County Councils, Mariners chairman
and CEO Howard Lincoln cites logistical concerns as
reasons why SoDo wouldn’t be the right neighborhood for a
new arena.

Safeco Field already experiences scheduling headaches with
its neighbor, CenturyLink Field.

Lincoln says the Mariners
work closely with the Seahawks and the Sounders to avoid
overlapping events, which creates traffic and parking
challenges.

Mariners President Chuck Armstrong said their concerns are regarding the fan experience.

“What we hear more from our fans than anything else is how hard it can be to get to the ballpark with the traffic jams and the gridlock we have already,” said Armstrong. “If you plop another venue down there with 200 event days per year, we just have some serious concerns about how that will all be scheduled.”

Lincoln notes that the city permit conditions
imposed on Safeco Field and CenturyLink Field prohibit
major events from occurring simultaneously and require a
four-hour window between the end of one event and the
start of the next event.

Adding the arena, he says, would only compound the
scheduling problem.

“The key factor is that when Safeco Field was planned and
what’s now Century Link field was planned, the city
imposed conditions on both of us; we can’t have major
events on the same day. We have permit restrictions that
prevent us from having games on the same day,” explained
Bart Waldman, Mariners Executive Vice President of Legal
and Governmental Affairs.

But McGinn, in an interview with 97.3 KIRO FM, says that
the ‘stadium district’ has already been purposed for
housing sports complexes. The SoDo neighborhood has
already gone through extensive public and environmental
review processes when it was created.

Lincoln says site selection is a critical component of the
new arena plans, and that when Safeco Field was more
imagination than reality in 1995, the Mariners looked into
four or five “alternative locations” to their present
home. Lincoln suggests officials should instead consider
Bellevue, Renton, Seattle Center and South Lake Union as
potential homes for a new arena.

The proposal for the arena, however, is Seattle-specific,
says McGinn. “We have a really promising proposal for
Chris Hansen, which involves hundreds of millions of
dollars in private investment and we can self-finance the
arena with the taxes on the arena itself.”

The letter from Lincoln was received by the mayor’s office
Tuesday, on the heels of speculation about the Sacramento
Kings. The team is looking for arena funding of its own,
and its owners say they won’t foot the bill for the team’s
new home.

Back at home, Hansen has been meeting with a panel to
address the concerns that building the complex would bring
to the city and county, as well as what financial burden
the arena bears.

McGinn hasn’t spoken with Hansen since receiving the
letter, but the panel is scheduled to meet on Wednesday to
discuss independent reviews of the arena proposal.

Hansen has said it’s his job to get Seattle prepared to
build the arena as soon as a team becomes available.

“We’ll work with the Mariners on their concerns,” McGinn
says, “but we’re going to keep working with Chris Hansen
and King County on bringing a NBA and a NHL team to our
stadium district in Seattle.”

Waldman also agreed that the Mariners will work with the
city and Hansen if everyone agrees the SoDo neighborhood
is the best fit for an arena.

“If at the end of that process the city decides that
that’s the best place to locate it, we’ll work our hardest
with Chris Hansen and his group and the city to make it
work the best it can.”