49ers Announcement of Move to Santa Clara - Part 1

Thanks to cbs5.com, I was able to view the complete video of the 49ers press conference concerning their stadium relocation to Santa Clara. Yesterday, news came out that Dianne Fienstein had intervened in trying to get the 49ers and Mayor Newsom to discuss the situation. I don't really see this amounting to anything in terms of stopping the relocation. I'll address the political aspects in part 2.

In addressing the issues at hand, the 49ers were very explicit as to why they were planning this move. Based on my own experiences, it is definitely a tough area in terms of public transit and I can see the infrastructure needs the team pointed out. On the one hand I understand why a city would not want to contribute a large amount of public funds to a stadium project. I am of the opinion that it's the equivalent of lighting money on fire and then flushing it down the toilet.

At the same time, since the 49ers are hoping to privately finance their stadium with the mixed-use facilities (hotels, retail, etc.), they shouldn't have to finance such a large infrastructure rebuilding project. As the team pointed out, the project would require either one of the world's largest parking garages, or somehow putting together a massive public transit project. To put it at it's simplest, a huge parking garage would just be lame. I can see how an NBA team or NHL team would do that, but tailgating is essential to football games.

The team repeatedly drove home the point that the most important issue was increasing the game day experience of their fans, before, during and after the game. This would go hand in hand with the increased revenues a new stadium would provide. Even when the team is struggling, the game day experience can be enough to make you forget those struggles.

The important part of all this is how the fans would react. There are two issues at hand. The first and most important is the fact that John York stated emphatically that the team would not leave the "Bay Area." If the team packed up and left obviously the fan reaction would be quite predictable, so we'll assume that Mr. York is telling the truth.

The second issue is people getting to a Santa Clara stadium versus Candlestick Point. I don't own a car and have made extensive use of Bay Area public transportation. Needless to say, commuting down to the South Bay can be relatively convenient. I've taking the rail down to HP Pavilion and Stanford's old stadium and have had no issues whatsoever. True fans will get to a team's new stadium whatever it takes. However, in this case it's possible that it will become even easier if you take public transportation. One can simply look at the new Arizona Cardinals stadium in Glendale, Arizona and the Lions old Silverdome in Pontiac, Michigan. Both are located well outside the city the team is named after and they are able to get fans to come out.

Finally, there is the idea of an emotional attachment to a stadium. Seeing as we are talking about Candlestick/3Com/Monster Park, the only emotional attachment is the idea of this being the place where some great moment's in 49ers history took place. However, great moments occurred at the Boston Garden and they had no problems moving into a new state-of-the-art facility. There will be a new Yankee Stadium as well, and obviously there were some great memories there. The point of this is that people are able to move past emotional attachments when it comes to stadiums. While people may be disappointed the team is moving, I really don't expect someone to chain themselves to Monster Park on moving day.