![]() Maybe it’s because the stadium bowl wasn’t a true circle, that the curvy roofline provided some visual interest, or maybe what was cutting edge in 1961 became charmingly retro by 2005. While cookie-cutter stadiums from the 1960s and 1970s were derided by fans as failing to provide decent football or baseball experiences, that wasn’t true at RFK Stadium. Get enough fans jumping around, and the whole stadium shook. In the case of RFK Stadium, the left-field bleachers were moved on tracks, and those bleachers became the equivalent of a stadium bouncy house. Louis, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Oakland, San Diego, Cincinnati, Philadelphia and Atlanta, a circular design allowed for the movement of seating areas depending on the event. In a move copied by designers of other cookie-cutter stadiums in New York City, St. #OAKLAND ARENA PRO#This greatly benefited pro football, where teams had played as lesser tenants in MLB ballparks and college stadiums. Dahl and Osborn Engineering took a quantum leap forward in treating baseball and football equally. That model was pioneered by RFK Stadium, which opened in fall 1961 as home to the NFL’s Redskins and MLB’s Washington Senators. When the Oakland Coliseum was designed, it was part of the cookie-cutter trend in sports facilities, which features a circular design and moveable seating to accommodate both baseball and football. Paul (Met Center and Met Stadium) and Philadelphia (Veterans Stadium and the Spectrum), and the original site plan for Kansas City’s Truman Sports Complex included an arena in addition to the football and baseball facilities. We saw that model used in Minneapolis-St. One such model was a dual-facility approach, including both an arena and a baseball/football venue. The Oakland Seals, then of the WHL, played at what was then known as the Oakland-Alameda County Stadium Arena in 1966-1967 before joining the NHL as part of the landmark 1967 expansion as the California Seals.Įxpansion fever was present in all four major American sports in the 1960s, and a number of venues were constructed to take advantage of rising interest and expanding television revenue. The first event was an AFL match between the Kansas City Chiefs and Oakland Raiders, who had bounced around the Bay Area since the league’s formation, including a stint playing at Candlestick Park. The Coliseum predates the A’s move to Oakland, opening in September 1966. In the proposed redevelopment plan, the Coliseum would be torn down to make way for the amphitheater and tech campus with a diamond set to commemorate the A’s (and, we presume, the Raiders). So while the plan has the initial approval of city leaders who see it killing two birds with one stone, a large question looms: Should the Coliseum be torn down? A Little Coliseum History While much of the work will be staggered-the Howard Terminal work would come well before the Coliseum is torn down-those are still huge tasks for any MLB team. Second, the A’s will need to tackle both development of a new ballpark and related offerings (office space, retail, etc.) as well as the overhaul of the Coliseum site. First, the Coliseum site needs to be acquired from both Oakland and Alameda County at a reasonable price, which probably will not be the result of any public bidding. Of course, this comes with a few caveats. The overall goal is to keep the site alive with plenty of destination events, and the current pluses of the location-freeway and BART access-would continue to be important in programming. The Coliseum would be torn down, but Oracle Arena would remain open for concerts, events and perhaps a sports exhibition or two. #OAKLAND ARENA UPGRADE#The team is planning to upgrade the current Coliseum complex into a mixed-use development, complete with retail and office space, a youth-sports facility and an event space with a new amphitheater. The A’s ownership pitched the Coliseum site makeover as an economic-development tool both for the team and for the city: the Howard Terminal ballpark itself is unlikely to generate enough revenue to cover debt service, so the team will use revenues from the Coliseum redevelopment to cover shortfalls. The big question: Is the Coliseum worth saving? Lost in all the excitement about plans for a new Howard Terminal ballpark unveiled by the Oakland Athletics and Bjarke Ingels Group last week is a radical proposal to make over the current Oakland Coliseum site. By Kevin Reichard on Decemin Major-League Baseball, News ![]()
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