Baltimore?s Arena Advisory Panel thinks it can undo 1st Mariner Arena?s wrongs by building a shining, sparkling venue in its predecessor?s place.
City officials call the 46-year-old downtown arena “operationally inefficient and increasingly obsolete,” and criticize its obstructed sight lines, cramped concourse level and lack of street-level activity.
State-of-the-art design and $300 million will cure those physical problems, panel members said Thursday.
The bigger issue is that 1st Mariner has created a “dead zone” of activity between Charles Center and West Baltimore, said Stephen Walters, an economics professor at Loyola College who has studied Baltimore development.
“The original site is part of the first big redevelopment project the city undertook in the late ?50s and early ?60s,” Walters said. “Enough time has passed to where we can say it didn?t work too well. Just plopping another arena down might not work any better.”
The current arena doesn?t connect with the Inner Harbor, the Convention Center or West Baltimore, said Douglas McCoach, director of the city?s planning department.
“It?s not a very good piece of our city?s urban fabric,” McCoach said. “There should be all kinds of different types of retail and commercial opportunities in the base of this building to complement the flow of people coming to events.”
With 18,500 seats ? up from 14,000 ? a new arena could accommodate a future NBA and/or NHL team in Baltimore, the panel said. 1st Mariner has, on several occasions, tried to serve several minor league sports teams without much success, said Frank Remesch, 1st Mariner?s general manager.
“Baltimore fans like pro sports,” Remesch said. “We?ve never really been a town that supports the minor leagues.”
1st Mariner, on pace to record its most profitable year ever, has succeeded in attracting family shows and smaller concerts. City planners expect a newer, larger arena to continue to bring big names and acts to Baltimore, said M.J. “Jay” Brodie, president of the Baltimore Development Corp.
