While others upgrade their venues, Aloha Stadium sits and rusts

[TexasTowelie]

Outside the Davis Family ownership, perhaps the most jubilant person about the Oakland Raiders’ impending move to Las Vegas is Tony Sanchez.

Small wonder since Sanchez is the University of Nevada-Las Vegas head football coach and his team will get to ditch the metal erector-set bleachers of wind-blown Boyd Stadium and take up residence in the palatial $1.9 billion, 65,000-seat home that is to be built for the Raiders near McCarran International Airport by 2020.

“Sharing a state-of-the-art stadium with the Raiders is another thing that will allow us to recruit at a high level,” Sanchez crowed in a statement. “The combination of an NFL stadium and our upcoming Fertitta Football Complex brings so much energy to this program and campus.”

While the Vegas edifice is, far and away, the biggest luxury item in the Mountain West Conference’s escalating building boom, it is hardly the only new stadium or set of renovations undertaken.

Read more: http://www.staradvertiser.com/2017/03/30/sports/ferds-words/while-others-upgrade-their-venues-aloha-stadium-sits-and-rusts/?HSA=3cf1993ef15157012fa7c34dc9a38e2e224c0f69

[msongs]

1. best bet is to cancel UH football. the stadium mostly sits there with low level of use outside UH

football season. UH football has pretty low attendance. the stadium's busiest use is for a giant swap meet on weds/sats/sundays. it has only rarely had any big entertainment events like concerts with big name acts. Honolulu has too low of a population base to afford a pro football or pro baseball team, and on top of that is the huge expense of round trip flying into and out of Honolulu. The best use of the property is for massive commercial development or mixed housing/commercial development.

Rail is a huge boondoggle but if that ever gets going a commercial district would be well served by rail. And the stadium sits right next to Pearl Harbor navy base.