News of the Arroyo

Title:	Plans for Rose Bowl create new concerns
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Date:	2003-04-27
Summary:	April 27, 2003 - There's mixed views at the Tournament of Roses about the possible coming of a National Football League team to the venerable Rose Bowl.
Author:	Gary Scott, Staff Writer
Publication:	Pasadena Star News
Content:	PASADENA -- Even if architects have found a way to bring professional football to Pasadena and preserve its historic Rose Bowl at the same time, the road to any NFL deal remains precarious, all parties to the plan acknowledge. They know that the stadium\'s storied history, Super Bowls aside, has been mostly collegiate in character. Since it was built 81 years ago, the Rose Bowl\'s greatest tradition is the college game played each New Year\'s Day, \"The Granddaddy of Them All.\' UCLA has made the Rose Bowl its gridiron home for more than 20 years, and Bruins fans love the park-like tailgating ambience of the Arroyo Seco. But traditionalists fear there is a real possibility that, if push comes to shove, an NFL team could shove harder than the Rose Bowl Game\'s organizers, the Tournament of Roses, builders of the original bowl. \"(According to) people who have worked with the NFL in other locations, it changes the operation totally,\' said David Davis, the Tournament\'s executive vice president. \"The NFL has a way of doing things, and they are going to hold sway.\' With the release last week of an initially well-received preliminary design for rebuilding the stadium, an NFL deal has gone from curious discussion to a real possibility. Tournament members are now faced with the potential that their collegiate, provincial tradition will run head-on into the corporate, billion-dollar business of professional football. \"We have some operational questions. If an NFL comes in there, when would we have access to the bowl to prepare for the game?\' asked Davis. \"In theory we could have an NFL game on Sunday and the Rose Bowl Game on Monday, which wouldn\'t be acceptable because there wouldn\'t be time to prepare.\' Both Davis and Tournament Executive Director Mitch Dorger said the city\'s NFL proposal remains too conceptual to fully analyze. But there are a few givens that raise concerns among Tournament of Roses officials. First and foremost, the seating capacity would have to be dramatically cut to meet NFL criteria. The Rose Bowl can seat over 92,000, but this would be dropped to about 64,000 for professional football. Even if the capacity is able to be increased to 75,000 seats for Rose Bowl and Super Bowl games, as is planned, it would still mean a substantial loss in attendance. Fewer seats might mean less revenue for the Tournament. It also cuts into the ticket allocation available for Tournament volunteers and for the college teams that play in the Rose Bowl. \"We have asked that there not be any economic impact on us,\' said Dorger. He also wants the Tournament to remain an active partner in the bowl\'s operation. \"We want to be a full partner in the use of the stadium,\' he said. \"We want our voice heard in the governance process.\' Dorger, Davis and other Tournament officials met with representatives of the Pac-10 and Big Ten conferences in Phoenix this week. Slides of the proposed Rose Bowl design were shown and issues related to the project were discussed. Tournament officials already had concerns about turnout from this year\'s game, which did not provide a Pac-10/Big- Ten rivalry as is traditional for the Rose Bowl Game. The teams for the game were also chosen later than usual because of the Bowl Championship Series, making it harder to allocate tickets or advertise the game. Turnout was at a 50-year low. A lowered seating capacity would not be a problem for BCS games, however. Dorger said most stadiums used in the BCS seat about 70,000. Construction on the \"new look\' Rose Bowl could also cause scheduling problems for the Tournament and UCLA. If the project takes 23 months, as has been estimated, it has the potential for displacing UCLA home games for one season or more, and could bump at least one Rose Bowl Game from the stadium. Davis said UCLA officials are not anxious to have the team play at the Memorial Coliseum, the only other football stadium in the Los Angeles area that could meet their seating capacity needs. Rose Bowl officials say they are looking at how Ohio State staged its football stadium reconstruction, which allowed home games to continue throughout the project. Davis said the proposed design was shown to college officials at the Phoenix meeting and was well received. \"People were pleasantly startled by the concept. It is a beautiful design,\' said Davis. \"It is as good as it is going to be for the Rose Bowl.\' Asked whether there is a general concern among Tournament volunteers that professional football will harm the Rose Bowl tradition, Davis said he has not heard it. \"Nobody, to me at least, has expressed any dramatic misgiving or concern,\' said Davis. \"But then again, I\'m not sure many of us have had a direct interaction with the NFL.\' Dorger was more circumspect. \"The Tournament has 935 people in it and there are probably 935 opinions,\' he said. \"We are very comfortable that the (Rose Bowl Operating Co.) understands our areas of interest and that they\'ve pledged to us full discussion and cooperation in trying to achieve this.\' The NFL proposal has the support of William Leishman, a former member of the Tournament\'s board of directors and grandson of the man credited with getting the Rose Bowl built in the early 1920s. \"Something has to be done,\' Leishman said. \"You have got to be state-of-the-art because white elephants aren\'t very popular.\' Leishman said the community has to be realistic about the stadium\'s future and consider the type of competition it faces one of the central reasons why an NFL deal was proposed is that if another football stadium is built in Los Angeles, it could steal business, and possibly UCLA. \"You can\'t compete in anything unless you\'re one of the big fish, state-of-the-art, and keep thinking of ways to do things better,\' Leishman said. -- Gary Scott can be reached at (626) 578-6300, Ext. 4458, or by e-mail at gary.scott@sgvn.com .
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