Battle Continues Over Stadium Near Javits
Staff -- Tradeshow Week, 6/13/2005
It remains to be seen whether a controversial $2.2 billion sports stadium and convention facility will be built adjacent to New York's Jacob K. Javits Convention Center.
In the latest developments, a judge dismissed a legal challenge to development of the New York Sports & Convention Center, slated to be home to the Jets football team and also provide 200,000 square feet of exhibition space. Three other legal challenges remain unresolved.
NYC & Co., the city's convention and visitors bureau, applauded Supreme Court Judge Herman Cahn's June 2 ruling that the Metropolitan Transit Authority acted accordingly in the bidding process of the Hudson Yards site.
"We strongly believe that the New York Sports & Convention Center, when located adjacent to the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center, will play a critical role to expand the convention and trade industry in New York — an industry which already generates more than $1.6 billion in direct delegate visitor spending every year as well as $250 million in city and state tax revenue," Cristyne Nicholas, NYC & Co. president and CEO, said in a statement.
But stadium proponents Gov. George Pataki and New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg have so far failed to win another battle: alleviating the concerns of state Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno. The pair, who sit on the state Public Authorities Control Board along with Pataki, have refused to approve the project's $300 million in state funding.
Meanwhile, proponents argue that a vote on the stadium must be taken if New York is to be considered seriously as the site for the 2012 Summer Olympics. The stadium is being proposed as one of the city's Olympic venues. The Intl. Olympic Committee is slated to decide July 6 whether London, Moscow, New York, Paris or Lisbon, Portugal, will be the site of the summer games.
According to plans, the facility would be transformable from a 75,000-seat football stadium to exhibit space within 24 hours by closing the retractable roof, removing pallets for the playing field, folding modular seating and lowering a lighting grid.
