Baylor's Stadium

[Pittx9]

First time I've really looked closely at the new stadium on TV. I like Heinz Field because it's easy to get to from the suburbs, but we're not a huge school and the stadium is empty a lot. I think Baylor is a school of comparable size and the size of their new stadium is perfect. I don't know if Pitt will ever go back to Oakland as it's a very congested area, but if they build a new stadium anywhere in Pittsburgh, Baylor's stadium would be a great one to model it after.

 

[WNYPanther]

Baylor is actually quite a bit smaller than Pitt (a little over 10k smaller). That being said I love what they did with the new stadium & the waterfront of the Brazos River. Their old stadium was a complete dump and in a remote area of Waco where you couldn't really walk to do anything pre or post game, just kind of parked in a field, tailgated and went to the game. I like how Heinz is surrounded by things to do (and McLane is very similar though on a smaller scale).

 

[CaptainSidneyReilly]

Agree, and should be with CMU sharing it, and making it State of High Tech Innovations Designs that can be upgraded in High Tech Ways and Model for Future Stadiums.

There is plenty of land and parking right down Fifth by Google and Apple Locations, lots of parking, warehouses can be bought up or eminent domain..

Sell UPMC Practice Facilities to Steelers, use the cash to build the New Stadium & Practice & UPMC Medicine Rehab right there.

 

[drunkinoakland]

Agree, and should be with CMU sharing it, and making it State of High Tech Innovations Designs that can be upgraded in High Tech Ways and Model for Future Stadiums.

There is plenty of land and parking right down Fifth by Google and Apple Locations, lots of parking, warehouses can be bought up or eminent domain..

Sell UPMC Practice Facilities to Steelers, use the cash to build the New Stadium & Practice & UPMC Medicine Rehab right there.

Is this really more on campus than Heinz?

 

[CaptainSidneyReilly]

Is this really more on campus than Heinz?

Just a 10-minute walk from Carnegie Mellon University, 2 blocks to the Walnut Street shopping district and an 0.8 miles from Chatham University.

 

[Sean Miller Fan]

First time I've really looked closely at the new stadium on TV. I like Heinz Field because it's easy to get to from the suburbs, but we're not a huge school and the stadium is empty a lot. I think Baylor is a school of comparable size and the size of their new stadium is perfect. I don't know if Pitt will ever go back to Oakland as it's a very congested area, but if they build a new stadium anywhere in Pittsburgh, Baylor's stadium would be a great one to model it after.

The #1 problem of Heinz is simply that its too big. I'd rather have a 45K stadium on the North Side than a 68K one in Oakland. Stadiums like Baylor, GT, BC, RU, TCU, Stanford are all what we should build if the time comes.

I love what Baylor does with the Baylor Line student section. Similar to college bball venues, they give the students the best seats, first 10 rows or so from goal line to goal line. They are really a part of the game instead of sitting in the endzone like at most places. I wished Pitt would do this on the visitor sideline for the students who want to be there.

 

[Pittx9]

The #1 problem of Heinz is simply that its too big. I'd rather have a 45K stadium on the North Side than a 68K one in Oakland. Stadiums like Baylor, GT, BC, RU, TCU, Stanford are all what we should build if the time comes.

I love what Baylor does with the Baylor Line student section. Similar to college bball venues, they give the students the best seats, first 10 rows or so from goal line to goal line. They are really a part of the game instead of sitting in the endzone like at most places. I wished Pitt would do this on the visitor sideline for the students who want to be there.

Agreed. I like Heinz overall, but being a city school we would be just fine with a 45K stadium. Maybe even 50-55 wouldn't be bad, as that would still be big enough to have a decent crowd for big games. I like the idea of having the student section very close to the action though.

It's not bad at Heinz in the end zone, I sit right next to them they were heckling the hell out of this kid on Virginia last week, you could tell the guy was rattled about it. But go down to score on the other end zone and it's not only right near the opposing fans, but most games not very packed in that area.

 

[CaptainMurphy]

We could replicate that setup right across the river from our practice facilities at the Almono site. Why not? There will already be a rapid transit link between Oakland and the site. Easy connections between Oakland and the South Side make it a no-brainier. I don't think it will ever happen but I think it is the most plausible location if we ever were to leave Heinz.

 

[Pittx9]

We could replicate that setup right across the river from our practice facilities at the Almono site. Why not? There will already be a rapid transit link between Oakland and the site. Easy connections between Oakland and the South Side make it a no-brainier. I don't think it will ever happen but I think it is the most plausible location if we ever were to leave Heinz.

Random thought: If we move our football program pretty much exclusively to the South Side (practice facilities and a new stadium), does the campus move too? Or does it stay in Oakland because of tradition?

I think the history of being in Oakland would be tough to go against as far as alumni backlash. I could also see the university becoming more modern and trying to become bigger, maybe even keeping part in Oakland and just extending to the South Side.

Oakland is just a traffic nightmare, but ideally you would like to have your football stadium on campus, so makes for an interesting scenario.

 

[rojo36]

Random thought: If we move our football program pretty much exclusively to the South Side (practice facilities and a new stadium), does the campus move too? Or does it stay in Oakland because of tradition?

I think the history of being in Oakland would be tough to go against as far as alumni backlash. I could also see the university becoming more modern and trying to become bigger, maybe even keeping part in Oakland and just extending to the South Side.

Oakland is just a traffic nightmare, but ideally you would like to have your football stadium on campus, so makes for an interesting scenario.

Desert the Cathedral of Learning, Heinz Chapel and other historic buildings ??? Not happening.

 

[Pittx9]

Desert the Cathedral of Learning, Heinz Chapel and other historic buildings ??? Not happening.

As it shouldn't. I think expanding the campus would be the only compromise that wouldn't cause a complete public outroar. I don't care what they have to do, the Cathedral should still be there in another 100 years. I agree on that one.

 

[DC_Area_Panther]

Since we are dreaming-- Here is what I would like to have:

Football stadium on South Side with plenty of tail gating lots fed by new double wide exit ramps from Parkway and fast monorail/people-mover service to/from campus. A flex stadium with 45-50,000 seat backs on sidelines and 2 x 7,500-10,000 capacity retractable bench seating end zones to allow extra capacity for 1-2 really big games (e.g., Notre Dame, PSU, WVU) each year. That gives you a cozy 45-50,000 facility incrementally expandable to 65,000 using end zone bench seating when ticket demand exceeds sideline seat back seating capacity.

That would be a really first class facility. Now all we need is to find that Alumni billionaire to finance it!!

 

[burnie1105]

IIRC, the Mon Riverfront has insanely high levels of heavy metal in its soil, which makes development extremely expensive (obviously not prohibitively expensive since there has been development, but high enough to make it borderline).

 

[raleighpanther]

It would be a mistake to build a 45k stadium. Its a pessimistic viewpoint based on the past, not the future.

If you have a program stuck, and likely to continue, in a 30 year period of relative mediocrity, in a minor conference producing minor football revenues, with an administration that doesn't much care about the success of the football program and won't put money into hiring coaches, funding a recruiting budget, etc., then a 45k stadium sounds about right.

So the 45k stadium should have been built in 1985. It would've served Pitt well for these past three decades.

Is a 45k stadium what we need for the future? Well, given that all of the above factors have changed, I'd suggest, and hope that the answer is no. We don't need an 80k stadium for sure, but we don't need a small one either. Suppose our hope that the 412crew thing happens, and Pitt becomes a very successful program with continued success in the near future, based in large part on high end local talent. I can see us needing a bigger stadium for regular conference games, not just for ND, WVU, or PSU. Not huge, but certainly one in the high 50s.

 

[Sean Miller Fan]

It would be a mistake to build a 45k stadium. Its a pessimistic viewpoint based on the past, not the future.

If you have a program stuck, and likely to continue, in a 30 year period of relative mediocrity, in a minor conference producing minor football revenues, with an administration that doesn't much care about the success of the football program and won't put money into hiring coaches, funding a recruiting budget, etc., then a 45k stadium sounds about right.

So the 45k stadium should have been built in 1985. It would've served Pitt well for these past three decades.

Is a 45k stadium what we need for the future? Well, given that all of the above factors have changed, I'd suggest, and hope that the answer is no. We don't need an 80k stadium for sure, but we don't need a small one either. Suppose our hope that the 412crew thing happens, and Pitt becomes a very successful program with continued success in the near future, based in large part on high end local talent. I can see us needing a bigger stadium for regular conference games, not just for ND, WVU, or PSU. Not huge, but certainly one in the high 50s.

You build a 45,000-50,000 seat stadium with one endzone open. If the demand is great, you expand it. You dont build a 60,000 seat stadium and hope for demand. If you put BC's stadium in Oakland, the atmosphere would be off the charts because all the seats would be filled and fans would feed off each other.

 

[TD_6082]

Yes. Baylor's stadium is really nice. I also love what TCU has done with their stadium. Houston completely remodeled their stadium. It looked nice on the drawing board, but it person, it looks really cheap.