[nightstreak]

I think renovating increasing BMO field capacity would be a better option than starting from scratch. That location is way better positioned than Downsview to support a 50k or even 60k audience.

Let Toronto get the WC right and let the soccer interest build over the next 1-3 years tho before any hasty decisions are made

It's too late to "get WC right" when it comes to the venue. The World Cup is in 10 months. We got what we got.

I went to the CNE over the weekend, showing friends from Spain and Portugal around and they both laughed and thought I was kidding when I pointed to BMO Field and said that this would be the venue hosting The World Cup in Toronto. I couldn't find a hole deeper enough to crawl into because I knew that their polite disbelief and nose scrunch was right.

I have no doubt that Toronto will host a street party like no other, better than any of the other cities by virtue of our broad international demographics—there'll be home grown fans for every national team at the World Cup. But I hope to god that international reporters don't shoot our creaky set of bleachers and ugly concession corridors and instead focus on the game on the pitch, the views from the stands and the parties around the city.

But it's very telling that when given World Cup hosting duties with years to prepare, we couldn't get our shit together to either find value in building a stadium or renovating the one we got to World Cup standards. We're not going to suddenly get our shit together when there isn't that kind of pressure in front of the world and a strict deadline to push us.

 

[Mihairokov]

A walk from Union Station with subway and regional and national rail and just off a major highway, surrounded by hundreds of restaurants and shops and thousands of hotel rooms, it could not be better situated for the kind of concerts that Rogers Stadium has failed at supporting.

What concerts has Rogers Stadium failed at supporting?

I went to the CNE over the weekend, showing friends from Spain and Portugal around and they both laughed and thought I was kidding when I pointed to BMO Field and said that this would be the venue hosting The World Cup in Toronto. I couldn't find a hole deeper enough to crawl into because I knew that their polite disbelief and nose scrunch was right.

I don't mean to be dismissive but this really isn't that big of a deal. There were plenty of sub-par or embarrassing stadiums in both South Africa and Russia: Once the matches and results start coming in nobody really cared, and BMO is going to have the distinct advantage of not being in a country disappearing and/or denying entry to foreign nationals. Perhaps ask your friends what cities they would feel safer visiting during the next World Cup.

But it's very telling that when given World Cup hosting duties with years to prepare, we couldn't get our shit together to either find value in building a stadium or renovating the one we got to World Cup standards. We're not going to suddenly get our shit together when there isn't that kind of pressure in front of the world and a strict deadline to push us.

Hosting it piece-meal means we're getting a piece-meal result. There is likely never a scenario where we ever host a World Cup solo in our lifetimes so this will be the closest that we manage. Obviously things like legacy infrastructure are a major issue in this country and it's the fault of our late-stage capitalist overlords who view bleacher seating as enough to gouge fans and supporters of every penny that we have - we eat it all up anyway. The next stage of soccer specifically in this country is building more and larger soccer specific infrastructure so that when it comes time for us to host more Gold Cup or Copa America or World Cup Qualifying matches we can host them in better, more right-sized, and tailor-made venues.

There's no value in building a standalone World Cup stadium in this country because there's no demand from local tenants or organizations. Thus we end up with an expanded BMO.

 

[narduch]

Feels like these arguments get re hashed every few months.

When you are watching on TV nobody is going to care about how stupid BMO Field looks.

Also it's a shame the expansion isn't permanent. I really fo feel that MLSE mismanagement of TFC means that they don't really need more capacity for that stadium.

 

[nightstreak]

What concerts has Rogers Stadium failed at supporting?

How have you missed the repeated reports of chaos happening before and after Rogers Stadium concerts? Hours to get in and get out, gridlocked roads and overburdened subway stations, insufficient availability of water and bathrooms. It's a stadium in the middle of nowhere where virtually everyone comes from somewhere else to get there and leave, all at once. The downtown venues I argued for are better equipped for events of that size.

Feels like these arguments get re hashed every few months.

When you are watching on TV nobody is going to care about how stupid BMO Field looks.

Also it's a shame the expansion isn't permanent. I really fo feel that MLSE mismanagement of TFC means that they don't really need more capacity for that stadium.

The value of hosting an international event like the World Cup or the Olympics are the legacy infrastructure they leave behind because the world exposure and immovable deadlines act as a catalyst to get these things done in time.

We knew we had won the World Cup hosting gig 4 years ago. It's as if we started planning details after that and nothing happened until halfway through that time, some of it just starting now, 10 months away. The bid for these sort of things would typically come with pre-determined plans and multi-level-government commitments to build the infrastructure, conditional on winning the bid and that would kick off soon after the bid was won.

In Toronto's case, it could and should've been a catalyst to accelerate the construction of Exhibition Station and even molded the plans for the Ontario Line to complete perhaps the downtown segment and/or local GO to and from BMO Field in time. It would've come with motivation to expanding The Bentway westward from Strachan to BMO Field and it would've come with public/private investment to improving BMO Field to grow the Toronto FC business in the city, which improves the local economy down to the neighbourhood scale and with commitments to the community that help grow youth interest in soccer that show up in quality of our players in the decade to come. It's a worthy investment. The PanAm Games left a legacy because it leveraged some of these catalysts. .

But none of that was done for the World Cup. The Ontario Line will be in heavy construction during the event. The Bentway has just begun plans to expand, to be built a few years after the World Cup — even though the Bentway was announced as the World Cup Fan Festival venue — and the vast majority of work on BMO Field will be dismantled after the Cup, leaving little to no legacy.

We squandered the opportunity.

 

[ash_iwn95]

It's too late to "get WC right" when it comes to the venue. The World Cup is in 10 months. We got what we got.

I went to the CNE over the weekend, showing friends from Spain and Portugal around and they both laughed and thought I was kidding when I pointed to BMO Field and said that this would be the venue hosting The World Cup in Toronto. I couldn't find a hole deeper enough to crawl into because I knew that their polite disbelief and nose scrunch was right.

I have no doubt that Toronto will host a street party like no other, better than any of the other cities by virtue of our broad international demographics—there'll be home grown fans for every national team at the World Cup. But I hope to god that international reporters don't shoot our creaky set of bleachers and ugly concession corridors and instead focus on the game on the pitch, the views from the stands and the parties around the city.

But it's very telling that when given World Cup hosting duties with years to prepare, we couldn't get our shit together to either find value in building a stadium or renovating the one we got to World Cup standards. We're not going to suddenly get our shit together when there isn't that kind of pressure in front of the world and a strict deadline to push us.

I meant 'get the WC right' in a local attendance and overall fan interest sense both TV ratings wise and like you mentioned at the street party level. Something that could fuel us actually filling out a permanent 50-60k stadium for a non baseball sport before the plans for a permanent stadium are set.

That's been the main roadblock to any kind of conversation regarding an NFL franchise or a national stadium.

Obviously the stadium isn't the best and the planners deserve criticism for the temporary stands, I'm just judging the value of a large multipurpose stadium at exhibition vs at Downsview for the future. Purely the location nothing else.

 

[guavadelic]

When you are watching on TV nobody is going to care about how stupid BMO Field looks.

You underestimate the ability of the international media to blow things up. The early days of the Vancouver Olympics were filled with headlines about malfunctioning buses and hired bus drivers getting lost transporting athletes/media to events.

 

[ChesterCopperpot]

and were forgotten 2 days later

 

[narduch]

You underestimate the ability of the international media to blow things up. The early days of the Vancouver Olympics were filled with headlines about malfunctioning buses and hired bus drivers getting lost transporting athletes/media to events.

I don't even remember that.

The biggest story I remember from the early part of the games was a luge athlete dying

 

[Canadian Chocho]

BMO is fine. The perceived dinginess is really from a lack of an exterior cladding "hidding" the innards and the metal second eck of the West Stand not being re-done a la concrete East Stand. While that second point does feel like a missed opportunity, I suppose it will get done eventually when the actual permanent need for it is required.

From a firsthand experiance I can say that many of the Qatar stadiums were no different on the inside (concessions, washrooms, etc..) once you get passed the outer shell. The biggest difference was probably the instrusive AC underneath the seats that made gamedays chilly.

Furthermore, BMO's greatest asset is its pitch. The billion dollar NFL stadiums that look great on camera had plenty of complaints this past summer during the Club World Cup over the quality of the grass that was basically overlaid their usualarticifial surfaces.

 

[Mihairokov]

How have you missed the repeated reports of chaos happening before and after Rogers Stadium concerts? Hours to get in and get out, gridlocked roads and overburdened subway stations, insufficient availability of water and bathrooms. It's a stadium in the middle of nowhere where virtually everyone comes from somewhere else to get there and leave, all at once. The downtown venues I argued for are better equipped for events of that size.

I don't mean to be bleak but if tickets are being sold and the shows are happening then Rogers Stadium isn't failing. AFAIK the entry/exits have been improved, as were a lot of the earlier complaints about the facility. It hosted a concert last night and tonight as well - it's not failing to host concerts.

We knew we had won the World Cup hosting gig 4 years ago. It's as if we started planning details after that and nothing happened until halfway through that time, some of it just starting now, 10 months away. The bid for these sort of things would typically come with pre-determined plans and multi-level-government commitments to build the infrastructure, conditional on winning the bid and that would kick off soon after the bid was won.

As I said in a previous post, we're only partially hosting this WC, which means our plans for it are only going to be partial. Four years isn't enough time in our landscape to build a complete a stadium, and that's without the already pointed-out issue that there's no tenant for a stadium that large.

We squandered the opportunity.

I think places like Edmonton and Montreal squandered the opportunity, IMO. If Toronto hosts matches and gets $X millions of dollars in tourist money then nothing's been squandered on our end outside of investing in more permanent upgrades at BMO.

You underestimate the ability of the international media to blow things up.

I have a feeling international media is going to be focusing on issues in the US instead of what kind of bleachers BMO has. BMO also has the advantage of not being located miles outside of city centres like most US stadiums being used for the event.

Again, once matches start nobody cares about these issues.

Furthermore, BMO's greatest asset is its pitch. The billion dollar NFL stadiums that look great on camera had plenty of complaints this past summer during the Club World Cup over the quality of the grass that was basically overlaid their usualarticifial surfaces.

BMO has a lot of pros over the NFL stadiums the US will be using.

 

[picard102]

How have you missed the repeated reports of chaos happening before and after Rogers Stadium concerts? Hours to get in and get out, gridlocked roads and overburdened subway stations, insufficient availability of water and bathrooms. It's a stadium in the middle of nowhere where virtually everyone comes from somewhere else to get there and leave, all at once. The downtown venues I argued for are better equipped for events of that size.

The "chaos" was one night. The subway stations are nowhere near overburdened. They are letting everyone in for free, and it's still quite manageable. The roads are also not gridlocked.

 

[6ixGod]

I went to the CNE over the weekend, showing friends from Spain and Portugal around and they both laughed and thought I was kidding when I pointed to BMO Field and said that this would be the venue hosting The World Cup in Toronto. I couldn't find a hole deeper enough to crawl into because I knew that their polite disbelief and nose scrunch was right.

Almost had the exact same experience just a week ago. When I showed my friends BMO they literally asked “did IKEA build this?” It’s not even about capacity, it’s about the look of it. I think BMO capacity is just right….but the fact it’s missing an ENTIRE NORTH STAND is just unacceptable.

Absolutely embarrassing stuff.

Mind you this is not only the home for Toronto FC, but is also Canada’s National Stadium for the Men’s and Women’s teams.

Toronto deserves way better. But alas, when people in power (and even on this forum) defend mediocrity, we get things like LRT debacles on Eglinton, a Mickey Mouse national stadium…….I could go on and on about how Toronto is run like it’s some small town.

 

[lead82]

Almost had the exact same experience just a week ago. When I showed my friends BMO they literally asked “did IKEA build this?” It’s not even about capacity, it’s about the look of it. I think BMO capacity is just right….but the fact it’s missing an ENTIRE NORTH STAND is just unacceptable.

Absolutely embarrassing stuff.

Mind you this is not only the home for Toronto FC, but is also Canada’s National Stadium for the Men’s and Women’s teams.

Toronto deserves way better. But alas, when people in power (and even on this forum) defend mediocrity, we get things like LRT debacles on Eglinton, a Mickey Mouse national stadium…….I could go on and on about how Toronto is run like it’s some small town.

Toronto is run like a small town. It’s an overgrown small town with myopic council and powers that simply don’t care to invest in such things. The public doesn’t care and we have bigger economic and social issues to deal with than build fancy stadiums. The Skydome would have been a better stadium for WC but it lacks proper pitch grass.

 

[AnnetteMeetsJane]

Toronto deserves way better. But alas, when people in power (and even on this forum) defend mediocrity, we get things like LRT debacles on Eglinton, a Mickey Mouse national stadium…….I could go on and on about how Toronto is run like it’s some small town.

BMO is only hosting 5 group stage games and a single round of 32 game - none of the high profile games. Throwing a temporary stand up, putting up some colourful banners and emptying the trash cans is about all it really needs.

We don't need a Wembley Stadium. BMO was barely half full (if even) for the Argos game yesterday and the same for most of the TFC games when I have been. Anything spent on that facility is a waste if fans aren't going.

 

[Mihairokov]

Toronto is run like a small town.

Toronto is run but its suburbs. There's plenty of big city thinking going on but it's muzzled by penny counters in the burbs.