GABP upgrades could cost county taxpayers $5 million

[KittyDuran]

For Hamilton County, not the taxpayers who will be footing the $5 million dollars. They won't see a penny of it back.

Why does the ballpark need a $5 million upgrade anyway? It's not like it's a dump. It's a beautiful park just the way it is.

It is a beautiful park just the way it is... but unfortunately it needs some touchups. Especially this:

The interior needs rust removal and re-coating of metal decks.

This is what the average fan sees... average being a non-premium ticket holder. Just as dabvu2498 said:

Around that area there were quite a few spots where you could see some rusty spots at junctions of the steel superstructure. If you were just breezing through, you wouldn't have noticed. But since we were there the better part of an hour, we noticed. The place is no where near falling apart but there are some cosmetic things that could be done to spruce it up. $5 million for sprucing up an 11 year old building of that nature sounds about right to me. Admittedly, I'm not a Hamilton County resident.

At the end dabvu2498 said that he is not a Hamilton County resident but based on this blurb if you attend a game or shop in Hamilton County some of the money is coming from that sales tax...

Stadium repairs are paid out of the stadium fund, which is financed with a half-cent sales tax paid by anyone who shops in Hamilton County. The fund pays for debt service, maintenance and capital projects at the stadiums, a payment to Cincinnati Public Schools in lieu of property taxes and a promised property tax rebate.

BTW, I work in Hamilton County but live in Butler County, and purchase most of my groceries and other items in Hamilton County either on my way home (Northgate) or at lunch.

[Caveat Emperor]

Every building needs routine maintenance done -- especially a building that is used by millions of people on a yearly basis and sits exposed to the elements.

This should be unshocking to anyone that owns a home or maintains a property.

[Eric from NC]

This does seem pretty reasonable. In comparison the Carolina Panthers wanted 150-300 million in taxpayer upgrades for a stadium where 90% of the seats require a permanent seat license, and they only allow about one non Panther event a year. As others have said, the hotel and rental car fees for the All Star game would probably cover a huge chunk of the 5M.

[KittyDuran]

Last night I took some pics (w/iPhone) of some of the rust damage - I'll post some later. I would hope that some of the money goes for better towel and TP dispensers.

[KittyDuran]

Bumping this up...

I posted some of the rust and bird damage on one of my blogs...

http://allmyphotos.tumblr.com/

[BurgervilleBuck]

Quitting being a Bengals fans is starting to look better and better each day.

It was the best decision I ever made, that's for sure.

[paulrichjr]

Bumping this up...

I posted some of the rust and bird damage on one of my blogs...

http://allmyphotos.tumblr.com/

After seeing those I vote we tear it down and build another one.

[KittyDuran]

After seeing those I vote we tear it down and build another one.

Actually, there are parts that look like they're ready to fall down. :P

[Z-Fly]

After seeing those I vote we tear it down and build another one.

I am guessing that location is under your name is correct, and you don't live in Hamilton County?

[Larkin88]

Still, if a lot of the floors are worn out after 11 years, maybe they didn't use the greatest materials to begin with?
I understand, this is a commerical setting, but still.. 81 games/year X 11 years .. that means the floors have about 2.5 years of "real life" on them.
Sure, maybe some parts of the GAB are used on other days, but it seems that they didn't exactly get top of the line stuff.

I'd bet it's all pretty routine maintenance stuff. Value engineering studies are rarely that myopic and usually involve business case planning several years, if not decades out. It would be literally short-sighted to "value engineer" something against a single point in time.

If a cheaper material was used for carpeting, for instance, it was probably determined that the cost to replace it after X number of years was still more affordable than a higher-price material would be over its total life... even if that life was marginally longer than material A. The business case planning that goes into those sorts of studies is extremely rigorous and a lot of those ROI details (down to materials and finishes) would have been taken into consideration well before GABP was signed off on.

I work in retail and environmental design, so this is just my two cents. But the Reds would have been foolish to have invested in premium flooring materials or top of the line finishes in a facility that large, that gets that much traffic. Beyond the functional considerations there, arena-type settings also need to be flexible enough in their trade dress so things don't look dated after ten years. Trends for flooring, wall treatments, lighting design, etc. change drastically from year-to-year.