It's looking more and more like part of the deal to keep the Buffalo Bills where they belong, is going to be a new stadium. But where does the stadium belong? By now, the list of options is quite public and has been scrutinized and speculated about ad nauseum. The downtown Buffalo waterfront; Niagara Falls, NY; Niagara Falls, Ontario; Batavia; West Seneca; my back yard... It seems like every piece of open space in Western New York and Southern Ontario (please God no) has been considered. I don't understand the desire to mess with a good thing.
Any Buffalonian will tell you we have the best tailgating spot in the league. I've had friends who went to big time football colleges come up for games and say our scene is comparable. During this seemingly never ending playoff drought, at least we have the 4+ hours before the game to grill, drink a few pops and play cornhole, KanJam etc. I don't care if it's 20 degrees out, it's fun, and it's an experience. For those who say the atmosphere is too rowdy, I beg to differ. Sure there is general debauchery - but that's at every stadium in the league - and the Bills have done a good job in recent years of increasing security. I can count on one hand the number of fights I saw at games last year. The out of control "party" atmosphere is highly overrated.
Sometimes the grass is not greener on the other side of the field. I went to all 16 Bills games last year which included 10 stadiums. Granted, I'm most familiar with Ralph Wilson Stadium, which absolutely plays a role - but it was by far the easiest to get to and from. The other stadiums with great tailgating and easy access all had one thing in common - they weren't downtown. I've been to Cleveland, Detroit, Pittsburgh among other cities with downtown stadiums. The tailgating scenes there are mediocre at best. I doubt anyone from those areas would credit the new stadium for any sort of economic boom in those areas. Once the game is over, downtown clears out - slowly. The bars and restaurants around these areas work because they have Major League Baseball too. I can't imagine that putting a stadium in downtown Buffalo for 8 events a year would lead to a tremendous increase in establishments that remain open the other 357 days too. The math doesn't make sense. Not to mention, putting in this new monstrosity on the waterfront, for example, could negatively impact the progress that is already being made. Don't upset the apple cart on the development of what has long been a stagnant area.
In the current location, I can stay for the entire game at the Ralph and be home (at worst) by halftime of the 4pm games. I'm home, on my couch by 5:30 while people in places like Foxboro and East Rutherford get to sit in traffic for another hour. Who doesn't want that? The highway is right there for people traveling east and west on the I-90. It's a great spot.
Western New Yorkers are nervous the team will leave if we don't get a shiny new stadium. I get it - I'm on edge too while waiting for this new unknown owner to say "this team STAYS!" while pounding the podium. The news today that Terry Pegula, with his new found $1.75B in gas money, is throwing his hat in the ring is great - but if anything it makes the need for an expensive stadium less necessary. He won't need the money from personal seat licenses. We don't need to keep up with the Jerry Joneses and the other NFL fat cats that most Buffalonians despise. Let's just stick to our roots and what we know and keep the stadium in a spot that is proven to work.
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