Building a State of the Art Arena In The Inner Harbor Is The Biggest No-Brainer In The History Of Baltimore
The Sun – Two of Baltimore’s most prominent developers want to build an arena on piers in the Inner Harbor, a new idea that has revived perennial debate about how to replace the aging arena on the city’s west side. The proposal to locate a 15,000-seat venue on piers 5 and 6 remains in the “big idea” phase,” said Blake Cordish, vice president of the Cordish Cos. The proposal would transform the harborfront between the Cordish Co.’s Power Plant Live and Harbor East, developed by the Paterakis family, who would partner with Cordish on the arena. The project, estimated to cost $450 million, would include an outdoor amphitheater and a pedestrian walkway spanning the Inner Harbor, an idea included in a long-range plan for the harbor introduced in 2013. The complex would be built to allow for expanded capacity, Cordish said. Adam Gross of the Baltimore architecture firm Ayers Saint Gross, which worked on the master plan for the Inner Harbor, would partner with another world-renowned architect on the design of the complex, Cordish said.
YES! YES! YES! DO IT BALTIMORE DO IT!!!! If there was ever one last piece to the Inner Harbor puzzle, this is it right here. I didn’t even know it needed anything more and then it smacked me square in the face when I read this. It’s the final stroke to the masterpiece. The finishing touch. Let’s rid ourselves of the Royal Farms Arena or whatever the fuck it’s called by the time I finish writing this blog. Place stinks. It’s ugly, it’s falling apart, the locker rooms are the size of a dishwasher…it needs to go. You feel dirty going in there. Shit, they couldn’t even host a preseason hockey game without all sorts of issues. Now imagine having a state of the art arena right in the heart of Bmore with an outdoor amphitheater to boot. Surrounded by Fed, Fells, and Canton. The stadiums right down the road. The Casino down the block. It makes Baltimore the perfect city as long as we don’t count the dark shadowy place where you should never go. They need to build this ASAP.
