College Facilities: Addition To Boise State Stadium OK’d

The Idaho Board of Education has “green-lighted Boise State’s long-anticipated Bronco Stadium addition,” according to Chadd Cripe of the IDAHO STATESMAN. The $35.9M project, “the most expensive in the Boise State athletic department’s history,” will replace the press box and add luxury suites, club seats and loge boxes in time for the ’08 football season. The project will add about 2,000 seats, increasing capacity to 32,000 (IDAHO STATESMAN, 1/9).

UCLA: SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL’s Don Muret reports UCLA last week issued a request “for designers to plan a long-awaited renovation and expansion” at Pauley Pavilion. The school has studied upgrades to the facility “for a decade, and officials previously estimated it could cost up to $150[M] to renovate the arena.” UCLA Senior Associate AD for Business Operations Ken Weiner said that work could include “adding club seats and premium hospitality space.” The RFQ states the arena has not been upgraded since opening in ’65 except for additional lighting in ’90 and a new scoreboard in ’99 (SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL, 1/8 issue).

OBSTRUCTED VIEW: In Oakland, Kristin Bender writes a group called Save Tightwad Hill has sued the Univ. of California (UC) in an “effort to stop expansion plans that will block their free views of games at Memorial Stadium.” UC now is “facing four separate lawsuits to halt its controversial plan to retrofit” the stadium and build a $125M sports training facility for athletes along the western wall (OAKLAND TRIBUNE, 1/9).