Warriors President & COO Rick Welts recently said that he would call it “'a mandate to architects' that the atmosphere at 19,500-seat Oracle Arena not only be preserved, but perhaps enhanced even though the design has not yet been finalized" on the franchise's proposed 18,000-seat Mission Bay arena, according to Diamond Leung of the BAY AREA NEWS GROUP. Welts said, “We believe we’re going to be able to say that every seat in the new arena is going to be as close if not closer than every seat currently is in Oracle." He added, “One of the ways that we’re going to accomplish this when we haven’t shown a lot of the interior design is that there will only be one ring of traditional suites instead of two stacked like at Oracle or at Staples (Center), where there’s three stacked suites. That really gives [us] the opportunity to more than maintain the intimacy.” Welts said that there is a "design trick involved -- he declined to reveal it -- that would enable the new arena to have almost exactly the same number of suites on only one ring while fans get closer to the action." Meanwhile, Warriors fans are "apparently responding to the team’s success on the court and the promise of a new arena, with the team having renewed" 92% of its season-ticket holders for next season. Welts said having a renewal rate of more than 90% for any team is “extraordinary.” Welts added that he "expected the vast majority of season ticket holders to renew for the new arena" (INSIDEBAYAREA.com, 6/30).
