USL club FC Cincinnati yesterday "revealed its plans for its permanent home" with a proposed design for a stadium that "includes a fan plaza, brewpub and a facade capable of broadcasting images across the entire facility," according to Andy Brownfield of the CINCINNATI BUSINESS COURIER. MEIS Architects Founder Dan Meis has been "working on the stadium design" since late '16. FC Cincinnati "wants to show MLS that it has a plan in place to build a stadium if necessary as part of a bid to win an expansion franchise." The proposed FC Cincinnati stadium is "designed in a horseshoe shape capable of seating about 25,000 with the ability to expand to 30,000." Meis said, "It's not a closed stadium, it's really active at the street level." FC Cincinnati President & GM Jeff Berding said that the stadium "would be paid for in part" with $250M from the owners. That would "account for more than half of the stadium's cost." Brownfield noted the rest of the funding could come from a "public-private partnership or tax increment financing, but ultimately that would be up to public officials" (BIZJOURNALS.com, 6/12). In Cincinnati, Patrick Brennan notes the stadium design "pays homage to the iconic Allianz Arena," home to Bundesliga club Bayern Munich, and "features a canopy and out-facing facade that can be illuminated with LED lights reflected off translucent material." Berding said that he "hoped to break ground" on the stadium by early spring '18 and have the venue ready for '20, when MLS expects to expand to 24 teams. Three possible sites were discussed at yesterday's event, but the conversation "veered toward Newport at several notable junctures in what appeared to be a concerted effort to pitch supporters on the Northern Kentucky city" (CINCINNATI ENQUIRER, 6/13).
WAITING GAME: In Charlotte, Harrison, Peralta & Morrill in a front-page piece note in a setback for MLS in the city, Mecklenburg County commissioners "pushed back a decision" on spending $120M for a new soccer stadium until Aug. 2. Some commissioners "don't want to invest unless the city also contributes." The decision is a "harder bargaining position for the county and it represents another road-block" for SMI President & CEO Marcus Smith's quest to bring a MLS expansion team to Charlotte (CHARLOTTE OBSERVER, 6/13). Also in Charlotte, Erik Spanberg wrote, "If this were a soccer match, Charlotte would already be out of the game." By the next meeting in August, commissioners "hope to have a better sense of whether the city will invest any public money" into a $175M, 20,000-seat stadium to be "built on county-owned property near uptown" (BIZJOURNALS.com, 6/12).
