It’s too bad that the league and most involved are so fixated on some super duper mega sports complex. Because despite what some would have you believe, a renovation of Arco arena is possible. The Warriors arena was renovated and it’s 20 years older than Arco, so spare me the “Arco can’t be renovated” malarkey. It could be and it would be cheaper, faster, and more likely to actually get done, but that’s another story.
This is the melarky and part of the myth that keeps people in Sacramento from realizing a new arena is needed.
The city consulted engineers regarding that possibility a long time ago. They also had consultants analyze the existing Arco. I've dug up those city reports before, but I'm not going to do it anymore, because evertyone just ignores them. It's like beating my head against a brick wall.
We're are not talking about a super-duper arena and its not just the Maloofs or the NBA. Remember, the NCAA doesn't even find it acceptable for a regional BB tournament. The Maloofs don't even want many more seats than the existing arena. They do need better seating and more lluxury boxes. Not many luxury boxes, but maybe the same as in San Antonio, a city similar to Sacramento in market size.
However, at least two concourses are needed (upper and lower) to ease ingress and egress. I can't imagine a full arena having a disaster stike without having countless people trampled to death in the panicked exodus. (I have to think the current arena practically violates fire code.) They need more kitchen space, a larger marshalling area, more loading docks, better locker rooms, more room for concessions, more restrooms, new an better ice-making equipment and a whole long list identified in the reports as inadequate.
The engineers examined Arco thoroughly and determined that the existing foundation could not support the the necessary expansion to make Arco a modern, viable arena for sports and entertainment. Foundations are designed to support a certain load. Arco was cheaply built. To "remodel" to the standards needed, you'd have to even tear out the foundation. It would almost assuredly take more money to rehab the existing arena structure, than to build a new one from the foundation up. (I work in the area of financing contstruction and rehabilitation. Believe me, I've seen rehab cost more than brand new.)
Next, the city has had at least two consultants examine Arco for viability more or less as it is, with no expansion. The report came back and listed all the things that the current Arco lacks (my list above was part of it). They concluded that Arco was near the to the end of economic viability. It may not be structurally falling down, but their conclusion was that it would soon be economically obsolete.
So rehab into an economically viable arena was not in the picture anymore. That's why, although there has been proposals to build on the same site, the idea of rehabbing the existing building has been out of the picture since those reorts were prepared.
The Palace of Auburn Hills was built the same year as Arco, It is still fine, becasue they could remodel it. However, the Palace was built at a cost of $80 million, while Arco was built for $40 million. The owners bought the team and built two arenas. Neither Arco was really built with a long term future in the plans. The push for a new arena in Sacramento was started before the Maloofs became owners of the team. I guess they never figured it would be a near impossible task.
Finally, we're not talking about an arena just for basketball, whatever some of the naysayers want to believe. Many of the needs cited are needs for large touring entertainment shows. That's the reason for things like a larger marshalling area, more loading docks, better ice-making equipment, etc. That's why some large shows are just not coming to Arco anymore.
So the whole issue of trying to remodel the current arena has benn very thoroughly reviewed by multiple engineers and consultants. If you still want to call it melarkey, then fine. You must have knowledge that those engineers and consultants don't have for their multiple reports on the subject. You should share it with the city.
Of course, Arco was cheaply built. The owners bought the team and paid to build two arenas with no public financing at all. Guess what, it wasn't a sustainble situation, financially. The team was so bad, they couldn't charge too much for tickets, but they couldn't cover their debt load and expenses either. They were on the verge of bankruptcy when Mayor Serna stepped in an gave the owners that $70 million dollars, plus a loan to pay interest on the loan. But the owners have been trying to get a new arena ever since and still eventually got out by selling a large share to the Maloofs.
That loan gave us a more then 10 year reprieve from losing the Kings and we were lucky that the Maloofs stepped in and didn't want to move the Kings from Sacramento. Our luck has just about run out.
