#NYI #isles Bloomberg's editor is giving Scott Soshnick a nice high five for getting more clicks & attention than he would get in his career— NYI Fan Central (@nyifancentral) July 22, 2016
As I wrote on 2/26/16 NY Islanders Attendance Success At Barclay's Threat To NHL Media Balance in NYC. The playoffs did nothing but make the case the Islanders are home to stay in NY at Barclay's, in a neighborhood filled with businesses, eleven train lines, and a railroad next to a modern arena.#NYI #isles Our fans at this point understand this sourced-based gossip gets writers page views and attention that helps keep them employed.— NYI Fan Central (@nyifancentral) July 22, 2016
Fill the unobstructed seats there 41 times, and more seating will be added, it's that simple.
Reality is NYC is not giving anyone parkland on former Shea Stadium site to a sports team (not NYCFC or New York Islanders or Madoff's pal, Fred Wilpon for his mall) he's broke, even after Citibank's naming rights for their Brooklyn Dodgers shrine, and taxpayer bonds that financed a downsized ballpark with half the seats in fair territory that's been renovated almost every year since it opened.
All the other owners got their taxpayer handouts in NY/NJ for new stadium's/renovated arena's, Mike Bloomberg is gone, the store is closed. Shelly Silver's pals left in Albany voted 6-3 in May 2016 for Dolan to keep getting his yearly taxpayer exemption. (now 48.6 million)
It's not the Mets property to give to anyone, this folly got too much ink long ago with the Islanders around 2009-2010.
NYC just spent 500 million to put a roof on Ashe Stadium, build more tennis infrastructure, and did not give the New York Islanders a first thought, they don't need another arena to sit empty in an over saturated market over three hundred days a year.
As for the chop shops east of Madoff/Wilpon field, that's a neighborhood of generational businesses, there long before Shea was built, in a swamp with no sewage system or basic infrastructure. In the best of circumstances that's a 25 year project after never ending eminent domain fights/lawsuits because the plan was give a convicted felon in the Bronx a 1.5 billion dollar moat aka Yankee-disney. Madoff/Wilpon the 600 million dolllar stadium with the difference in Willets Point real estate.
Madoff/Wilpon went bust, Mario Cuomo cleaned it up for Wilpon in a settlement. Sterling equities (not Steve Stirling) are not getting three billion from taxpayers for their neighborhood.
One subway line, no businesses, with the LIRR over a half mile walk away (outdoors) in Flushing Meadows Park for a fan base that could not draw 10,000 actual people to the Coliseum most years on weeknights since 1989.
Nothing to see here, not for the length of Barclay's 25 year lease, likely ever. Another writer who needed some page views got some clicks, that's it.
I don't know if Jon Ledecky is handling this properly when incompetent Barry Baum, who was a catastrophe at NY Post covering the Islanders speaks for Barclay's. Ledecky made his points loud/clear about Barclay's a week ago, and also said the team is not leaving it's new home in New York.
What I do know is this fan wants stability, with finality to this rhetoric once and for all.