New Seattle Arena - The Emerald

This is a Sketchup and Google Earth model of a new arena I have designed for Seattle, Washington.  I thought it appropriate to name it The Emerald Arena, it is designed to look like a jewel on the skyline of the Emerald City.  The arena would be circular, with a facade made of alternating green glass, clear glass, and green brick and a gleaming green roof.  The interior would have a lower bowl, club level, and upper bowl, and two levels of private suites.  The capacity of this model arena is 22,238 for hockey and 23,550 for basketball.  There would be 7,024 seats in the lower bowl in 21 rows, with an added 1,312 seats for basketball .  The club level would have 2,256 seats in 5 rows.  The upper bowl would be split into a 300 level and 400 level.  The 300 level would have 2,998 seats in 6 rows and the 400 level would have 8,570 seats, with 9 rows behind the goals and 21 rows at center ice.  Press level would be behind the 400 level seating.  There would be 68 suites, 28 on the lower level and 40 on the club level.  The arena would be built next to the Seahawks football stadium just South of Downtown Seattle.  This is a very good location, there is a great deal of transportation infrastructure in this area.  

New Tampa Bay Rays Stadium

This is a model for a new Tampa Bay Rays stadium at the site of the current Al Lang Field.  It would have 32,000 seats, with one main concourse serving a 35 row split level seating bowl from left center field around to the right field corner.  There would be 10 more row of box seats extending down to foul territory.  There also would be a balcony with six rows of club seating and 41 luxury boxes, and a press box siting above that. Field dimensions would be 364-395-411-397-322.  There would be a roof around most of the stadium grandstand and covered concourses to provide shelter during rain delays, though no dome.  I thought this would be a simple, nice, and relatively inexpensive stadium for the Rays, as there would be no landfill needed, a very small footprint, and a fairly simple seating bowl to construct.

New Vikings Stadium

 A view from the field

 View from Club Seating

 View from back of upper bowl

 View from lower corner seating

Exterior Elevation

Main Enterance 

 Stadium Overhead

Arden Hills Location

This is the first new stadium design I have done in a very long time.  It is for the Minnesota Vikings, located in Arden Hills, Minnesota.  The location is where the Vikings are planning to build their new stadium, assuming it is approved.  However, my design looks far different.  I don't like the idea of a retractable roof stadium in the NFL, where best case scenario you would get 11 home games a year.  A retractable roof puts you in the running for an NCAA Final Four or maybe one Super Bowl, but Minneapolis won't ever be in a Super Bowl rotation.

Many of the new NFL stadiums have a disjointed look to them, with stacking levels of suites and general seating going far above the playing field.  I thought this would be a nice look, with one simple, split level bowl circling the entire playing field, with suites and club seating supported above the bowl under the roof.  There are poles....there are obstructed views, but in modeling the stadium, the vast majority of the seating behind 50th row where the poles are have views no worse than that shown above.  For each of the 48 poles in the stands, I have taken 30 seats off of the stadium capacity; seats wouldn't be installed in the first four or five rows directly behind poles where large portions of the seating bowl were obstructed.  I think this approach is better than having multiple levels of club seating and suites and then an upper bowl far above those, making for very remote, very steep upper seating.

The capacity for this stadium would be 78,680.  There would be 33,904 seats in the lower bowl, which has 40 rows.  There would be 34,046 seats in the upper bowl, with about 12,000 in rows 40-51, and the rest in rows 52-70 where some obstructed views become possible.  

Three levels of premium seating would be above the main seating bowl.  Level 1 would be the club level, with 5,930 seats in six rows circling the field.  Levels 2 and 3 would be suites, totaling 228.  The exterior is clad in limestone with tall purple windows and tall columns and glass at the main entrances.  The facade was meant to look somewhat monumental, like a big government building in Washington DC, or maybe a little like old Yankee Stadium.  

I hope you like this first new effort in quite a while.  E-mail comments to schulzte@gmail.com