I don't really see any point to renovating Reed unless it's like a Zachry-esque "renovation" where the old building is only technically part of the new one.

Also disagree that parking wouldn't be a problem at UCG. That would be a disaster.

They were kicking the tires on an idea of putting a new arena over by Hensel Park which is conceptually kind of an interesting idea. I believe that has about a negative 50% chance of ever happening, but it's interesting.

But I'll believe any improvement is coming to our basketball arena when I see it happen.

Hire some graffiti artists and make the entire outside of the arena one giant mural. I don't feel like the inside is terrible other than just being too dark IMO.

As far as landscaping, good luck. The frats are going to kill all the grass no matter what you do.

The actual landscaping directly around the arena is fine. It took 30 years for those twigs they planted to turn into real trees but they finally have.

It's just the areas along Olsen where the grass looks absolutely terrible. I don't know if that's a fixable problem because of football tailgating traffic but it's basically just hard sand. It does look bad and Hop goes on a rant about it every third game but it's not the end of the world.

Hopefully the new Aplin Center building will put up a competitive fight against Satellite Utility Plant Number 1 as the premier focus of activity on this part of campus.

Here is the issue with landscaping

This was after pig game

The drainage is part of the problem. Forget a day where it actually poured like that day, there's areas along Olsen near the sidewalk where it's still muddy even if it hasn't rained in weeks.

bobinator said:

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The drainage is part of the problem. Forget a day where it actually poured like that day, there's areas along Olsen near the sidewalk where it's still muddy even if it hasn't rained in weeks.

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we tailgate there, it drains, but you still can't park couple thousand people on the grass and it hold up

They need to junk grass and try out some other material, hell make it a engineering project. Try out mulch, fake grass, rubber turf stuff, gravel, anything.

But you'll never grow grass there as long as you allow tailgating

Yeah the whole area (and the corresponding area on the other side closer to Olsen Field) both look awful, but again for me that's pretty far down the list of stuff I care about.

I think they will do nothing as long as possible. Paying down bonds is the best use of free cash while the NCAA and colleges themselves are actively imploding.

If we want to include a pipe dream central campus scenario, then they should demolish the Rudder complex and build a new arena facing Military Walk.

Maybe we could just play basketball in Rudder Auditorium.

New arena

Do I have to turn in my ring if I say build it on Simpson Drill Field?

Corner of University and Texas would be awesome a new location. for being the main intersection announcing "you have arrived at a&m" it sucks. The wrong atm is on the fence. The U-Haul and gas station and empty world of beers store are all eye sores. It's terrible.

The area right there is big enough where you could build a replacement facility next door to it so it could stay in use while the construction takes place. Then you tear down Reed and build up a bunch of other crap there.

Make the new facility a joint basketball, volleyball, and indoor tennis facility. Maybe indoor something else for whatever you need indoor somethings for. I'm not talking about some massive thing with movable bleachers because those never work out, but some big facility that has separate spaces for each. They don't have to be joined in terms of actual building structure but maybe joined by a covered area between each building. Have them all share parking and other infrastructure.

Build some other cool buildings and whatever else around it to make it more cool. Build another nice little park or something too. We are good at ponds. Build another pond. And a parking garage. We are good at those.

I can donate $5 to the project.

I think our main problem with these ideas is we fast forward to the end result but we need to think more about building up the underlying culture. We have kind of a circular logic problem with Reed because Reed's problems are only really problems when we have big crowds. They'll continue to be big problems no matter what sort of ideas people come up with unless you change the overall culture infrastructure.

For example, I think from an attendance standpoint you'd be better off putting a few million dollars to some kind of outdoor restaurant/beer garden (with restrooms) outside the arena rather than putting money into the arena.

Problem #1) Practically nobody comes to games early: Why would they? The only places around Reed with food and drinks before the game are the A&M hotel, the MSC and the Rec. Occasionally, for really big games, if the weather is good, you'll get a handful of people tailgating, but it's probably less than a few hundred people even for the biggest games. There's nowhere to just grab a drink and some food or watch other basketball games, maybe have some games out for the kids. Why does this matter? Because....

Problem #2) For big games, the traffic around Reed is an absolute disaster: The however many thousand people that are used to showing up right at tip off still do, but now you're adding several thousand more people on top of that. For almost every near-sellout game the last few years, like a quarter of the crowd is still outside the arena at tipoff.

Problem #3) The in-game experience needs work: There are people at work on this currently and I'm excited to see what they can come up with, but on several levels, the in-game experience is rough. The Hullabaloo band has become the vibe equivalent of a cold shower. We have very strange in-game games that do not exactly promote crowd involvement. And it's not just "not fun for the youths" the former students have an opposite problem where the speakers aimed at the upper midcourt areas are so loud that you can't even talk to the person next to you and legitimately hurt your ears. (I thought this was an old-man-yelling-at-clouds problem until I sat in one of those sections for a game last year and it really is awful.)

This all adds up to:

The big problem: When we do have big crowds, the experience mostly sucks: You're ten minutes late getting in the arena, the lines for the bathrooms are winding through the concourse (this is partially a signage problem), the atmosphere is mostly boring, etc.

The big solution: Winning, obviously, but that's not enough. Even after saying all of that, if we're good enough, or the opponent is, people will suck it up and show up anyway. People like being part of a winner. But we shouldn't need to overcome a terrible experience. You need to build up an arena experience that's fun so that if we're good-but-not-great or playing a mediocre team, people still want to come. The arena experience isn't something people should be thinking "is it worth all that..."

Yeah, I don't even consider those close really big didn't want to get wall-actually'd. They are close-ish, especially if the weather is good. But if often isn't!

I thought about mentioning that because it's an absolute disaster for the 6:00 games especially. You've got people coming in, people going out, nobody is keeping any kind of count of available spaces so they start turning people away even though there's parking in the lot. Truly an impressive cluster.

they have a fan zone for kids and mini area for buying a beer, they set up a tent on the NW entrance. Its also where you pick up any reward items.

in theory you could blow out the entire west side concourse, bathrooms, concessions, then build out into the parking lot to make a larger area for whatever. Maybe mini food court, beer garden, etc. It would screws up some parking but it really screws up the routes outta Reed, so you'd have to redo most of hte parking on that side. And you'd still have issues with student parking during weekday games.

Another plus for this idea would be open it up on football saturdays, some us would like to go inside when is 1000 degrees while we try to tailgate. And some of us would pay. Of course we'd never do that. We don't use any west campus buildings for football game day. Open up Olsen club, open up Reed, etc.

Yeah there's a token fan zone and beer tent but it can hold like 100 people, it's not moving the needle on anything. Good idea though, people do go in there, would just be nice if it was like ten times as big, lol.

It also doesn't open until an hour before the game I think.

I think there's two issues (maybe 3) here that relate to each other, but are really independent of each other.

1. Game Day atmosphere - All those idea's from Bob's thread Here. should be explored to ensure that everyone has a good time and will want to come back. Sure, you have those people who want to actually see a good game, but there are others who are are tagging along to have a good time. It's those fans that we should entice in other ways where the team's performance is not the most important aspect. Obviously having a good team always helps, but I really think we should be doing something to foster our team's new identity with Buckyball.

2. Reed the Arena - It's oversized and not great for basketball in my opinion. It was built as a multi-use facility and sure looks that way. They need to figure out how to place the students closer to the floor while keeping season ticket holders in good viewing positions. If they want to keep it, okay great, but do something about it to where it looks good on camera and in person. But just do something and not have wild plans that only look good on paper. If nothing gets done, you're already behind.

3. We need to improve the quality of our non-conference opponents. No one really wants to see us play North Kentucky or College of the Blind, etc. We should be able to get one or two quality opponents that fans will want to come see.

Reed isn't great for basketball but it's not the absolute end of the world either.

I actually think the biggest missteps from a in-your-seats-watching-the-game standpoint is that there's only one lower level bathroom that I'm pretty sure only like 50 people know is there and that the upper deck of the arena absolutely sucks. You might as well be on the moon.

If you're a fringe fan thinking of attending a game last minute or buying cheap season tickets or something, those seats are trash. The viewing angles are terrible, the way the steps to the concourse flow into the seating area is insane, etc.

biggest issue is ANY concessions you're linked to levy. Although soccer has 2 food trucks.

I wish they'd take old softball field and make it a food truck, beer garden, open space for just this reason, have a tent for basketball if it's cold or raining. could have it for football, baseball, soccer, softball etc.

If you do food trucks maybe you don't have levy or levy can sell the beer or something.

I've been saying that since they started building the new facility. It's in a perfect location not only for sports but even potentially for students to use before/after intramurals.

bobinator said:

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I've been saying that since they started building the new facility. It's in a perfect location not only for sports but even potentially for students to use before/after intramurals.

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and if you make it all food trucks, then you don't have to worry about concessions or levy crap, etc. the food trucks can fight over coming on their own

bobinator said:

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Reed isn't great for basketball but it's not the absolute end of the world either.

I actually think the biggest missteps from a in-your-seats-watching-the-game standpoint is that there's only one lower level bathroom that I'm pretty sure only like 50 people know is there and that the upper deck of the arena absolutely sucks. You might as well be on the moon.

If you're a fringe fan thinking of attending a game last minute or buying cheap season tickets or something, those seats are trash. The viewing angles are terrible, the way the steps to the concourse flow into the seating area is insane, etc.

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The whole thing was designed by amateurs. And you just went a long way towards calling the not atrocious Reed actually "atrocious."

It's not atrocious overall. That's actually part of the problem. If the whole experience absolutely sucked for everyone then it would be more likely to change.

But for most fans, most of the time, Reed is exactly "fine."