The Seahawks paid the university $6.1 million for 20 games over two seasons. The team covered game-day expenses and controlled campus parking spaces, while the school took care of the field. The team also spent $1.1 million to cover the universitys field and practice area with FieldTurf.
Since 1995, five NFL teams have played a season or two at college stadiums while their cilities were being built or remodeled:
Mark Rotenberg, the University of Minnesotas top lawyer and lead negotiator in talks with the Vikings, said the U is willing to consider temporary seating but opposes permanent seating expansion. "We love the stadium, and we want to keep it the same size," he said.
Asked whether the NFL was reluctant to have the team play at TCF, Vikings vice president of stadium development Lester Bagley said: "Its not ideal for anyone, including the NFL, ns, the Vikings, visiting teams, the university."
Vikings and stadium officials are eyeing property southeast of the Metrodome. Is it doable? Hard to say.
Another stadium site emerges right next door
Microsoft billionaire Paul Allen bought the Seahawks in the late 1990s with the expectation of getting a new stadium. After Washington voters narrowly approved public funding, the team began wooing the University of Washington as a temporary home. The Seahawks immediately pledged to keep Husky Stadium dry, avoid playing on the same weekends as UW and meet with university neighbors to discuss traffic concerns.
Mondale said theyre seeing whether a stadium might work southeast of the Dome on property occupied by the 511 Building, a former Control Data center that houses telecommunications firms, and Xcels Elliot Park substation.
Bagley said that stadium construction might require only two seasons, but that the team wants to plan for the worse-case scenario. If a deal is reached soon, he said, preliminary structural work could begin this ll at the Dome to allow the Vikings to continue to play there.
Back to school
Staff librarian Sandy Date contributed to this report. Kevin Duchschere • 612-673-4455
Seating could be issue
For the 2002 season, the Bears agreed to pay the University of Illinois 10 percent of gross ticket revenues as rent, and split the concessions 50-50. Legislators at first refused to allow beer to be sold during Bears games, but then approved a subsequent bill allowing beer on Cook County golf courses as well as in the Champaign stadium.
The Seahawks and da Bears
Last update: Friday January 27, 2012 - 9:03 PM
NFL has a record of success on campus,In 2010, the Minnesota Vikings and the University of Minnesota came together to put on an NFL game at TCF Bank Stadium on short notice.
TCF Banks seating capacity could be a sticking point. The college stadiums where Seattle and Chicago played seated about as many or more than their own stadiums.
Two seasons - or three?
Even worse, the university prohibits beer sales there.
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Neither the Seahawks nor the Bears said how much revenue they lost in the seasons they spent away from home.
Bagley cautioned that the stadium site question isnt settled and reiterated that the teams choice is Arden Hills. But if financing and political pressures lead to the Dome site, he said, the Vikings need to be ready to take up temporary quarters at TCF. "We knew it was always a possibility we would have to do this again for more than one game," he said.
Since 1995, five NFL teams have played a season or two at college stadiums while their home cilities were being built or remodeled.
The Vikings say that three seasons at TCF will cost the team $36.9 million in operating losses and $11 million to refurbish the U stadium to NFL standards. The Vikings paid $1.7 million to the U to play there against the Bears in December 2010.
NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said Friday that reports that the league wasnt eager to have the Vikings play at the U didnt come from his office, but he declined to comment further. Three-fourths of NFL team owners would have to approve the temporary move.
How long it takes "depends on when the bill is passed and how quickly we could get an architectural team going," said Ted Mondale, chairman of the Metropolitan Sports Facilities Commission.
The Vikings estimate that moving to the U for three seasons will cost $48 million. The biggest problem is that TCF has 14,000 fewer seats than the Dome, which would squeeze out thousands of season-ticket holders. The university stadium would need to be winterized for the frigid months when the Gophers dont play but the Vikings do.
Perhaps the best parallel to what could become the Vikings future is the Seahawks past. The team played the 2000 and 2001 seasons at Husky Stadium while a $430 million stadium was going up where the Kingdome stood 4 miles away in downtown Seattle.
The NFL team had decided it was time for a new stadium to replace its outmoded downtown domed arena, and agreed to a public-private deal to build on the domes footprint. In the meantime, it proposed to play at the stadium of the large university nearby. The school agreed, and a deal was struck.
One idea is to build next door to the Dome, which would allow the Vikings to play there until the new stadium was ready. The team says Star Tribune property adjoining the Dome is too narrow to build on, but it hasnt ruled out an area southeast of the Dome that contains an office building and Xcel Energy substation.
By then, UW officials were grinning ear to ear. "We genuinely enjoy these people," then-Athletic Director Barbara Hedges told a Seattle columnist.
With the Metrodome site picking up momentum as the potential location for their next home, Vikings officials are figuring out how and where the team could play during the two to three years it will take to build a new stadium.
In May 1999, the Seahawks agreed to a deal that included an $800,000 transportation plan with shuttles and trash cleanup, no weekday and night games, and a community planner for local issues.
Bagley said the Vikings were told that the substation cant be relocated and that the 511 Building carried long-term leases. "That wtechnical schools mnould be the ideal situation, but weve not yet seen a viable plan that would accomplish that," he said.
Challenges aside, the U and the team believe they can reach an agreement. They worked together on short notice in December 2010 to move the Vikings to campus for a game against the Chicago Bears after a blizzard ripped open the Domes fiberglass roof.
For now, team officials assume they would build where the Dome stands. Which is why they and U officials are talking about how to turn cozy, collegiate TCF Bank Stadium into an NFL arena.
Last update: Saturday January 28, 2012 - 5:59 PM
A future scenario for the Vikings and the University of Minnesota? Maybe. But it actually happened to the Seattle Seahawks and the University of Washington in 1999, when tNFL has a record of success on campushe Pac-10 school let the Seahawks move to Husky Stadium for two seasons in a deal that both sides said worked out well.
Rotenberg said the U would probably install the heating coils the Vikings want below the playing field, and he said it likely would accommodate the teams desire to sell alcohol during games, an opinion echoed Friday by U President Eric Kaler.
