Our own Rick Snider has an interesting theory about the future of the Capitals and Wizards, and it includes staying in DC but not at their current location?
Indeed, and instead of writing a column on it for our digital space, Rick joined The Junkies Thursday morning to explain:
“People keep asking me about the Commanders stadium at RFK…and it’s not the Commanders – I think it’s the Caps and Wizards who could end up there,” Snider said. “Basically, Capital One Arena has served its purpose for the neighborhood, but it’s done it, so you move to RFK for a couple reasons.”
The first one? Space, both more and less.
“It takes up much less space than a football stadium, so you can convert the neighborhood and have room to do the other things,” Snider said. “Football is a vanity project for the city, but you can’t make money off of it – you can with this. And, if you take Capital One Arena and turn it into luxury residences, you still keep the economic development in the area, and the RFK site wins – and you don’t have to pay for a football stadium if you don’t want to.”
The other reason is along that last line: it’s unlikely that Virginia, the perceived suitor for the Caps and Wizards if they are to move out of DC, could get them AND the Commanders.
“If the Caps and Wizards were to move to Virginia, could they pay for that AND a new football stadium?” Snider asked. “Let Virginia pay for the football stadium. DC has to look at its own interest; you can finally get the RFK corridor revitalized, Ted gets to convert his place downtown and the city doesn’t have to upgrade that, and you still have space at RFK.”
But wait, EB says – what’s wrong with Capital One Arena as is?
“It doesn’t have enough rich-folk money, and I mean, my heart bleeds for you,” Snider said. “I know we’ve had trouble with crime in that area, and Ted would like to move from that, too.”
Bish jumped in to tell a story about how someone he knows had to shut down his restaurant in Chinatown because of employee safety issues, but he doesn’t believe the RFK site would be much safer if crime and security is an issue – and EB agrees, thinking Chinatown will go downhill again if the sports teams leave.
So, then, how will Chinatown survive if the Caps and Wizards move?
“You can convert the building. The Mayor wants to convert some of the old government buildings, which is harder to do, but this fits more into the Penn Quarter neighborhood and is a private building,” Snider said. “It’s always been a residential pass-through. You could bring back the neighborhood there and supplement all the businesses. There’s not as much police presence around Capital One these days, so why not invest more in security?”
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All that said, this is something, Snider says, he’s seen building for a while now.
“I’ve been seeing hints for more than a year that Ted wants that arena site out at RFK, which has a second metro line available to go there, so you don’t need all that traffic going through anymore,” Snider said. “I always said that Ted isn’t two steps ahead of you, he’s two blocks ahead of you.”
It’s been said that the citizens who live near the RFK site would balk at a football stadium, but perhaps a new arena is the best of both worlds?
“The stadium is like life after people, but around the stadium itself, they’ve developed a lot of it,” Snider said. “The Benning Road area has a lot of new development, and it’s coming; you can see it. The citizens want year-round stuff, so if you say the arena only needs around half of the 191 acres, that leaves the other half to other projects we want, and, with 200 dates they can sell, it’s a lot of jobs they can create. It’s a fair deal for everybody.”
Perhaps, in the end, Ted Leonsis simply wants his legacy to be having revitalized two areas of the District with his product?
“The RFK site has been nothing; they opened it in 1961 and never really done anything else around it,” Snider said. “They’ve tried things and nothing has ever worked – but the area around Nationals Park was terrible before they built the stadium, and Capital One Arena turned Chinatown around.
This could be the thing that revitalizes it, and you get the double venue.”
Listen to Snider’s entire segment with the Junkies above!
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