UPDATE: This article has been updated to correct the estimated cost of the proposed stadium on the Las Vegas Strip. We regret the error.
LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — The money it will cost to build a new state-of-the-art stadium for the soon-to-be Las Vegas A’s does not include acquiring the land or moving the team from the Bay to the desert.
However, a local economist who has been in the mix in virtually every big draw lured to Las Vegas – Tesla, F1, the Raiders, and now the A’s – said the area around the land might be just as spectacular.
Jeremy Aguero, principal analyst at Applied Analysis in Las Vegas was hired by the A’s to break down the financial implications of breaking ground on a development – for the ballpark and what he calls a “world-class,” “baseball village,” – in Las Vegas.
Some of the newer Major League Baseball stadiums – in San Diego’s Gas Lamp District and the Battery in Atlanta – might serve as a blueprint for the A’s as they figure out what to do with the remainder of the 49 acres around the new ballpark – which could take up to 9-13 acres.
“I’m not here to suggest that either one of those are instructive in terms of what would be developed,” Aguero said. “But I think lessons learned from very successful surrounding developments is exactly what the A’s have conveyed to me that they’re looking to do.”
The area around T-Mobile Arena, where the Golden Knights play professional hockey, is in an adjacent lot to the proposed site for the A’s new home at Tropicana Ave. and Dean Martin Dr. fully developed with shops and restaurants along the Las Vegas Strip.
The home of the NFL’s Las Vegas Raiders, Allegiant Stadium – which Aguero points to as a “shining star of how economic development deals should be done – has not fully developed the surrounding area. But the money spent to develop that project has already been recouped by Clark County.
To that end, the chairman of the Clark County Commission said the deal with the A’s is not yet set in stone.
“Right now we just don’t know enough detail,” Gibson said.
Gibson said the Nevada Legislature and Governor Joe Lombardo would frame the negotiations with the A’s and then hand it off to the County Commission.
“You can use these parameters to fashion a deal,” Gibson said.
