The New York City FC proposal to Columbia University involves sharing the stadium with their football team. The $100 million club has been searchin
The New York City FC proposal to Columbia University involves sharing the stadium with their football team.
The $100 million club has been searching for a permanent home for a couple of years now, but for different reasons have been having a hard time finding the right place. The crazy New York real estate market does not help much either, as the club have tried to establish themselves in Queens, Bronx and by a pier on Hudson River but none have worked so far.
The team officials have looked into many locations already but from what it looks like they might be right back where they started in Manhattan. What they are considering is moving to the Athletics Complex at Columbia University, which is located in the northern part of Manhattan. However, what they actually want is to build a new stadium from scratch to be used for soccer and football.
[quote_box_center]“New York City F. C. is looking at sites all over New York City,” said Risa Heller, a spokeswoman for the team. “We are working with the de Blasio administration to find a world-class site for a soccer-specific stadium.”[/quote_box_center]
The Yankees Stadium transformed into a soccer field for New York City FC
For now, the club that is owned partly by Manchester City and the Yankees will be playing this season at Yankee Stadium since they do not have a home stadium yet. But the executives for New York City FC are very excited about making this a possibility, even though no agreements have been made yet.
The new stadium that the Columbia Lions and NYCFC would share would cost around $400 million, changing it from a 17,000 to 25,000-seat stadium. There are other arrangements they would have to make in order to get this to work, for instance parking. However, this is not the first time an MLS team would be sharing a stadium with a college. Houston Dynamo did share theirs with Texas Southern University, and Portland Timbers with Portland State. San Jose Earthquakes also did the same with Santa Clara University.
Major League Soccer has also some interested in the club finding a home stadium and establishing themselves in New York City, as this is a market with a lot of potential and very lucrative.
