https://www.bizjournals.com/jacksonville/news/2019/11/08/jacksonville-chases-2-deals-aprofessional-soccer.html?iana=hpmvp_jac_news_headline
QuoteThe city is in talks to land two major developments: a professional soccer stadium and a $542 million liquefied natural gas facility, according to materials for a meeting of the Mayor's Budget Review Committee on Nov. 12.
The city is working to enter into an option agreement to sell land to RP Sports Investments Inc., owner of the Jacksonville Armada. RPSI would pay $5,000 to enter the option agreement, which would give it the right to purchase about 5 acres for $1.
RPSI would have to close on the land, located along A. Phillip Randolph Blvd and the Arlington Expressway, by Jan. 31, 2023, or ownership would revert back to the city.
The company would also have to begin construction on 25,000 to 175,000 square feet of office space and a soccer stadium "suitable for professional soccer play" with at least 2,500 seats and 100 to 200 parking spaces by Jan. 31, 2024 and substantially complete construction by Jan. 31, 2025.
If RPSI closes on the land and doesn't substantially complete construction by this deadline, it would have to pay the city the fair market value of the land.
Quote
RP Funding would make a $5,000 payment with the option to hold the land for three years. If RP Funding moves ahead and decides to build, it can buy the land for $1 but the stadium would have to be completed by 2025.
That's a big ask. Essentially freezes the property for 6 years for $5,000 and the potential for a small soccer stadium for what's now an amateur team, and an office building. 2,500 seats also suggests they have no intention of joining a professional minor league.
Quote from: Tacachale on November 08, 2019, 04:37:03 PM
Quote
RP Funding would make a $5,000 payment with the option to hold the land for three years. If RP Funding moves ahead and decides to build, it can buy the land for $1 but the stadium would have to be completed by 2025.
That's a big ask.
But It's Easier Here ... to extend deadlines
https://www.news4jax.com/news/local/jacksonville/plan-would-bring-new-soccer-stadium-to-downtown-jacksonville
Looks like they're aspiring for 10k.
I'm seeing Parramore style déjà vu...
Quote from: thelakelander on November 08, 2019, 06:49:37 PM
I'm seeing Parramore style déjà vu...
At least it's on an empty lot. And there's not a league forcing us to destroy a neighborhood and spend millions on a redundant stadium.
True but that doesn't mean that it's the right fit for the community. I wonder if there's been any neighborhood input. Putting the use issue aside (a use and end user base that's just about as culturally incompatible as they come), the plan itself is horrible. A massive parking lot on the Avenue?! This thing needs some work.
I went to the game last night, USA Womens Team. Perfect evening for soccer. Now I've been to LOT J twice this weekend, for Sting Concert and Soccer game. Absolutely cannot imagine how this (aka Event Parking) is going to work with a $500 million development in the middle of that parking lot.
Feels like another Jacksonville project that has quietly disappeared....
Per an Orlando MLS beat writer, Armada leadership was in Minnesota for the MLS All-Star game to meet with league officials.
Sounds like there might be a plan brewing for the Armada to move into MLS NextPro (MLS' feeder system) when the new stadium is completed.
https://twitter.com/GavinEwbank/status/1557713690253819905?s=20&t=IJ6d8i3gCVJ9Fv5hHql7Lw
Cool update!
Quote from: Ken_FSU on August 12, 2022, 03:29:35 PM
Per an Orlando MLS beat writer, Armada leadership was in Minnesota for the MLS All-Star game to meet with league officials.
Sounds like there might be a plan brewing for the Armada to move into MLS NextPro (MLS' feeder system) when the new stadium is completed.
https://twitter.com/GavinEwbank/status/1557713690253819905?s=20&t=IJ6d8i3gCVJ9Fv5hHql7Lw
QuoteThe Armada have until Jan. 2023 to initiate the land option agreement with the city on the land for their downtown stadium. Would expect, if this agreement with MLSNP gets done, a formal announcement around that time.
Would definitely be interesting. I do hope they give a little more thought to the layout of whatever they ultimately build, especially knowing that the fairgrounds will be moving out. Lot happening on APR and it'd be a shame to squander the opportunity of really well connecting to that potential even if the expressway divides things a bit.
^ Luckily, the Eastside community has been engaged!
A step forward for the Armada stadium plans:
https://www.jacksonville.com/story/sports/mls/2024/02/27/jacksonville-armada-stadium-city-council-extends-soccer-deadline/72765768007/
Sounds like this is going to be equivalent of a privately owned park that happens to have a soccer field with bleachers and a huge surface parking lot as its only amenity.
So five years and counting for them to build the equivalent of a high school stadium?
No wonder Tebow and co. called their bluff and started their own team.
Quote from: landfall on March 02, 2024, 01:50:19 AM
So five years and counting for them to build the equivalent of a high school stadium?
No wonder Tebow and co. called their bluff and started their own team.
A team that is going to play where exactly?
I'm not too optimistic about the Armada's prospects. Especially compared to Sporting Club Jacksonville. The MLS Next League they are joining is basically just the reserve teams for MLS clubs. There are only two clubs currently in the league that aren't feeder teams for existing MLS clubs. The primary function of the league is to provide competition for youth players as a test to see which players (if any) are ready to get called up to the MLS feeder teams. But by and large most players in the future in MLS will not even come up through the league. Like in Europe, maybe a few players on the senior teams will have come up through the reserve team.
MLS Next is the third division, while SC Jax will play in the second division in the USL. With the direction soccer is headed in the country, the second division (like in England, Germany, and other European countries) can become fairly competitive and popular. The average attendance in the USL in 2023 was 5,552. This is more than the Jumbo Shrimp drew last year and over 1k more than Minor League baseball averaged. MLS Next games are mostly scrimmages with like 100 people at games.
Lastly, SC Jax is affiliated with Florida Elite, which seems to be the far and away dominant club in Jax now. Armada is affiliated with JFC. When I grew up playing there were basically four competitive clubs in Jax: Clay County, JYS, JFC (which previously had different names), and Jaguars (which predated the NFL team and got a nice settlement). Jaguars are now defunct (RIP), JYS doesn't have travel teams, Clay County and JFC are both weaker than in the past. Florida Elite is a newer club, but is already totally dominating the soccer scene in Jax.
Basically, I would bet a lot of money that SC Jax will be the more successful of the two clubs.
Quote from: pierre on March 02, 2024, 10:35:42 PM
Quote from: landfall on March 02, 2024, 01:50:19 AM
So five years and counting for them to build the equivalent of a high school stadium?
No wonder Tebow and co. called their bluff and started their own team.
A team that is going to play where exactly?
Should be announced before too long.
The ultimate losers are as usual going to be the public as two subpar setups compete for the same market. The Armada are a joke, they've spent years pissing about in glorified youth soccer and have been teasing about what is ultimately some high school bleachers on the Eastside, so forgive me for having little trust in them and being sceptical of their capabilities. The USL leadership have way more name recognition and apparent financial backing behind them but yeah, St. John's County hardly whets the appetite.
If the Armada weren't so useless and had just settled for playing in the USL at the baseball grounds I think although not absolutely ideal in terms of having their own home professional soccer in Jacksonville would probably be ticking along just fine whilst a solution to that is identified.
The USL stadium hasn't been announced yet.
Games at UNF with training facilities in SJC makes the most sense.
I'm looking forward to seeing what the reaction here will be when the USL stadium location is announced.
Quote from: thelakelander on March 07, 2024, 01:49:39 PM
I'm looking forward to seeing what the reaction here will be when the USL stadium location is announced.
I'm looking forward to seeing a mirror what happened with the Orlando City Stadium way back when.
Quote from: thelakelander on March 07, 2024, 01:49:39 PM
I'm looking forward to seeing what the reaction here will be when the USL stadium location is announced.
Will that be anytime soon?
https://www.jaxdailyrecord.com/news/2025/jan/30/jacksonville-armada-issued-permit-to-build-downtown-soccer-stadium/
Finally! the Jax Armada have been issued permit to build the stadium.
Idk why I thought they already had the permit.
This will be interesting nonetheless!
Quote from: Tacachale on March 03, 2024, 04:49:11 PM
Quote from: pierre on March 02, 2024, 10:35:42 PM
Quote from: landfall on March 02, 2024, 01:50:19 AM
So five years and counting for them to build the equivalent of a high school stadium?
No wonder Tebow and co. called their bluff and started their own team.
A team that is going to play where exactly?
Should be announced before too long.
This discussion was almost a year ago. And aside from rumors of a possible location on the western side of the Regency property, I have not heard anything about a Sporting Jax stadium.
In the original announcement three years ago, it was stated the men's team won't start playing until they have a stadium. It makes me wonder realistically when the team will actually start.
And Sporting Jax is pretty much in the same position as the Jax Armada were a few years ago... playing games at UNF's Hodges Stadium... it is cool that they started a women's team and their inaugural season is approaching though.
https://www.jaxdailyrecord.com/news/2024/dec/03/sporting-jax-womens-usl-super-league-team-to-play-inaugural-season-at-unf/
Quote from: copperfiend on February 01, 2025, 04:15:19 PM
Quote from: Tacachale on March 03, 2024, 04:49:11 PM
Quote from: pierre on March 02, 2024, 10:35:42 PM
Quote from: landfall on March 02, 2024, 01:50:19 AM
So five years and counting for them to build the equivalent of a high school stadium?
No wonder Tebow and co. called their bluff and started their own team.
A team that is going to play where exactly?
Should be announced before too long.
This discussion was almost a year ago. And aside from rumors of a possible location on the western side of the Regency property, I have not heard anything about a Sporting Jax stadium.
In the original announcement three years ago, it was stated the men's team won't start playing until they have a stadium. It makes me wonder realistically when the team will actually start.
Last I heard (6 months ago, maybe), they were eyeing something far less exciting than Regency, 20+ miles out from DT Jax.
Who knows what will actually happen, but part of me wonders if this thing was launched under the assumption that tens of millions of dollars in public incentives would be theirs for the taking. Tough to make those numbers work when you've got a larger, higher priority football stadium and sports & entertainment district to tackle first.
Regency is still in play for SC Jax. We should know something in the next couple of months.
Even though St. Johns County is the absolute hot bed of soccer in Jax these days, that location still makes the most sense. 295 and Atlantic makes it accessible from your urban core hipster fan base and the southside/SJC where most of your die hard soccer families are.
NE Florida is a low key strong soccer area. At the youth level, it's probably only fourth best in the state after South Florida, Tampa, and Orlando; but those areas are stacked. Jax still cranks out of a lot of talent and has great participation at the youth level. Even BASL at the adult level gets fantastic participation. I believe it is far and away the best adult league in the state. If SC Jax is run well, I think they can get tremendous fan support and possibly set themselves up for an ascent to MLS in the future.
Off topic a bit, but it's truly crazy how bad boys high school soccer is in Duval these days. Fletcher, Stanton, BK, and Bolles all used to be state powers and now are shells of what they once were. Mandarin is the only historic power that is still strong, and they are stronger than ever. Talent has gotten spread around a lot more, and the new SJC schools all seem to be strong.
Quote from: CityLife on February 03, 2025, 09:13:44 AM
Off topic a bit, but it's truly crazy how bad boys high school soccer is in Duval these days. Fletcher, Stanton, BK, and Bolles all used to be state powers and now are shells of what they once were. Mandarin is the only historic power that is still strong, and they are stronger than ever. Talent has gotten spread around a lot more, and the new SJC schools all seem to be strong.
An intern at my company is a collegiate soccer player and they did not play for their high school team. They said that clubs are far more important and a better jumping off point for a collegiate or professional career. Their club, from SJC, is one of the best in the state and very few of their players actually participated in their high school programs. That's a bummer, but you can't blame the players for wanting to spend their playing time more efficiently. The
Yeah, club has always been more important than high school, but it is especially more so now with the emergence of ECNL, MLS Next, and other elite platforms like that. With those leagues, plus apps like Hudl and VEO; it is considerably easier to get noticed now than it used to. Nobody falls through the cracks anymore and elite players don't have to play high school. That said, there are still a lot of elite players with scholarships already lined up that choose to play high school, and I doubt not having one or two players elite players is what is holding schools like Fletcher and Stanton back. Back in my day, Fletcher's team went 15+ players deep with quality players. Their record in the past few years is abysmal. Either the surfers have stopped also playing soccer, or it's not as family friendly of an area as it used to be. I speculate it's the latter. Having, the best club in the area (Florida Elite) located in SJC also probably pushes a lot of families to live closer to there.
Quote from: Ken_FSU on February 02, 2025, 06:54:35 PM
Quote from: copperfiend on February 01, 2025, 04:15:19 PM
Quote from: Tacachale on March 03, 2024, 04:49:11 PM
Quote from: pierre on March 02, 2024, 10:35:42 PM
Quote from: landfall on March 02, 2024, 01:50:19 AM
So five years and counting for them to build the equivalent of a high school stadium?
No wonder Tebow and co. called their bluff and started their own team.
A team that is going to play where exactly?
Should be announced before too long.
This discussion was almost a year ago. And aside from rumors of a possible location on the western side of the Regency property, I have not heard anything about a Sporting Jax stadium.
In the original announcement three years ago, it was stated the men's team won't start playing until they have a stadium. It makes me wonder realistically when the team will actually start.
Last I heard (6 months ago, maybe), they were eyeing something far less exciting than Regency, 20+ miles out from DT Jax.
Who knows what will actually happen, but part of me wonders if this thing was launched under the assumption that tens of millions of dollars in public incentives would be theirs for the taking. Tough to make those numbers work when you've got a larger, higher priority football stadium and sports & entertainment district to tackle first.
I wonder what the stadium plan was when they announced the team. That was in 2022 and they had 2025 as a tentative start date. That included a completed soccer stadium. It's 2025 now and there's been no announcement of any type of stadium.
Realistically, it is probably 2028 for an expected start for Sporting Jax if there is a stadium requirement.
There was such a huge missed opportunity -- I know, this is the capital city of missed opportunities -- to get a proper stadium built, which could have served as the temporary home of the Jaguars during construction of Everbank. Now that the public coffers are tapped out on stadium financing, it just made it significantly harder. That "stadium" is nothing more than an office building with a field attached. Maybe there's a plan to expand that once they start playing, but those things don't happen, especially in the city where renderings go to die.
Not sure this would have been viable. There probably would have been a thousand reasons not to, but there seemed to be a prime location for a 30,000-40,000 seat stadium on city land at the corner of St Johns Bluff Rd and Town Center Parkway. There are already large turn lanes and signaling for that property, but whatever was planned there was abandoned. There needs to be that middle-capacity venue to attract "sports tourism" if that's really going to be a pillar. Maybe if it came to fruition, it miiiight have moved the needle for UNF to consider a football program.....
Eh, probably too swampy to do anything there, which is why no one has done anything there.
Apparently we don't deserve nice things.
Quote from: Jrz Jax on February 03, 2025, 09:54:41 PM
There was such a huge missed opportunity -- I know, this is the capital city of missed opportunities -- to get a proper stadium built, which could have served as the temporary home of the Jaguars during construction of Everbank. Now that the public coffers are tapped out on stadium financing, it just made it significantly harder. That "stadium" is nothing more than an office building with a field attached. Maybe there's a plan to expand that once they start playing, but those things don't happen, especially in the city where renderings go to die.
Not sure this would have been viable. There probably would have been a thousand reasons not to, but there seemed to be a prime location for a 30,000-40,000 seat stadium on city land at the corner of St Johns Bluff Rd and Town Center Parkway. There are already large turn lanes and signaling for that property, but whatever was planned there was abandoned. There needs to be that middle-capacity venue to attract "sports tourism" if that's really going to be a pillar. Maybe if it came to fruition, it miiiight have moved the needle for UNF to consider a football program.....
Eh, probably too swampy to do anything there, which is why no one has done anything there.
Apparently we don't deserve nice things.
That's Bearish!!
I wouldn't count Jax all the way out!
The city of Jax does not own any large parcels of land on St johns bluff rd near the town center to sell to a sports league owner like what's happening on the eastside. The area on St johns bluff you are speaking of was previously owned by the Morrocco Shriners and sold to a private developer to turn it into more retail stores and apartments.
https://www.jaxdailyrecord.com/news/2021/nov/30/morocco-shrine-temple-property-sells-for-dollar16-48-million/
Dury Hotels over Dury Inn was eyeing some other privately owned property over that way:
https://www.jaxdailyrecord.com/news/2023/aug/28/drury-inn-suites-considering-jacksonville-site-near-st-johns-town-center/
A little further south of the former Shriners property ... buuuut, I looked back and I misread the deed there. It's not owned by the city, but they had to shave off a little of the property to widen St Johns Bluff Rd., not the entire property. That hotel looks like it's on the other side of the street, between Bluff Road and Route 295/power lines.
(https://i.imgur.com/lNXhkXNl.jpg)