Lindsey Huling's Blog

Olympic Assignment

Saturday, November 20th, 2010 | Assignments for TLEP 4830 | No Comments

My Olympic article came from the Utah Travel Center. The Olympics took place in Salt Lake in 2002, for the Winter Games and in my opinion, were a great success.

After the games took place the Utah Athletic Foundation inherited all the Olympic facilities. It was then their goal to provide Utah citizens with facilities that they would be able to use, in thanks for their support with the building of the games. Each facility used in the 2002 Olympic Games has since been transformed into community facilities, open to the public.

The Utah Olympic Oval is currently known as one of the premiere speed skating facilities in the world and offers many ‘Learn To’ programs for residents. Both adult and children skating lessons take place here as well as many hockey games and practices. The Utah Olympic Park was used for Nordic jumping, bobsledding and luge during the games. Now, visitors are able to take bobsled rides year round, participate in ski camps, and continue to use multiple ski jumps still available. The facility is now also home to a ski museum. At the third facility, Soldier Hallow provides its visitors with cross country trails, skiing and snowboarding, snow tubing, and it even offers a rental shop for those in need of equipment.

As you can see the Utah Olympic facilities have continued to be of use to residents and visitors alike. The organization in charge of their transformation did an unbelievable job with planning and developing the areas into usable facilities for locals. I believe that part of the success for this amazing transformation is because of the residents in Utah, and their interests. As one of the top states in exercise and outdoor recreation I feel it would be difficult for a state, such as Ohio, to make use of the facilities. With this said I think that many areas that have held Olympic Games in them have difficulty figuring out how to transform their buildings into facilities used for more than just sports. One of the cities that have had trouble developing after the games has been Athens.

Athens, Greece was home to the 2004 Summer Olympic Games and has since been looking like a rundown parking lot. According to my comparison article 21or the 22 facilities used for the summer games are now in a state of despair. While I cannot be sure as to why exactly the games were not a success for such a historically rich city, I can provide a few possible insights. As discussed in class, a world city is known as a city familiar with people all throughout the world. I think with Athens being a world city people did not look at it as an area to go visit to either see the games or to see the buildings constructed for them. With a place like Salt Lake, nobody in China really knows where or what it is. With that said I think with an area like Utah, which has had a fraction of international visitors compared to Greece, the Olympics get the name out and make international and domestic travelers, want to visit the area. Also different from Utah, Greece did nothing with the buildings after the games left they are continuing to be rundown and vandalized by citizens. This has caused the city to have held the Olympics and then gain a small one time profit, also known as transitory.

Overall I think it can be very hard for cities to really benefit from the Olympic Games. It takes a lot of work to stay within the budget when building the facilities as well as transforming them into useful facilities afterwards. I believe the majority of cities that host the games end up experiencing the Plateau Theory, their revenue and visitation statistics go up for a few months and slowly but surely they start to head back down to where they were when they began. Needless to say, it would be very difficult to decide whether or not to host the games and it would require planners to look at every possible option of outcomes, including the horrible ones.

Research Article Critque

Saturday, November 20th, 2010 | Assignments for TLEP 4830 | No Comments

Professional Sports Facilities, Franchises and Urban Economic Development Critique

Abstract: Accuracy of implications discussed regarding whether sports facilities create revenue for cities, as well as hundreds of jobs. Also covered is the justification as to whether or not sports facilities and franchises help out an urban area, financially or internally.

In the article titled Professional Sports Facilities, Franchises and Urban Economic Development, written by Dennis Coates and Brad R. Humphreys, the two authors argue that the buzz around sports facilities generating revenue, has actually never been proven. They also suggest that many urban area sport facilities lose money as opposed to generating revenue.

Now, in the beginning of the article the authors seem to have valid points, suggesting that facilities are costing millions of dollars to construct and are need of replacement every 20-30 years. They also talk about how the majority of the budget comes from the public sector, not private like many believe. It was not until the middle to end of the article that I believed that Coates and Humphreys’ were beginning to scrounge for possible reasons or answers to why sports facilities may not draw in revenue.

They began speaking about how consumers, after the sports facility has been constructed, are now spending their money on tickets and food at sports games and not at other entertainment hot spots in the area, as they would have normally. I agree that if a sport facility is built that consumers will spend their money of different types of entertainment, but to me this is how business works, it is not a loss of economic revenue. I don’t care what type of facility is built, gym, restaurant, daycare, car wash, all facilities built will, at least for a moment, cause visitors and residents to change their spending habits. Coates and Humphrey also suggest that when it comes to working, those in the sports facility will spend less time being productive at work because they are too busy watching and discussing the game. Since no research has currently been done on such a topic, I will continue to believe this as being false. In my opinion the same amount of work would be done at a sports facility as there would be at any other establishment. The most ridiculous argument that I feel the two authors made was stating that the cost of subsidizing the facility may come at the expense of other public workers, meaning fewer police men and firefighters on the street. They even went on to state that it could all result in a weaker education system, lower productivity and lower incomes! While many of the points brought up I felt were valid, such as the large amounts of money it takes to build the facilities, many points I also felt were just absurd.  In many topics the authors even admitted to their not being any scientific studies to prove their statements, such as their being less work productivity and a higher cost of subsidizing the facility. Many times I felt the authors were trying too hard to find areas that supported their theory of the negative impacts of sports facilities.

Also discussed within the article was the issue of mega events, Olympics, Super Bowls, and so on. On this subject I definitely agreed with the authors fully, for the first time. They too had mixed feelings as to whether the events were positive and beneficial financially. It was concluded that employment and financials rise briefly, but the aftermath for say the Olympics, is very wary. It is up to the city to decide how it will handle the mass crowd, followed by a large amount of buildings left empty, so in the end it is suggested that positive economic benefits are going to be weak.

Overall I felt the article was definitely well written and had many strong points. Though I did not agree with all the suggestions made I still feel it is a strong article and I would suggest it to others who are interested. One area I wish would have been focused on more by the authors would have been the sense of pride that comes to the community while having a sports team in the area.

Behind the NFL Scenes

Monday, November 8th, 2010 | Assignments for TLEP 4830 | No Comments

On Friday November 5^th I went to a presentation at the Perry Field House titled Behind the NFL Scenes with Robert Waggoner. Robert Waggoner has been an NFL Official for 15 years now, before then he was in the MAC conference officiating football games as well as lacrosse. He was asked to come to BGSU to speak about the importance of decision making skills, but with that he brought a vast amount of amazing stories.

As someone who does not pay too much attention to the game of football I was intrigued by the speaker because I enjoy learning about the ‘behind the scenes’ views of just about anything. You never hear official’s thoughts and views on TV, only the calls they made that nobody else agrees with.  I found it interesting that Mr. Waggoner said that many people feel that he, and other officials ruin the game, he views it as he makes the game run. I totally agree with his opinion because as he said without them, there would be fighting and the game would be at a standstill. As an official you must be quick in your thoughts and you must make the correct call, or you will hear about it for a long time to come. Unfortunately, nobody is perfect, and nobody can make the right calls all the time, so it is unfortunate to be in the spotlight when it occurs. For Mr. Waggoner he has been a part of two of the most controversial calls to have occurred this season. After one of calls, I was shocked to learn that he and others involved in the call, received death threats not only against themselves against their families as well. When he stated that all I could think was, it is just a game! It is amazing to see how far people will go in situations that do not even have to deal with life or death.

Other aspects of his speech that I thought were interesting were the regulations for commercial time during a game and that many of the officials have second jobs. When it came to the commercials I guess I was shocked to learn that there are specific regulations for it i.e. 19 commercials for each game, 20 if there is an injury and 21 if it is a nationally broadcast game. It is just another aspect of the game that you can now see is run by the media. When I found out about the officials having second jobs I was amazed at the possibility of even holding a job, such a teacher, when there is so much traveling and time involved in being an NFL Official. It really makes me wonder what the average salary is for an official because Mr. Waggoner seemed to think you could make a living off of it, depending on what style you would like to live. I definitely am glad I went to the presentation, I gained a lot of knowledge about how the NFL is run and what all it takes to be an official. I also learned about the importance of decision making and how one little call or decision can really turn your life around.

Perry Field House Tour Reflection

Sunday, November 7th, 2010 | Assignments for TLEP 4830 | No Comments

Having never been to the Perry Field House, I was very interested to go inside and see what it was like. I was surprised, because I thought it would have been bigger, but I suppose we may not have seen the entire building, such as offices and locker rooms. When I first entered into the track and field/ basketball court area, I was very impressed with its size and how nice it looked. It was not until Dave Hollinger began pointing out the flaws of the area that I began to notice that while the quality of the area may be nice, the layout and amount of space, is not.

When compared to the aspects of the book the indoor track and field does not seem to meet the requirements of safety very well. It may meet the minimum requirements for space, but as many people know, sometimes the minimum just does not cut it. The fact that they had to modify the track in order to meet the new safety regulations for the pole vaulting area is just ridiculous. If I were the one who had built the field house, I would have made sure to put the pole vaulting area further away from the track, on the other side. This way, when sitting in the stands guest’s vision would not be blocked by the student’s pole vaulting. I would have also arranged the area this way because I feel pole vaulting can be very dangerous if not done properly. There is no need for random visitors or athletes to be walking through a competition site while trying to get to their event, it is too dangerous.

Another aspect that I feel the Perry Field House has failed at meeting the suggestions in the book is the bleachers. I understand that it is difficult to raise the money for extra space within a facility, but bleachers are a big deal in sporting events.  The fact that the bleachers are roll away ones, to me, is alright. By having roll away bleachers it allows for more practice area when competitions are not in play, it also allows for different event set ups to take place and not have an eye sore in the middle of the room. My only problem with the bleachers is that the designers did not really give them a designated spot. As Dave was saying, the bleachers are set up in the center of the track, meaning visitors must walk over the track to get to their seats, as well as continuously turn their heads to see the competition. Having experienced a track like this before, it can be very annoying to not see the whole race due to poor design and set up.

Something that I was very surprised to learn was that the basketball floors in the field house are better than those located in Anderson Arena! I definitely think this meets, if not surpasses, suggestions in the book because it is nice to see good quality flooring being provided to your average students, not just those who are athletes. While it may be annoying to have to cover the expensive flooring while an event is going on, visitors who see the area without the cover will definitely be impressed by it. This in return will cause visitors to comment on how nice and new the field house looks, and it will give BGSU a better image.

The second area that I feel meets the standards in the book was area for the indoor football and soccer. Although the turf is not the most up to date, the area is large enough for a game to be played and it can be easily maintained. The field is large enough for visitors to walk around the outside of the field without interrupting play and it is also located very close to the main doors of the facility. There is an accurate amount of lighting in the room, as well as trial lighting that is supposed to save energy costs. It is nice to see that all different aspects of Bowling Green’s campus are trying new ways to be more energy efficient.

Overall I thought the space in the field house was really nice. Being one of the newer buildings on campus I wish it were one that I, and visitors, was able to use and see more often. A lot of people don’t even know where the field house is, or what it does.