San Francisco Gears Up for Super Bowl Sunday

It won’t rain on Super Bowl Sunday but the football spectacular will pour money into San Francisco Bay area business coffers, the head of a task force overseeing the event’s logistics said Thursday.

San Francisco Supervisor Quentin Kopp, chairman of the Bay Area Super Bowl Task Force, almost guaranteed it won’t rain at Stanford Stadium on Jan. 20.

“The best meteorologists say it will be clear to overcast,” he told a news conference. “It might rain the night before the game, but not the day of the game.”

Kopp said the game will bring $100 million in direct spending to the Bay Area, adding that the estimate was “conservative.”

If the San Francisco 49ers don’t make it to the final clash, about $10 million more would be added, he said.

One group that might not make money is the task force itself, Kopp said.

“We don’t stand to make money and have asked private sources for help,” he said, pointing out the task force has only $175,000 in tax money.

“Servicing the needs of the fan is the chief responsibility of the task force,” according to Kopp, who said the job calls for easing problems ranging from hotel accommodations to traffic.

Hotels in the four-county area have been surveyed monthly for their room availability for Super Bowl weekend, Jan. 17-20.

To date some 243 hotels have responded and listed 12,875 rooms as still available.

“In San Francisco alone, some 142 hotels are listed as unbooked, with the remaining 101 distributed over the counties of Alameda, Santa Clara and San Mateo,” Kopp said.

Kopp was asked about reports of some motels charging inflated rates for Super Bowl.

“We have had reports of only four motels gouging and we have taken them off our hot line service. I think that’s a pretty good record, considering how many hotels and motels are in the area.”

Kopp also said he didn’t expect any major parking problems, pointing out the practice the Palo Alto police department had with the Olympic soccer games played at Stanford.

A special Super Bowl Express train will run from San Francisco to Stanford Station, a short walk from the stadium. Round trip tickets are $20 apiece.

The task force’s main job will be ahead because “85 percent of the prospective spectators won’t learn they are securing tickets until their teams win the January 6th playoffs.

“That means that on Jaunary 7th, there will be an enormous last-minute scramble for hotel rooms and transportation,” Kopp said.

The game itself will be preceded by several pre- and post-game parties, including events held by 26 firms in a “tent city” covering 650,000 square feet on the Stanford campus.