Be Happy It’s in Your Back Yard

The instant I heard Dodger Stadium’s property proposed as site for a new football stadium, I knew that neighborhood residents would stand up and make themselves heard, objecting to it.

Well, sure enough, several dozen of them turned up at an L.A. City Council public forum Monday to state their opposition to a new stadium being constructed in their vicinity, because of, oh, you know, all that noise and traffic and commotion. To which I have something to say in reply to these people:

Don’t live near a stadium .

Dodger Stadium isn’t new. It wasn’t built last week. It has been standing there for something like 35 years. They play baseball 81 days a year there. Plus exhibition games against the Angels. Plus postseason games, as many as 11 a year under baseball’s new format. They also have amateur baseball, concerts, charity events and film location work there.

So, don’t go saying how a football stadium would throw your neighborhood into an uproar. You live near a stadium. It’s that big, round building up the street. The lights are on all night there. Football is played in the daytime, for a few hours on Sunday afternoons. Construction noise? You could have construction noise from building a new garage, or a McDonald’s.

Furthermore, a football stadium for Chavez Ravine will mean something worth the inconvenience--jobs. Hundreds of jobs. At a time when the whole country is going down the tubes, economically, the adults and teens of Chavez Ravine could benefit from some of the work and money that would come with a new stadium, once it is built.

No place is going to be ideal. This is Los Angeles, so there isn’t much available farm land. If you build in the city, you’re always going to disrupt somebody’s neighborhood. If you build in the so-called country, you’re going to disrupt the environment. You could build in Nevada, but it’s a tough commute.

Dodger Stadium has been good to its community. It hasn’t been the scene of holdups, of gang wars, of muggings. The worst thing that ever happened in that parking lot was that a baseball player threw a firecracker. The loudest noise in the whole neighborhood is Tommy Lasorda.

This isn’t about football.

If you live near a stadium, stuff happens. The good people of Echo Park, of Elysian Park, of Griffith Park, they spend more than 150 days each year experiencing some sort of activity at Dodger Stadium, much of it very late at night. All they want to do is add eight, 10, maybe 12 afternoon football games. I don’t see why this should be such a shock. You live near a stadium .

I was in Pisa, Italy, once and turned a corner at a coffee shop and came face-to-face with the Leaning Tower. It was tucked into a quiet little neighborhood. Tourists were everywhere, but local residents didn’t complain about too much activity. Why? Because they lived near a leaning tower, that’s why. If you want peace and quiet, don’t live by a leaning tower or a baseball park.

The Dodgers themselves used to play 154 games per year, home and away. Today, they play 162. With baseball’s need for greed, some day it will probably be 170. Your neighborhood would be the same. You couldn’t call the commissioner of baseball and ask him to knock off all that expansion. Dodger Stadium will be old and decrepit some day and will need to remodel. That’ll be noisy too.

Look, I am sorry that jackhammers would shake and rattle, that trucks would rumble by, that hard-hats would whistle. But they have a word for this. It’s called construction . It’s how buildings go up. It has been going on now for a few thousand years. If they weren’t erecting a stadium near you, they might be putting up a hotel, a 16-screen cineplex, a Blockbuster Video. Everywhere there’s 2,000 square feet of open space, somebody puts up a Blockbuster Video. I think it’s a law.

The organization Football LA is exploring and evaluating new stadium locations. While other large cities bid for pro football franchises, Los Angeles lags behind. Wouldn’t it be nice if the neighbors and merchants of Chavez Ravine would rally together in support of progress, of new industry, of new employment opportunities, of civic pride and morale? Remember, living near two great stadiums might increase the value of your businesses and homes.

A football stadium on Dodger Stadium’s land would be a magnificent neighborhood asset. Don’t stand in its way. Help build it.