Coliseum Design: A Marriage of Old, New

A bridge to the past, or a bridge to the future?

Local officials hoping to bring pro football back to Southern California envision the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum as both.

From the outside, fans would pass through the same walls where Olympic athletes walked in 1932 and 1984 and gaze at the same peristyle that hovered over two Super Bowls and the Dodgers’ victory in the 1959 World Series.

But walk five steps into the tunnels, and you won’t recognize the place: Vast concession concourses selling sushi and Chardonnay. Elegant private suites and luxurious lounges for people who can pay. Glitz and glamour instead of stone and sweat.

Gone would be the wide-open bowl with its continuous rise of red plastic chairs. In its place, boosters plan a three-tiered stadium with fewer seats, each with a better view of the action.

“You drive up, it’s going to look like the Coliseum,” said Patrick Lynch, the stadium’s general manager. “Then you go through the tunnel, and you see new. The way that this [exterior] will look and feel is just like it always has. Inside, it will be for 2000 and beyond.”

*

In part by citing the importance of preserving a national monument, city officials have built a strong cadre of cheerleaders behind a proposal to overhaul the Coliseum. They will make their official pitch at a meeting of National Football League team owners Oct. 30-31.

The architectural blueprints show gutting the stadium where the Rolling Stones rocked and the Pope preached, where John F. Kennedy accepted the presidential nomination in 1960 and Billy Graham spoke to an audience of 134,000 in 1963. Architects plan to drop a “stadium within a stadium,” plopping the 21st century inside the historic facade.

In deference to the NFL’s insistence that owners want a new venue, “not a renovated antique,” Los Angeles Councilman Mark Ridley-Thomas shuns the name Memorial Coliseum, instead peddling the project as the “New Coliseum.”

With costs now estimated at $230 million, the New Coliseum would have 67,000 seats but could expand to 85,000. It would be the centerpiece of a revitalized Exposition Park complex and the anchor for a “sports and entertainment corridor” connecting it to a hockey and basketball arena proposed at the Convention Center, and Dodger Stadium to the north.

*

Cities nationwide have struggled with the question of what to do with historic sports facilities: Comiskey Park in Chicago is now a parking lot, its bricks auctioned as memorabilia when the new Comiskey opened across the street in 1991. Baltimore’s Memorial Stadium was demolished, but Camden Yards, its replacement, was designed to celebrate the old ballparks while incorporating ‘90s accouterments. Debate is currently raging in the Windy City over whether to build the Bears a new stadium, or simply drop a dome atop Soldier Field to make it warmer and more attractive for fans and players.

“You’ve got to have some common sense. Unless you just happen to be in the monument business, you clearly have to use a historic structure in a way that is economically viable,” said Coliseum Commission President Roger Kozberg, who called himself “a preservationist at heart.”

“Everybody would always come in and say, ‘All you’ve got to do is tear down the Coliseum and build a new one and you’ve got a great deal.’ I simply wouldn’t do it,” Kozberg said. “I’m sure there will be some people who will say, ‘If you touch a bit of old cement, you’re destroying it.’ I think that’s a real shortsighted view. To have some structure that falls into decay because you can’t use it--the public loses something there, too.”

Architectural experts and preservation advocates say that even radical renovations are acceptable on historic landmarks as long as they do not disrupt the integrity of whatever made the place famous. For some buildings, that might be the very structure, leaving little room for change; others, however, are renowned for narrow, decorative or ornamental aspects, such as the Coliseum’s peristyle.

“The world is full of important symbols like that. The important thing is to honor them,” said Community Redevelopment Agency chief John Molloy. “All of the important historic elements are there [in the plans]. I don’t know how historic the seats are.”

*

According to the Coliseum sketches by Kansas City-based HOK Sports, which has built several other showcase stadiums for the NFL, the peristyle would remain unchanged, from the headless statues of the male and female athletes commissioned for the 1984 Olympics to the foundation stones from ancient Rome and Greece. Plaques commemorating the two Olympic Games, paying homage to local heroes, and memorializing the Israelis who were killed in Munich in 1976 and the Los Angeles veterans of World War I would be untouched.

In fact, the plans call for an expansion of the patio area behind the peristyle so that on non-game days, the plaza could be used for receptions or concerts.

“I love the peristyle,” Lynch said on a recent tour of the stadium. “It’s world-renowned. You see it, you know it.”

Coliseum lovers say the other two characteristics that make the landmark architecturally distinct are the exterior wall and the full-bowl feel of the interior, in which the seats rise in one continuous arc, each visible from any vantage point.

Under HOK’s plan, the outside walls would be entirely preserved. In fact, their appearance would likely be restored to be more like the original, as the bathrooms and vendors that now ring the stadium would be removed and the area relandscaped so visitors could approach the stadium itself without a ticket. One potential problem is that the new top-deck seats would be higher than the current ones--from outside the stadium, the view of the historic walls could be compromised by the sight of the modernized stadium protruding from the top.

“If this idea is to be carried off, part of what makes it quite dramatic is for the exterior to be the historic Coliseum and the interior to be the new Coliseum,” said Robert Harris, an architecture professor at USC who has been active in preserving the Coliseum. “To the extent that we see [the new seats] and it’s aggressive, then it’s competing with the historic structure.

*

“The combination of new and old isn’t what upsets me,” Harris added. “What would upset me is being clumsy about it.”

Inside the stadium, instead of one sweeping scoop of row upon row of seats, the new design calls for a triple-decker stadium, the luxury suites and private lounge for club-seat patrons tucked underneath the upper level. The tiered effect is the hallmark of the new NFL stadiums, and the high-priced club seats and suites a key selling point. The sketches show that fans in these exclusive areas would be as close to the field as their counterparts in Joe Robbie Stadium in Miami or Charlotte’s Ericsson Stadium.

This is where the largest conflict could arise.

“That democratic sense of watching an event, that sweep of the bowl, is a character-defining feature” of the Coliseum, said Linda Dishman, executive director of the Los Angeles Conservancy. “There would be discussion about the loss of that.”

The very entrance to the venue would change dramatically as well: The long tunnels running from outside to the field would disappear. Instead, a few yards into the tunnel fans would emerge into a vast concourse of concessions and restrooms, or perhaps a promenade of full-service restaurants, shops and museum exhibit space. A similar concourse would lie underneath the upper deck for fans seated there. The private lounge for club- and suite-sitters would be sandwiched between the two public concourses.

*

The trouble-plagued press box built in 1995 also would disappear, replaced with a new press area sandwiched among the luxury suites. The present press box has been a center of controversy after Times articles this year reported numerous problems with welds that help suspend the structure. In response to the articles, inspectors found defects in 26% of the welds examined. The connections were repaired over the summer.

Michael Crowe, an architectural historian with the National Parks Service, said the three key features that must be preserved at the Coliseum are the exterior walls, the peristyle and the openness of the bowl. Although the federal government does not have to grant permission for renovation of its landmarks, it can remove them from the elite list if their character is altered, Crowe said.

“With a resource like the Coliseum, you don’t have a lot of wiggle room for what you can do and retain its integrity,” Crowe said, stressing the importance of the bowl shape. “Once you start to fool with that, you’re starting to compromise the ability for somebody to be able to walk in and say, ‘I can understand how the 1932 Olympics were here.’ You lose something of the history of Los Angeles and the country because you lose that ability.”

Those pushing the New Coliseum plan are quick to point out that the stadium has had repeated revision since its opening 73 years ago. Built for 75,000 fans, it had a major upgrade just nine years later to accommodate 100,000 people for the 1932 Olympics.

The peristyle’s facade was replaced with Travertine marble in the 1960s when the original bench seating was also redone. Just three years ago, a major remodeling effort lowered the field 11 1/2 feet to improve sight lines and the end zone seats were removed. Since the 1994 Northridge earthquake, the stadium has received about $100 million in taxpayer-funded repairs that solidified the exterior walls and bought a new scoreboard and press box.

The changes contemplated under the current plan are too vast to be called a renovation--overhaul is a more appropriate word. But both boosters of the proposal and preservationists agree that it is probably the only way to keep the lights on at the historic stadium.

“One of the problems with renovation, particularly in America, is that people think old can never be good,” said Beverly Hills architect Barton Myers, who penned similar sketches for a stadium within a stadium at the Coliseum but is not involved with the current project.

“The other approach is that you find a way to give new life to an old building,” Myers said. “If they want the Coliseum to really last another 50 years or 100 years and not become a dinosaur, they’ve got to be able to see a new building and an old building working together.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Stadium Within A Stadium

Los Angeles official are peddling a plan to drop a state-of-the - art stadium inside the historic Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. Outside, it would look the same; a few steps within, a 21st Century stadium would offer luxury suites and tiered stands.

Club Lounge

* Club seats below luxury suites would provide access to private lounge ringing stadium on middle level, offering cushioned couches, bars, television sets.

Luxury Suites

Just above club seating would be two levels of glass-enclosed private suites, whose owners also could use the private lounge.

Portable Seats

Would expand 67,000 capacity to 85,000.

Press Box

New press box would sit among 130 luxury suites.

Peristyle and Wall

* Built in 1923, unchanged wall would serve as facade for new stadium inside.

* The marble- clad peristyle would remain untouched.

Patio

Expanded patio behind peristyle for receptions or concerts.

C: Concourses

Under the seats, where there now is just dirt, would be two vast concourses of concessions ringing the stadium. One would serve ticket- holders on lower level, and one would be located above the suites for fans seated in the upper deck. These might have shops and full- servicerestaurants as well as the usual snack bars and restrooms.