Ovitz’s Coliseum Design Dazzles NFL in Preview

Entertainment mogul Michael Ovitz has produced a razzle-dazzle design for revamping the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum and placing much of Exposition Park atop three- to five-story parking garages.

The National Football League is expected to endorse the plan this week in Atlanta, although Ovitz and his rival for an expansion franchise, Eli Broad, won’t make formal presentations to the league until Monday night--an indication that Broad and his partners are struggling to win a team.

In another sign of trouble for Broad’s effort, sources say the league’s expansion committee is expected to not only recommend Ovitz’s design for approval, but also to ask him to remain in Atlanta an extra day and put on a Tuesday performance for all of the league’s 31 owners.

“We’re talking Central Park here and a unique recreation environment with the stadium standing as a monument in the middle,” said an NFL official given a preview of Ovitz’s plans. “It just blew everyone away.”

Ovitz has dubbed his project, created by architect David Rockwell, “The Coliseum at Exposition Park.” The design blends the architectural look of the Roman Colosseum, used as the model for the L.A. Coliseum when it was built in the 1920s, with a touch of Hollywood--a frosted glass rim that would be lit at night.

The 68,000-seat stadium, which could expand to 92,000 for Super Bowls, would include two end-zone glass towers to house lavish luxury boxes; two reflecting pools; a picnic area; patches of grass in front of more than 200 luxury suites; 15,000 club seats; and a misting system to keep fans cool. Fountains would spurt water when a touchdown is scored.

But what may be most eye-catching about the design is its approach to parking. If built, the park around the stadium would be greener because the new parking structures would be covered with grass and trees. That new green space would be several stories above the ground; beneath it would be 27,091 parking spaces, more than enough to satisfy the NFL but would only be possible with some public funding, according to Ovitz’s group.

The existing Sports Arena would be demolished to make room for some of the parking structures.

Ovitz has offered to give his design to the NFL with no strings attached. That would allow the league to pick his design and still leave the competition for an owner open.

“He has the desire and the passion, which is something we’re looking for in an owner in Los Angeles,” said an NFL owner.

Joined by grocery magnate Ron Burkle and a number of celebrities, Ovitz heads one investment group seeking to bring a team to Los Angeles. The other, known as the New Coliseum Venture, is led by Broad, an investment services entrepreneur, and developer Ed Roski.

The NFL’s approval of Ovitz’s design--now considered a foregone conclusion by league insiders--is an indication that Broad and his partners suddenly are struggling.

The NFL intends to adjourn its meetings with the commitment to set a price for an L.A. expansion franchise. This could be followed by the quick selection of a team owner.

A complicating factor is that Roski and Broad hold what they consider a special negotiating right to bring football to the Coliseum. League officials complain that they have received shifting explanations of the significance of the agreement. That threatens to complicate the Atlanta meetings and could jeopardize the chances of meeting the league’s Sept. 15 deadline for a concrete Los Angeles deal.

Among those who have seen Ovitz’s design and who support it are: Commissioner Paul Tagliabue; Robert Kraft, chairman of the finance committee and owner of the Patriots; Jerry Richardson, chairman of the stadium committee and owner of the Panthers; and Carmen Policy, president of the Cleveland Browns.

“I thought it was an exciting juxtaposition of the quality of ancient architecture with the Los Angeles scene,” Policy said. “It creatively uses the concept around which the L.A. Coliseum was built--a grand place for grand sports spectacles.

“This could very well be the solution we’re looking for in Los Angeles, especially with the parking plan and the new recreation possibilities the park concept brings to the community. . . . We would love to play in a stadium like that.”

Ovitz also highlighted the blending of old and new.

“We wanted to pay homage to the initial design of the Coliseum, which is a Los Angeles landmark,” he said. “The glass wall at the top of the stadium, much like the circular wall behind the highest seated wall in the Roman Colosseum, is there to create an effect of intimacy. People driving around Los Angeles should see this landmark lit up much like the monuments in Greece and Rome are at night.”

Ovitz said his ownership group would finance the construction of the $298-million stadium.

But the group would need public money for the estimated $225 million to build the parking spaces provided in his plan.

Ovitz’s plan is intended to satisfy the NFL’s most pressing requirement--at least 25,000 parking spaces on site. He would do this with seven parking garages ranging from two to five stories surrounding the stadium.

There would be 16 entrances. Fans would be given specific parking spaces noted on their game tickets and driving directions to their assigned garage, each of which would carry the name of an NFL division.

“Everything is dedicated to making it a fan-friendly day beginning from the moment you leave your house,” Ovitz said. “Much like the navigation systems now put into cars telling you how to directly get someplace, we will have a radio station dedicated to providing driving information and an access plan that calls for no left or right turns from the 15 side streets leading into our garages.”

Broad’s stadium, estimated to cost $270 million six months ago, is now pegged at $340 million. The stadium would be slightly smaller than the one envisioned by Ovitz, seating about 60,000 people for professional football games and expandable to 80,000 for Super Bowls or USC-UCLA games.

“Our stadium will be second to none,” said Broad.

He also promised to deliver a $15-million to $20-million marketing plan in order to all but guarantee sellouts for every game.

Easy Access Considered Crucial

On the issue of parking, Broad said he intends to present league owners with four options. They range from a relatively modest plan to construct a single parking structure at Exposition Park and rely on nearby parking to make up the difference, to a far more ambitious proposal to dig beneath the park and place thousands of spaces there. The four plans range in cost from less than $80 million to more than $270 million.

Broad and his partners favor the less expensive options.

If needed, Broad said, he believes some public money would be available to assist in paying for parking spaces.

The city government has made clear that it does not intend to put up public money for football. But Broad said he expects the state government to be willing to help, particularly if the parking helps quell fears by the park’s museum tenants that football would hurt their operations.

A survey by Charlotte-based sports consultant Max Muhleman, commissioned by the NFL to study the Los Angeles area and now accepted by the league as gospel, indicated that a football team cannot prosper at the Coliseum unless fans can park close to the stadium and gain easy access in and out of the area.

“If we can’t come up with a quality parking solution, as far as I’m concerned, that’s a deal-breaker,” said Richardson.

Looming in the background of the proposals is the question of their environmental impact.

The option favored by Broad’s group would provide just over 17,000 parking spaces at Exposition Park and rely on shuttle buses from downtown. A more extensive plan, such as Ovitz’s proposal, might trigger the need for the team’s new owners to produce a new environmental impact report, which could take a year or longer.

“If that’s the case and we can’t open the stadium until 2003, so be it,” said an NFL official. “The important thing here is doing it right in Los Angeles, and from what we’re seeing from Ovitz, he has that passion to make it happen.”

Meanwhile, the two sides continue to elbow for political advantage. Some have suggested that the NFL is trying to keep alive the possibility of reconsidering Carson’s bid for a team if the Coliseum falls through.

That is a familiar leverage play by the NFL, which also has been using the threat of awarding an expansion team to Houston as a means of securing Los Angeles’ cooperation. Houston’s agreement with prospective owner Robert McNair expires at the end of January.

“The city of Carson and I were asked a few weeks ago by Michael Ovitz and his representatives to remain in the hunt for NFL football,” Carson Councilman Daryl Sweeney said in a prepared statement last week. “This request was made even though Mr. Ovitz publicly announced his intention to seek a franchise at the Coliseum. This is not a role that I and, I believe, the city of Carson are willing to play. We are convinced the 32nd franchise will be awarded to the Coliseum.”

Ovitz would not address reports of his or the NFL’s alleged continuing role with Carson, saying only, “We were asked to move from Carson to the Coliseum. I still think Carson is a terrific alternative, but clearly the league wants to try and make the Coliseum work.”

Politically, each side has some advantages.

Broad and his group have a head start on Coliseum preparations and enjoy a broad range of political support. Broad is a major player in Los Angeles civic affairs, one of the Democratic Party’s most important fund-raisers and a close friend of Mayor Richard Riordan. He and Roski are also supported by City Councilman Mark Ridley-Thomas, City Hall’s strongest advocate of the Coliseum site and the lawmaker representing the area.

Ovitz has celebrity cachet, and his group includes the influential Burkle.

“Ron Burkle has done amazing things for this city--he gave more to inner-city charities than any other ownership group, and that’s a matter of public record--and yet has remained very low-key, never asking for any credit,” Ovitz said. “He’s been there from day one for me, and like Eli, he has great relationships with city and state officials that can complement the skills I bring to our ownership group.”

Burkle, also a billionaire and a close friend of Broad, is a well-known supporter of Gov. Gray Davis, and both groups will be seeking state funding for their parking plans.

“I’m encouraged because Michael has come up with a plan the NFL likes, and I’m completely supportive of what he’s doing and the vision he has,” Burkle said. “He’s pulled something off here with the plans he’s presenting that maybe I’m not sure could be pulled off. It’s exciting, and something that has the potential to be very good for the community.”

In the end, however, the votes that matter most are those of the NFL owners, who will select their new partner.

Broad continues to struggle in making inroads with the NFL fraternity. Some in the NFL are not convinced that Broad has the passion to own a football team. Rather, they see him as using football to advance his main agenda, the renaissance of downtown Los Angeles.

Broad disputes that. He says he is meeting with individual league owners and making a committed effort to enlist the support of former Bronco quarterback John Elway.

Ovitz, meanwhile, has followed the league’s direction in a number of areas, including its recommendation that he hire consultant Mark Fabiani to boost his local standing. Fabiani served as a top deputy to then-Mayor Tom Bradley, playing a key role in the Bradley administration’s final years.

“He will help us in making our presentations to city and area officials once the NFL has endorsed our plan,” Ovitz said.

For Ovitz, one major obstacle is the conspicuous lack of political support for his effort. Trying to make up for that, he is reaching out to city leaders with his characteristic panache. He recently hosted a glittering dinner party at his home for some of the city’s leading political and business figures.

The dinner was held in honor of British Petroleum chief Sir John Brown, whose company recently acquired Arco. Among those present for the dinner were Riordan, Ridley-Thomas and county Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky, who also is a member of the Coliseum Commission. Mingling with the politicos were Dustin Hoffman, Warren Beatty and Annette Bening.

“I’m going to get this,” Ovitz said. “We have a good ownership group, a terrific design and, more than all that, the passion to see this through.”

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MAN OF CONTRASTS: Councilman Mark Ridley-Thomas, leader of Coliseum effort, has his detractors. B1