Jackson State new stadium…..

[archdog]

On campus is the obvious answer. If the atmosphere is good, and they start winning, people can drive 10 minutes to be on campus. It just adds so much to a college. Imagine if MSU's stadium was out by HWY 25. It would suck.

 

[Smoked Toag]

I've had to look into this for work in the past year thanks to them filling up the Vet again, and some things I've learned in that: 1) JSU has acquired a TON of old residential property to the east of their campus over to Terry Road, and has demolished a ton of old houses. They absolutely have room to put it on-campus (and who could begrudge a college wanting an on-campus stadium, honestly?), and 2) the bill that transferred Veterans Stadium from the Dept of Finance & Administration to Jackson State specifically says it belongs to JSU until they start playing football games at another venue, at which point the entire property passes to UMMC to utilize as they see fit (which means it'll be demolished to make way for UMMC expansion).

Sounds like there's your answer. Feasibility study was simply a formality (but still a very necessary piece of documentation, I know all the super Republicans are haters of things like that). Sounds like everybody wins. JSU gets a stadium on-campus where they want it and they get it paid for. The State gets to do it the cheapest way possible, and then expand the hospital.

 

[Smoked Toag]

On campus is the obvious answer. If the atmosphere is good, and they start winning, people can drive 10 minutes to be on campus. It just adds so much to a college. Imagine if MSU's stadium was out by HWY 25. It would suck.

I get that, but urban campuses are a little different animal. I bet if you asked Deion, he'd have preferred something downtown and a little bigger, where he can tout flash or whatever. A smaller on-campus deal kinda keeps you small-time, which is fine for most, like say Tulane or Louisiana Tech. But seems like Deion had bigger dreams, with all this social media and recruiting and such. Memphis playing basketball at the Forum is a good example of making the program seem 'bigger'. I don't know, just kinda rambling, and JSU likely isn't to that level.

Either way, on-campus certainly seems to be the best play here.

 

[PirateDawg]

Thanks for the response. It will be interesting to watch this progress. I would love to see us attract a pro team to Mississippi in the new league.

 

[Junction John]

It was a formality, you're right on that. They wanted it on campus and basically were just looking for someone to confirm it. The plans for the old landfill on the east side of downtown, on the bluff facing I-55 were killer and would have been a huge boost to the city, transforming the way the city looks from the interstate and as you come across the bridge on Pearl Street, not to mention inviting actual retail/restaurant development because of visibility and access. It would also be basically on the water when the One Lake project happens. I hate that it couldn't happen like that, but they wanted to be able to say they had an on-campus stadium, so that trumped all the other real benefits for the city.

Too bad. Chalk up another L for Jackson on the "what coulda been" chart.

 

[Junction John]

There is one area. East side of Jefferson, city owned property. Former landfill and surrounding wooded area. Facing I-55 and future One Lake. That would have been better. But oh well.

 

[greenbean.sixpack]

First, you have to start with the viewpoint that it really can't get much worse. Accepting that, yes, downtown Jackson can absolutely be saved. The bones are there for it to be very cool. And again, it can only get better.

The revitalization WILL happen, at some point. It may just take a pro-business mayor, simple as that. There are a lot of young people in Jackson now, and they'll eventually vote someone decent in.

Jackson is just about 20 years behind other cities around the South. I mean they were building a stadium in the suburbs, when others were figuring out that it benefited the whole area by being downtown. Looks like they are about to make a similar mistake with JSU's stadium, although it will definitely be cheaper by being on-campus. It'll certainly never attract anything major.

And maybe that's fine. I'd rather invest in a nice arena, whenever the time comes for that. A lot more potential than a football stadium, which can basically only host JSU football, a bowl game, maybe some soccer or something. MSU, Ole Miss and USM have zero interest in moving home football games away from their own stadiums. An arena can hold all-weather concerts, NCAA basketball, etc. If Jackson doesn't do this, Flowood probably eventually will.

I'm not so sure, check the demographics of Jxn, compared to B'ham, ATL, Montgomery, Memphis, Little Rock even BR and NOLA. There is NO significant gentrification happening, Belhaven, Fondren, Eastover/Leftover aren't really growing in population. I don't look for any significant voting patterns changing in the foreseeable future. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._cities_with_large_Black_populations

Many of the professional firms that were downtown 25 years ago, are now in Madison/Ridgeland/Flowood, there is no reason for most professionals to live in Jxn, absolutely no draw.

 

[BossDawg78]

Speaking of JSU and new stadiums, what are the opinions on this? Looks awful strange to me, but the addition of dorms seems pretty cool.

https://www.wbrc.com/2021/07/22/jsu-receive-80m-stadium-redesign-upgrades/

 

[kb549]

Put it downtown near the Interstate, what could possibly go wrong?

Lake Swayze is looking bad after all this rain. I can’t tell for sure, but I think I can make out that the outfield dumpster has floated over the fence and is around 1st base. The outfield wedding tent appears to now be a slip & slide. Stay classy, bears.

 

[HumpDawgy]

Wherever they put it, they should make Brett Favre pay for it.***

 

[Maroon Eagle]

Residence halls combined with football stadiums aren’t all that unusual historically. I’m a little surprised to see it done at a school that’s about to go FBS though.

 

[Smoked Toag]

I'm not so sure, check the demographics of Jxn, compared to B'ham, ATL, Montgomery, Memphis, Little Rock even BR and NOLA. There is NO significant gentrification happening, Belhaven, Fondren, Eastover/Leftover aren't really growing in population. I don't look for any significant voting patterns changing in the foreseeable future. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._cities_with_large_Black_populations

Many of the professional firms that were downtown 25 years ago, are now in Madison/Ridgeland/Flowood, there is no reason for most professionals to live in Jxn, absolutely no draw.

You're just being overly negative. Like I said, it's not getting any worse.

 

[johnson86-1]

If I recall correctly, it’s a quid pro quo that’s been years in the making.

When Phil Bryant ran for Governor, one of the things he wanted was to have the space for an expanded UMC with the med school and hospital taking control of Memorial Stadium.

He said that if it occurred that the state would have to build and pay for JSU’s new stadium.

I don't care where they put the stadium. I don't think it will make a big difference either way. Certainly if it's somewhere between downtown and the interstate, you have the potential for it to positivley impact downtown and be used for things besides JSU games, most of which won't be an option if it's on JSU campus, but I really don't like putting more money into UMMC's downtown campus. If they aren't going to do something to protect some core of areas of investment from crime and the city administration, then they need to start thinking about the feasibility of eventually moving UMMC. Will be incredibly expensive, but so will having our only research hospital and med school in an area people don't want to go to.

 

[johnson86-1]

Everybody has left, the money exodus has essentially stopped. You can't have much worse of a mayor or city council, or county commission. Then you had the COVID crime spike. It literally can't get any worse, man.

Revitalization was already happening, was slowed by COVID, and now it's ramping back up.

This seems like a lack of imagination to me. The mayor or city council and county commission may not be able to get worse, but that doesn't mean they can't continue to make the city worse. To change the momentum, you will need a majority of the city council and mayor to turn over, you will probably need helpf from the legislature, you will need a lot of money (some of which can come from the legislature, but a lot is going ot have to be private), and you need jobs to come back.

And it's going to be harder to get better now that so many businesses have left because a lot of the people/businesses that would be able to bring jobs and money back to downtown now have investments outside of the city limits that they won't want to strand. You're going to need new growth, which is going to be hard to get quickly enough to change the momentum.

Even if it got bad enough that politically, you could set up a capitol/downtown district that was protected from Jackson, put a ton of federal and state money into, who is going to move jobs back into downtown jackson? I'm assuming all these nice buildings in Ridgeland and Madison have either long term leases or are owned by the occupants. Maybe some of the companies with significant out of state operations could be enticed to move jobs and put new jobs in Jackson for cheap office space and low cost of living.

Plus I suspect the investors in the King Edwards feel somewhat hung out to dry. They put something nice on the edge of the "safe" area that could act as an anchor for the area, and the city did jack **** to protect them. How many other investors in downtown have been burned by promises that hte city was going to get it's **** somewhat together?

 

[Smoked Toag]

Even if it got bad enough that politically, you could set up a capitol/downtown district that was protected from Jackson, put a ton of federal and state money into, who is going to move jobs back into downtown jackson? I'm assuming all these nice buildings in Ridgeland and Madison have either long term leases or are owned by the occupants. Maybe some of the companies with significant out of state operations could be enticed to move jobs and put new jobs in Jackson for cheap office space and low cost of living.

May seem contradictory to my 'it can't get worse' mantra, but this is best case scenario. Jackson will never be saved as a whole. Medium and large companies are never coming back. BUT.....Jackson is the capital, so there will always be a heartbeat, even if it's state-driven. That's enough. The only private companies that will come back will be smaller ones. I know all this already.

Really, more than anything, the downtown district needs to feature entertainment more than anything else. That's what other cities have done.

Plus I suspect the investors in the King Edwards feel somewhat hung out to dry. They put something nice on the edge of the "safe" area that could act as an anchor for the area, and the city did jack **** to protect them. How many other investors in downtown have been burned by promises that hte city was going to get it's **** somewhat together?

Anyone who invests in Jackson knows the drill. If they don't, I'd have to question their IQ.

Either way, outside of martial law or the volcano collapse, I can't REALISTICALLY imagine a worse Jackson than right now. It's pretty much the worst metro area in the country, and rock bottom was COVID. But it still has potential and its attractive parts, simply because it is a metro area with urban bones.

 

[The Peeper]

First time I ever visited Death Valley/Tiger Stadium was Fall of '77 (we lost 27-24) and they had dorms under the stadium then from the 1920's. Had a friend that was a manager on my high school team that got a partial scholly in '80 to go there and he lived in one of them for free. He said it was a **** hole, cold in the winter cool and damp in the summer. Here's a pic. Did a little reading and they have since been torn down apparently.

View attachment 24305

 

[greenbean.sixpack]

You're just being overly negative. Like I said, it's not getting any worse.

I hope you're right, I've worked downtown for 27 years, in the mid 90s it has hopping, but it had fallen off bigly even before COVID. I badly want Jxn to succeed, I just don't see it improving much, it may not get much worse, but probably won't improve much either. There is just no vision in Jxn political leadership, and that is likely not to change. It seems that current leadership doesn't want people coming in from the burbs and spending money. This is opposite from most other southern cities of comparable size.

 

[Maroon Eagle]

UMC is on the edge of Fondren. As far as expansion is concerned, the remaining bit of undeveloped land has as many as 7,000 people buried underneath. UMC really needs the Memorial Stadium property.

The Asylum Hill Cemetery is the name given to a tract of land which is now part of the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson, Mississippi. Between 1855 and 1935, it was the site of the Mississippi State Lunatic Asylum, which was renamed the State Hospital for the Insane in 1900. Recent archaeological studies undertaken by UMMC revealed the existence of as many as 7,000 graves located on the only remaining undeveloped part of the main campus.

Link to Cemetery History website.

 

[Smoked Toag]

I don't care where they put the stadium. I don't think it will make a big difference either way. Certainly if it's somewhere between downtown and the interstate, you have the potential for it to positivley impact downtown and be used for things besides JSU games, most of which won't be an option if it's on JSU campus, but I really don't like putting more money into UMMC's downtown campus. If they aren't going to do something to protect some core of areas of investment from crime and the city administration, then they need to start thinking about the feasibility of eventually moving UMMC. Will be incredibly expensive, but so will having our only research hospital and med school in an area people don't want to go to.

When's the last time you've been down there? Seriously, I can't remember when the Fondren/Belhaven area was actually dangerous. And a medical campus is about as safe as can possibly be. I mean there are people jogging down through there all the time. How can a student actually attend Milsaps if the crime is as high as it's made out to be? Come on.

Just because there is a Halloween carjacking doesn't mean it's Somalia. You have to watch your back in Memphis and Birmingham too, but they don't get the hate Jackson does. Remember when the economic development guy got shot in Memphis? Does that mean you can't go down there anymore? And that was before the COVID crime spike.

 

[johnson86-1]

UMC is on the edge of Fondren. As far as expansion is concerned, the remaining bit of undeveloped land has as many as 7,000 people buried underneath. UMC really needs the Memorial Stadium property.



Link to Cemetery History website.

As a state fan, I don't see any problem with just doing development over a bunch of graves. It's not like putting scott field on a burial ground has hurt our football team.

But aside from that, I don't see much material difference between:
(1) We're going to continue to tie our research hospital to a crime ridden city with poor administration, that is incompetent at providing basic city services like clean running water, has a rapidly declining tax base, and a crime problem, and also we're going to do our future expansions over a grave yard and
(2) We're going to continue to tie our research hospital to a crime ridden city with poor administration, that is incompetent at providing basic city services like clean running water, has a rapidly declining tax base, and a crime problem, but we're going to demolish a decrepit football stadium so our future expansions won't have to be over a grade yard

They both seem really bad? Like at this point, let's just put it over the grave yard and see what happens, just for ***** and giggles. Maybe we can be the preeminent medical school when it comes to studying the occult (both medical and non-medical sense).

 

[johnson86-1]

When's the last time you've been down there? Seriously, I can't remember when the Fondren/Belhaven area was actually dangerous. And a medical campus is about as safe as can possibly be. I mean there are people jogging down through there all the time. How can a student actually attend Milsaps if the crime is as high as it's made out to be? Come on.

Just because there is a Halloween carjacking doesn't mean it's Somalia. You have to watch your back in Memphis and Birmingham too, but they don't get the hate Jackson does. Remember when the economic development guy got shot in Memphis? Does that mean you can't go down there anymore? And that was before the COVID crime spike.

Are car jackings dangerous?

https://www.wapt.com/article/carjacking-victim-retells-scary-encounter/39543941
https://www.wlbt.com/2021/12/14/belhaven-residents-remain-targets-carjackings/
https://www.northsidesun.com/carjac...-after-town-hall-meeting#sthash.Fy74ywjZ.dpbs
http://kingfish1935.blogspot.com/2021/10/attempted-carjacking-in-belhaven.html

And this is in one of the "nice" parts of Jackson.

Certainly there is crime in every city, but usually there are nice areas where you can get away from it. And there are also nice amenities.

I don't want to bash Jackson because it's bad for the state for us to not have a decent city of any size, but there doesn't appear to be a path forward for Jackson unless the state can somehow carve it up and protect it from Jackson's and Hinds County's governance.

And I get putting a positive spin on it; it's certainly not somalia and most people don't get car jacked or murdered, but living in those areas is a lot of risk without much benefit for the typical person.

 

[Maroon Eagle]

I don't want to bash Jackson because it's bad for the state for us to not have a decent city of any size, but there doesn't appear to be a path forward for Jackson unless the state can somehow carve it up and protect it from Jackson's and Hinds County's governance.

For what it's worth, UMC has its own separate police force which is responsible for public safety on its campus & in its most recent security report issued last year there were nine crimes in 2020 and 23 over the latest recorded 3-year period: Link.

 

[johnson86-1]

For what it's worth, UMC has its own separate police force which is responsible for public safety on its campus & in its most recent security report issued last year there were nine crimes in 2020 and 23 over the latest recorded 3-year period: Link.

I didn't mean to imply that I thought UMC campus was dangerous. I just think Jackson is at risk of devolving into such a hell hole that UMC can't keep it separated.

That stats look potentially pretty good though (although I don't have a good idea of what would be "normal" for a campus the size of UMC). The potentially concerning parts of the report are 1 rape, 8 aggravated assaults, 15 burglaries, and 18 vehicle thefts.

The rape and aggravated assaults, I think it's very relevant whether those are random, or whether those happened between acquaintances. If it were recording simple assaults, I would assume at least one or more (and possibly all) of those incidents could likely have happened between coworkers or say between family members visiting the hospital. But with it being aggravated assaults, I'm not sure. It could be all the cases involved simple assault against a pwerson with protected status. Hell, all of the aggravated assault charges could be crazy patients committing simple assault against ER doctors. If that's the case, then those numbers look pretty good I assume.

The burglaries is just any breaking and entering essentially; doesn't have to be a residence, in which case 15 burglaries would be concerning. But with all the buildings on campus, I suspect those are more property crimes and not putting people at huge safety risks. For the car thefts, car jackings would be a major concern. Just stealing parked cars, while certainly not good, doesn't raise the same safety issues.

 

[Maroon Eagle]

Understood. I just wanted to show what the UMC police force has done. I'd like to look at previous reports to make comparisons.

 

[Upyurs]

So don't build something based on something that might happen once every 20 years?

Absolutely not.

 

[RocketDawg]

It looks terrible.

 

[Misfit]

If the state is involved in it on any level, you can pretty much count on it being a loss for the city. I'm a 68 year old native Mississippian and I have never been able to understand the hate of Jackson.