Breaking Ground

Ground will be broken in Minneapolis today. The Minnesota Vikings have two more home games in this disappointing football season. While those games are played inside, construction on a new stadium will be taking place outside the Metrodome. It's still a little stunning that this new stadium is really happening. It's been a long, long road. It took more than a decade to gain any sort of traction with the state and local governments. The last few years have been downright painful. Watching the legislative process in the spring of 2012 was mind-numbing. Even the past few months, when everything was thought to be good to go, have been rocky.

First, Vikings owners, Zygi Wilf and his family were found guilty of some shaky business deals that they had made over twenty years ago. That prompted Minnesota governor Mark Dayton to re-open the Wilf's financial books to make sure that they can actually pay their share of the new stadium. They can. After that was settled, the bids for pretty much everything started coming in quite a bit higher than expected. Some of nifty stuff that everyone wanted in the new stadium was in jeopardy of getting cut before construction even started. The Vikings had been scheduled to to pay $477 million of the stadium's nearly billion-dollar cost. Through various means the Wilf family committed an additional private contribution of up to $41.4 million. Now, everything seems good to go for today's groundbreaking. If everything proceeds as planned, the Minnesota Vikings will open the 2016 NFL season in their new home. 

The Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome opened September 12, 1982. The fact that this lump of concrete and fabric lasted thirty-two years is a miracle. It was made on the cheap. Even with the dollars of the late 1970s and early '80s, $55 million wasn't much for a stadium. It seems downright puny next to the billion dollars being piled up over the next few years. The Metrodome roof famously fell when a bunch of snow fell in 2010. Imagine that, snow in Minnesota. The roof fell twice before a game was even played. As a naive, young kid from California, I assumed that the Metrodome sailed through the decision-making and construction process. I was surprised to discover that the process was every bit as frustrating and long as that of this new stadium. I was never quite sure what to make of the Metrodome. Domed stadiums were still somewhat unique at the time. At least, they were to me. Houston's Astrodome, Detroit's Silver Dome, New Orlean's Superdome, and Seattle's King Dome were the few that provided the sterile, indoor presence in the league. I loved Vikings football in little Metropolitan Stadium. December and January in Minnesota looked incredible. For a team named for Vikings, frozen football seemed perfect. It was certainly easy for me to think that while watching games on TV in California. No heaters for the Vikings, both teams on the same sideline. Metropolitan Stadium was a throwback to another era of professional football. The Metrodome brought the Minnesota Vikings a little closer to the rest of the league but they didn't do it right. In terms of their home, the Vikings always seem to be a few decades behind their rivals. Today, they start the process to change that.