Currently--with a 25 year lease being signed as rumored, I see a $75-100mln renovation to make the layout more symetrical & bring total seating to around 16k... Edit: Bettman did today say they were already looking to make seating for hockey about 15,500. That's not too bad
It's a shame but it doesn't affect me being a Ranger fan, but they won 4 Cups in a row in that building...
Islanders Are Going to Brooklyn, a Coup for New Arena By Joseph Berger and David. W Chen New York Times October 24 2012 The deal was officially announced Wednesday afternoon at a news conference at the new arena in Brooklyn with Charles B. Wang, the owner of the Islanders, and Bruce Ratner, the owner of the Barclays Center. Under the 25-year agreement, which has to be officially approved by the National Hockey League, the Islanders would move to the Barclays Center for the 2015-16 season. The fate of this year’s hockey season is in limbo because of a labor dispute. “We have tried very hard to keep the Islanders in their original home in Long Island,” said Mr. Wang, who grew up in Queens and attended Brooklyn Technical High School. “Unfortunately, we were unable to achieve that dream. Our goal was always to have the Islanders play in a local world-class facility that contains the amenities our fans deserve.” The Barclays Center is already home to the Brooklyn Nets, which moved from New Jersey, and adding a hockey team would represent a major coup for Mr. Ratner and his arena. The Islanders would play 41 regular-season home games, doubling the number of professional sports games at the arena. But unlike the Nets, the Islanders would keep New York in their name. “This is the perfect new home for the storied franchise,” Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg said during the announcement of the deal. “Don’t forget the team is named for the island we’re standing on.” Mr. Ratner, who negotiated the agreement with Mr. Wang, said that Mr. Wang had fielded offers to move the Islanders to other cities. “But Charles didn’t do that,” he said. “He wanted to keep them in the State of New York and keep them local.'’ The Barclays Center is not ideally suited for hockey — a hockey rink is bigger than a basketball court — and the size of the arena’s interior was reduced to pare costs. As a result, the arena has room for 14,500 seats for hockey, far smaller than most other hockey stadiums and 3,500 seats fewer than are available for Nets games. Gary Bettman, the commissioner of the National Hockey League, said there had been discussions with Mr. Ratner and Mr. Wang about the possibility of adding more seats to raise the capacity to just over 15,000. But, Mr. Bettman said, the arena’s capacity was “not an issue.'’ The Islanders’ current home, the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Uniondale, N.Y., has a capacity of about 16,250, and the team’s average home attendance last season was 13,191. The $1 billion arena is the centerpiece of Mr. Ratner’s sprawling Atlantic Yards development in Downtown Brooklyn. The project has been met with fierce opposition with critics citing its size, the increased traffic the arena will attract and what they claim is an inadequate amount of low-priced housing that will ultimately be built. For Long Island, the loss of the Islanders, the only major professional sports team in the region, would be a blow to its civic pride, though it has been 29 years since the team last won the Stanley Cup. Mr. Wang, the team’s owner, has been eager to upgrade or replace the team’s aging home, which opened in 1972 and is one of the older arenas in professional hockey. Last August, Nassau County voters, who pay among the highest local taxes in the nation,easily defeated a contentious proposal to spend $400 million to overhaul the arena. The Islanders’ current lease requires them to play at Nassau Coliseum through the 2014-15 season and Mr. Wang said that he intended to honor the lease. Mr. Ratner, who is also a part owner of the Nets, began talking to Mr. Wang about moving the Islanders to Brooklyn six or seven years ago, meeting with him on regular occasions at Mr. Wang’s favorite Chinese restaurant in a Long Island shopping mall, according to officials familiar with the deal. But the deal was not sealed until recent months when Mr. Wang got a chance to see the finished arena, Mr. Ratner said, and was impressed by what he saw. “When Charles came here and saw this place, and saw how beautiful it was and how accessible it was, it accelerated the talks,” Mr. Ratner said. “It looks like a beautiful concert hall, not an arena. There are good sightlines, and transportation is easy.” As news filtered out that the arena was going to add another tenant, some residents of the surrounding area expressed concern about traffic and parking. Peter Krashes, president of the Dean Street Block Association, predicted that the advent of the Islanders would mean more automobile traffic in the surrounding brownstone neighborhoods since the bulk of the team’s fans are from Long Island. He noted that the Barbra Streisand concert at the Barclays Center this month, which also drew heavily from the suburbs, resulted in far more cars in the neighborhood and in the arena parking lot than an earlier concert by Jay-Z. Mr. Krashes said there was “an absence of governance” over the arena, with neither the state nor the city exerting full responsibility. “Not one of them,” he said, “is providing oversight of the project.” Given that failure, Mr. Krashes said, he is concerned that the number of traffic agents and police officers to patrol the arena and control cars will continue to decline. He said more follow-up traffic studies would be needed to determine the impact. It is unclear what effect the arrival of the Islanders would have on the city’s other professional hockey team, the New York Rangers, who play in Madison Square Garden. (A third local professional hockey team, the New Jersey Devils, plays in Newark.) Both the Rangers and the Devils had supported the idea of a new Islanders arena on Long Island. On paper, the Rangers should be worried about one of their archrivals moving miles closer to their home arena. But the Rangers have less reason to worry than meets the eye. They are the dominant hockey team in the New York area and if anything, the Islanders moving to Brooklyn separates the team from their dwindling fan base. Also, the Rangers are owned by Madison Square Garden, which broadcasts the Islanders’ games. If the Islanders generate more interest, advertising revenue will rise and MSG can charge cable companies more to carry their games. So the corporation that owns the Rangers will benefit as well. Finally, the Rangers are in the midst of a three-year renovation of the Garden and have been steadily raising ticket prices. The extra income will more than offset any loss of fans who might, for whatever reason, switch allegiances. The Islanders began their existence as an expansion franchise 40 years ago after the N.H.L. agreed to put a team in the newly built Nassau Coliseum to pre-empt a move there by a rival league, the World Hockey Association, which started up to challenge the N.H.L.'s monopoly on big league hockey. The Islanders grew quickly from cellar-dweller to upstart to powerhouse, whose accomplishments dwarfed those of the Rangers, their bitter rivals. Led by Hall of Famers like Mike Bossy, Bryan Trottier and Denis Potvin, they won four straight Stanley Cups from 1980 to 1983 and reached the 1984 Cup final, a run that encompassed 19 consecutive series victories, still a league record. But the glory years were followed by a long, steady decline. A series of owners included one, John Spano, who was convicted of fraud; it turned out he had no money to buy the Islanders. Attendance declined to near the bottom of the league while the team and Nassau County squabbled over the aging arena. One rabid Islanders fan, Harris Peskin, 21, a student at Cardozo Law School who lives in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, went to the arena in an Islanders hockey shirt when he learned the announcement was made. He described the day as bittersweet. The move will make his attending games more convenient, he said, “but I would trade convenience for them to be in their rightful home.” His earliest memories, Mr. Peskin said, are of going to the Nassau Coliseum with his father when they lived on Long Island and “smelling popcorn and talking to my father about the dynasty.” Charles V. Bagli, Ken Belson and Jeff Z. Klein contributed reporting.
Surprised neither SNY or YES hasn't made a play for the Islanders. Would make sense to truly compete.
For a franchise that's done an incredible job rebranding itself and making a name, the BrooklyKnight was one GIANT step backwards... I can't see him lasting long. The franchise shouldn't have a mascot, period.
^^^ Agreed, kill the Brooklyn Knight-lame. The Brooklyn Jay-Z's spit the bit big-time blowing a 22 point lead and losing going away to the Minnesota Albino Wolves minus Love & Rubio.
Good luck, no injuries Monday Night. Looks like we could be battling for the Atlantic as BOS and PHI watch from behind.
