News from Omaha

[eomaha.com]

Perhaps an unintentional backhanded compliment... which someone used to giving them out, quickly latches upon.  Glad it made your day though.

[mean]

I was talking about iggy. Maybe it was unintentional, I dunno. Didn't make may day. I thought it was kinda rude. I was being sarcastic.

[smh]

I was talking about iggy. Maybe it was unintentional, I dunno. Didn't make may day. I thought it was kinda rude. I was being sarcastic.

You forgot to include your /s.

[ignatius]

nope, wasn't a backhanded remark, not sure how that could be read into it.  meant it.

[eomaha.com]

Nice problem for Omaha to have...

Swim trials overlap? No problem

TD Ameritrade Park and Qwest Center Omaha stand about 500 paces from each other, but they may seem closer on June 25, 2012.

That day, and possibly the next, the College World Series and U.S. Olympic Swim Trials will take place at the same time. A total of up to 38,000 people could pack the two venues next year on June 25 and, if the CWS requires an additional game to determine a champion, June 26.

Hotel rooms and parking spaces may be scarce during the brief stretch of overlapping events. The U.S. Olympic Swim Trials will start June 25 next year at the Qwest Center and end July 2.

Omaha should be overjoyed to host overlapping national sports events next June, some city leaders say. It's the blessing and challenge of owning excellent facilities that attract big-time events. If there are inconveniences in lodging, parking and traffic flow, those involved say, the economic return and boost to Omaha's image as a place with gumption are worth it.

“Certainly it's got our attention,” Harold Cliff, president of the Omaha Sports Commission, said of the city's challenge in hosting both events. “We're quite confident that things will work very well.”

Cliff said start and finish times are staggered so everyone doesn't arrive at once. The CWS game will start at 6 p.m., the Swim Trials at 7 p.m. during the days in question. The trials should conclude about 8:30 p.m., while the baseball game would finish about 9 p.m.
Omaha will receive major exposure on a national stage. ESPN and NBC will converge on north downtown to cover the events. It's the kind of challenge a city wants, said Jack Diesing Jr., president of CWS of Omaha Inc.

“We hit it out of the ballpark, frankly, on this one,” Diesing said. “It's a home run.”
TD Ameritrade holds 24,000 fans and the Qwest Center, modified for the Olympic pool, will hold about 14,000. When the Swim Trials took place at the Qwest Center in 2008, they drew more than 160,000 fans spread over 15 sessions on eight days. That attendance set a trials record.

The area has undergone a trial run. The Bob Seger concert took place at the Qwest Center and Creighton played Nebraska at TD Ameritrade Park on May 10. Together, they drew more than 29,500 fans. Cliff said accommodating those events didn't pose a major challenge.

Now the stadium is hosting its first CWS, which is a test unto itself.
Marty Reece, a native Omahan who now lives in Shawnee, Kan., said parking and traffic congestion have presented no huge problem for him and his family during this CWS. “Getting in and out of TD Ameritrade — it's ridiculously fast,” said Reece, who has had season tickets for 17 years.

Reece said hosting the CWS and the Swim Trials on the same day or two will be challenging. “I think it will be tight, but it looks to me like Omaha can handle it,” he said.
Hotels in the metro area would seem to be tested by the influx of people. Swimmers and coaches already have booked more than 17,000 hotel room nights over 11 days beginning June 22, 2012.

Further, about 4,000 room nights have been set aside by the Omaha Sports Commission for swimmers' parents, friends and spectators for the Swim Trials. Tickets for the trials go on sale Saturday.

Dana Markel, executive director of the Omaha Convention & Visitors Bureau, said that by next June, Omaha will have 5,350 hotel rooms within five miles of north downtown. In the metro area, about 13,220 rooms will be available.

Markel said the metro area's hotels will be able to handle the overlapping events. She and others said hotel rooms will open up when CWS teams are knocked out of the tournament. Further, many players and spectators at two youth baseball tourneys in the metro area will have left before the start of the Swim Trials, Markel said. Those tourneys drew about 400 teams to the area this year.

Mike Kosalka, assistant general manager of the downtown Doubletree by Hilton, said it would work. “By the time they (the swimmers) are coming in, the College World Series is starting to die down,” Kosalka said. “Overlapping a day or two is fine.”
USA Swimming officials have met with Omaha Sports Commission leaders to start preparations.

“We've known that there are going to be some challenges,” said Mike Unger, assistant executive director of Colorado Springs-based USA Swimming. “Let's make this challenge a good thing.”

Bay Area residents Danny Andrada and Jake Koltun, both 18, left the stadium area Wednesday afternoon, completing a vacation at the CWS. It was time to get back home to summer jobs. The young men said foot traffic around the stadium at times had been heavy, but it was no big deal for them.

“We're from San Francisco, so we're used to packed streets,” Andrada said. “I think it's crowded, but I don't think it's too crowded for another major event.”

Marty Reece, the longtime CWS fan now living in Kansas, said he has been surprised by the parking available in the vicinity of TD Ameritrade Park. He said numerous people seem to be beckoning to drivers to use lots in areas nearby. Reece, a medical device salesman, has reserved a spot for $200 for the entire series in a private lot north of the stadium.
During the 2012 overlapping days, the CWS will have priority over all Qwest Center lots with the exception of Lot A, on the southeast side of the arena. The Metropolitan Entertainment and Convention Authority oversees about 5,000 parking spaces near the venues.

There are 9,000 parking spaces within a 12-minute walk of the Qwest Center, said Rebecca Kleeman, a MECA spokeswoman.

Unger said he expects shuttle buses for the Swim Trials to run from Mutual of Omaha in the midtown area and other locations. He said USA Swimming plans to make the bus trips entertaining, perhaps by placing former Olympic swimmers on the buses to discuss the events the fans are about to see. Unger said he's considering using British-style double-decker buses, which would nod to the fact that the 2012 Olympics are in London.
Todd Pfitzer, Omaha city engineer, said he is carefully monitoring CWS traffic flow. Traffic lights will need to be tweaked at some intersections for smoother pedestrian flow just before and after games, Pfitzer said. But so far, he said, he's happy with what he's seeing.

“It's been better than any of us had really hoped,” Pfitzer said. As for the overlapping events of 2012, Pfitzer wasn't worried yet.

“It's a year away,” he said. “We will address it.”

[KCPowercat]

Cool.

[heatherkay]

How is the CWS doing with the flooding?  I know the new ballpark is hard by the river.  I've seen a couple of stories about water coming up from the storm drains in some of the outlying parking.  Are the road closures in the area causing significant headaches?

[eomaha.com]

The city has managed to stay ahead of it... has brought in all sorts of pumping equipment.  Having an uneventful CWS has definitely been a priority. Hopefully, after the crowds leave... all hell doesn't break lose (read... airport under 10 feet of water... or 30,000 evacuated from Council Bluffs... both HIGHLY possible outcomes).

[skim82]

The city has managed to stay ahead of it... has brought in all sorts of pumping equipment.  Having an uneventful CWS has definitely been a priority. Hopefully, after the crowds leave... all hell doesn't break lose (read... airport under 10 feet of water... or 30,000 evacuated from Council Bluffs... both HIGHLY possible outcomes).

Holy cow.

Hopefully that doesn't happen. 

As for Omaha, great town. Enjoyed my time there.  This is not a backhanded compliment, I think Omaha would be a wonderful place to raise children and reside in.  However, I did get a much more laid back vibe in Omaha than even in KC (which I didn't like because even KC is too slow paced for me at times). 

Overall, it's great to see Omaha making tremendous strides.  Hopefully the flood waters recede soon to calm the fears associated with flooding.

[eomaha.com]

155 room, 11 story Hyatt Place proposed in Old Market, 12th and Jackson

http://www.omaha.com/article/20110717/M ... old-market

[moosnsqrl]

This 132-room Element Hotel just opened earlier this year and is only a 5-10 minute drive from the Market area.
http://www.starwoodhotels.com/element/p ... rtyID=3443

[eomaha.com]

True... there's also free shuttle that runs between Midtown Crossing (where the Element is) and downtown on weekends.

The Hyatt Place is the first hotel which will actually be within the Old Market... there's been an Embassy Suites adjacent it on 10th Street for quite some time now.

[eomaha.com]

Three developers submitted proposals in response to a city RFP for filling surface parking lots southwest of the CenturyLink (formerly Qwest) Center... NWC of 10th and Capitol Streets... part of downtown Omaha's emerging 'Capitol District'

Number of hotel rooms
Shamrock: 350
Buckingham: 250 (plus 100 extended stay rooms)
Nexus: 350

Apartments
Shamrock: 200(market rate) 80(affordable)
Buckingham: 231
Nexus: 100

Office Space
Shamrock: Office/residential space: 140,000 square feet
Buckingham: 20,100 square feet
Nexus: 122,200 square feet

Entertainment/Retail space
Shamrock: 61,300 square feet
Buckingham: 41,406 square feet
Nexus: 84,200 square feet

Shamrock


Buckingham


Nexus

[FangKC]

I hope these same developers will express interest in developing our East Village plan.

[pash]

.

[FangKC]

Last I checked, the East Village development was inside the Loop.

[pash]

.

[UrbanNebraska]

By the way the Shamrock proposal was picked. Here are a few more renderings.

[FangKC]

Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway has purchased the Omaha World-Herald, and other World-Herald-owned newspapers, for $200 million. The World-Herald company has solid profits. Berkshire Hathaway also owns stakes in the Washington Post, and Buffalo News.

Prior to the sale, the World-Herald is the last major employee-owned newspaper in the country. The World-Herald is the 49th largest newspaper in the country as measured by the daily distribution of the printed newspaper. It also is in the top 10 newspapers in the country in terms of the percentage of households in its market that subscribe.

http://www.omaha.com/article/20111130/N ... rld-herald

http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/n ... erald.html

[mean]

Interesting acquisition. Not sure how advisable it was, considering the state and likely future of paper media, but maybe Buffett has something up his sleeve.