"Best Home In All Of Sports": Clippers Unveil Plans For New Inglewood Stadium
INGLEWOOD (CBSLA) — The Los Angeles Clippers Thursday unveiled renderings for the team's privately-financed sports and entertainment center anchored by the new basketball arena in Inglewood.
The 26-acre proposed campus will be located on the southeast corner of Century Boulevard and Prairie Avenue — about three miles east of Los Angeles International Airport — and will include an 18,500-seat arena, corporate L.A. Clippers headquarters building, team training facility, sports medicine clinic, community courts, park spaces, educational facilities, restaurants and shops.
"My goal is simple. I want the Clippers to have the best home in all of sports," Clippers Chairman Steve Ballmer said in a statement. "What that means to me is an unparalleled environment for players, for fans, for sponsors and for the community of Inglewood. Our goal is to build a facility that re-sets fans' expectations while having a transformative impact on the city we will call home."
The project will be built on mostly vacant land under the flight path of LAX, land that the team said is not suitable for residential development. The project is slated to be completed by the fall of 2024, at the end of the Clippers' lease at the Staples Center.
"Inglewood is a diverse, dynamic community blessed with a skilled workforce, emerging infrastructure and a bold economic blueprint for the future," Gillian Zucker, Clippers President of Business Operations, said in a release. "In addition to the thousands of jobs this facility will create for the local community, we are equally committed to working with our new neighbors in the continuing renaissance developing in the City of Inglewood."
The proposed arena will have a three-dimensional oval design with diamond-shaped metal panels the team said were inspired by the concept of a basketball swishing through a net. The panels have also been designed to provide solar benefit for maximum energy efficiency. The design of the building is LEED GOLD-certified. A release from the team says the campus will achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions.
To highlight the temperate climate of Southern California, the proposed campus integrates landscaped areas that will be accessible from every concourse level. The complex also envisions a multi-purpose plaza featuring a concert stage, community basketball courts and a space for the community to gather and watch live events and movies on a supersized screen.
The project is expected to create an estimated 10,000 construction jobs and more than 1,500 permanent jobs. When completed, the complex will generate an estimated $268 million in economic activity for Inglewood annually, and more than $190 million in new tax revenue from 2020-2045.
"We are excited to welcome the nation's most philanthropic sports team to Inglewood," Mayor James T. Butts said in a statement. "Over the past three years, the Ballmers and the Clippers have repeatedly demonstrated their commitment to improving communities like Inglewood. The Clippers' presence in our city will create a sustainable revenue source and boost civic pride, revitalizing our community for years to come."
