SOUTH LOOP — Sorry, sports activities followers: The Chicago Bears shall be taking their skills to Arlington Heights in any case.
Bears President and CEO Kevin Warren broke the information to season ticket holders — and in a while social media — in a letter forward of Monday night time’s season opener in opposition to the Minnesota Vikings, bringing years of hypothesis to an in depth. Group brass stated they’re centered on constructing out a brand new fixed-roof stadium on the previous website of the Arlington Worldwide Racecourse in suburban Arlington Heights with hopes of internet hosting a Tremendous Bowl as early as 2031.
“Transferring exterior of town of Chicago just isn’t a call we reached simply,” Warren wrote within the letter. “This mission doesn’t signify us leaving, it represents us increasing.”
The Bears have referred to as Soldier Subject dwelling since 1971. In saying his workforce’s departure from its longtime Chicago stadium, Warren emphasised that greater than half of Bears season ticket holders reside inside 25 miles of the Arlington Heights website.
“The Chicago Bears belong to extra than simply Chicago. We belong to your entire state of Illinois. The Nation. The World. We’re at a pivotal juncture of the Chicago Bears franchise to construct a brand new stadium, our future dwelling in Arlington Heights, which would require zero state cash for development,” Warren wrote.
The Bears are anticipated to current its newest plans for the Arlington Heights property at a group assembly within the fall, in line with the Tribune.
Warren stated the workforce expects to create greater than 56,000 development jobs and 9,000 everlasting jobs, which it predicted will add $10 billion in financial impression attributed to statewide development and an annual $256 million in new enterprise and tourism.
It additionally envisions that the brand new stadium and corresponding mixed-use growth will entice main occasions such the Tremendous Bowl, school basketball’s Ultimate 4, world soccer video games and concert events.
In 2023, the Bears bought 326 acres of former horse racing services in Arlington Heights — which is greater than 25 miles northwest of Chicago — sparking fears that the workforce would go away town correct. Warren stated Monday that the workforce additionally “totally evaluated different websites inside Chicago’s metropolis limits, however none have been viable.”
Warren wrote the workforce is partnering with political, labor, enterprise and group leaders throughout the state to create “a plan for property tax certainty and a good contribution towards important infrastructure that may profit your entire group.”
“Arlington Heights is the one website inside Prepare dinner County that meets that commonplace. It permits us to higher serve our fan base and ship a really transformative and elevated gameday expertise,” stated Warren.
Warren added that the franchise was “optimistic about working with the Village of Arlington Heights to acquire mandatory approvals and start constructing our new dwelling.”
The information comes after years of lobbying from metropolis officers and builders to steer the Bears to stay within the metropolis. In 2022, former mayor Lori Lightfoot pitched the concept of a $2.2 billion dome over Soldier Subject in an effort to maintain the workforce on the lakefront.
Final yr, Mayor Brandon Johnson went on a media blitz to promote taxpayers on the concept of a brand new, publicly funded $4.7 billion stadium that may’ve been a stone’s throw from the present stadium. Neither Bears brass nor Gov. JB Pritzker have been satisfied, with the latter slamming the concept of utilizing public area and taxpayer cash for the mission.
Johnson couldn’t be reached for remark late Monday.
Even the workforce behind the Bronzeville Lakefront megadevelopment mission supplied up a few of their prime actual property to make the stadium occur, telling Bears brass the placement would “bridge the hole to Downtown.”
Ald. Lamont Robinson (4th) was not prepared Monday to simply accept the Bears’ transfer to the suburbs and stated his aim remained to “preserve the Chicago Bears in Chicago, ideally within the 4th Ward.”
“This mission stands to create practically 60,000 development jobs and 10,000 everlasting jobs. That’s a uncommon financial injection that needs to be to the good thing about companies and residents situated in Chicago,” Robinson stated.
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