ThrillDr1 t1_iy8b9rt wrote
Polar park is NOT neighborhood friendly - people aren't using the neighborhood to go to dinner or grab a drink- and for the city to assume that people would was short-sighted and ridiculous.
People go to the game, buy overpriced food and drinks and then they LEAVE. The entire area went through gentrification, landlords got greedy and upped the rent causing businesses to leave.
The city easily swayed to buy a bag of shit because they wanted a stadium so badly that they didn't do their due diligence, and now the people, once again, pay for that, quite literally.
chupacabra_666 t1_iy8dozo wrote
I went to a bunch of games last season and every time we wanted to grab drinks and late food after the game most options were closed. In most MiLB towns businesses around the stadium adapt to benefit from it. Drink specials, GameDay menus, etc. If people are going to eat and drink Inside the stadium before the game it's probably because that's the best option for them. Like another user mentioned, it's not like the area was thriving before. Seems like the story shouldn't be "ballpark closing businesses", it should that businesses expected the ballpark to save them from their decline without any effort.
sunshinepills t1_iy8lp7w wrote
Couldn't agree more. I know it's a much larger stage, but take a walk around the Fenway Park area during a Red Sox game and count how many bars are closed because tHaT gOdFoRsAkEn BaLlPaRk Is TaKiNg AlL oUr MoNeY. I assure you, the WooSox would just be tickled if you spent all of your money within the ballpark but they're certainly not holding game-goers hostage in there.
orzechod t1_iy95fib wrote
"not thriving before"? really? Green Island is one of the few places where Worcester feels like a real city. I'm down there 4-5 times a month for lunch, dinner, drinks, or shopping.
your_city_councilor t1_iy9v9oy wrote
Definitely agree. For whatever reason, businesses think that they'll do well by not bothering to even try to attract customers. Why didn't they/don't they tailor their hours around when there's going to be a huge influx of people? Why not at least try to do some advertising to pull people in?
And closing early: maybe Worcester restaurants should try to be open more often. I moved away from Worcester after high school, and when I came back I was utterly surprised by how many restaurants were just closed on several days of the week or who closed way too early. People say that has to do with the pandemic, but that's the way businesses were acting even before.
Why is the public market thriving? Why hasn't the park taken away their business? Why isn't the parking situation harming them? All of these businesses want to just say "but the ballpark!" as a scapegoat.
thisisntmynametoday t1_iyaeb2f wrote
Public market businesses have been quoted on the record talking about downturns in business during games. Especially on weekends.
Ballparks are a black hole for local businesses. While they might drive pre and post game crowds to neighboring places, it’s in the most inconvenient times when it’s a night game. 5-7pm and 11pm-close aren’t the best times for restaurants. It’s good for bars.
6-9 pm is the prime dining time for most customers, and many will stay away on game day due to the crowds and perception of lack of parking, inconvenience, etc.
If you are a restaurant staying open later to catch a ballpark crowd that has already been eating and drinking inside, you are gambling. People might go home. They might be full and only want to drink at a bar, not a restaurant.
And if your dining room is empty 6-9pm because of the public’s reluctance to dine during games, then you are losing money. It costs money to open your doors, and it costs a lot more to staff up for 12+ hours a day. That requires a lot more employees than you might afford for a gamble.
Jerry Remy’s restaurant opened up right across from the right field corner at Fenway. Prime spot, but they couldn’t make a living off of being slammed 81 home games a year, then much smaller crowds the rest of the time. https://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2015/03/04/closure-jerry-remy-restaurant-preceded-years-financial-struggle/d84dQz01W7Xwmh9GqpWnoL/story.html
your_city_councilor t1_iybhwe4 wrote
>5-7pm and 11pm-close aren’t the best times for restaurants. It’s good for bars.
But restaurants have to cater to the people who are going to be around them. Having a staff there from 5-7 and working to entice people who are walking from parking inside, and maybe doing something in terms of advertising.
What did, say, the barbecue spot actually do to try to attract people who were going to the games? Weekends they were 12-8, other days of the week they were open 4-8? What kinds of hours are those?
thisisntmynametoday t1_iybu9ej wrote
The ballpark has 75 home games a year. There’s about 24 weeks to the season, and maybe half of those weekends have home games Friday-Saturday.
That is 12 weekends a year where a ballpark adjacent business is going to see a significant decrease in business due to the ballpark on weekends, which is when restaurants make the most money.
Trying to “attract” a percentage of the ~9000 fans who attend a 3+ hour baseball game isn’t feasible. Most people go out for a drink or two before the game. Most aren’t going to add in 1.5 hours to sit down for a meal before or after the game. Weeknight games start at 6:35pm. Realistically, who is getting out of work early to go eat before the game, and who is going to go out to eat at 10pm after the game? Not many. Study after study shows that fans spend most of their money and time inside the ballpark, and the perception of crowds on game day drive away other customers.
Across the board businesses in the Canal District (not just restaurants) have said sales are down on game days because customers stay away on game days because of traffic, congestion, a lack of parking, 2 hour meters, and an absolute lack of public transport.
Have you ever worked in the restaurant industry? Restaurants stay open for the hours that people show up. Adding hours means adding employees, adding product, and additional costs. You just can’t decide a few weeks a year to have odd hours and add in temp workers. That’s not how the industry works. Off hours are off hours for a reason, and you will lose money trying to attract customers in during off hours.
your_city_councilor t1_iye5tkk wrote
>Have you ever worked in the restaurant industry? Restaurants stay open for the hours that people show up.
Yes, I've spent years working in the restaurant industry. Restaurants change their hours around, experimenting to figure out what's best for attracting customers.
And the whole parking issue as an argument against Polar Park makes no sense to me. It's an argument for keeping the neighborhood unpopulated, aside from a couple of restaurants and bars that don't bring too many people. If parking is the issue, then the restaurants should petition the city to build a garage. One (at least) was built by the park already.
Lack of public transport is also an issue that can and should be addressed, but it's not an argument against the park, either. Worcester - including its businesses - either needs to resign itself to being a decaying mill town or it needs to be creative.
thisisntmynametoday t1_iyerab4 wrote
If you’ve worked in a restaurant than you know having food service past 10pm is a way to barely break even during those hours and burn out BOH staff. And you would know that pregame hours in the early afternoon are usually slow as well. Money is made during weekends and dinner service, and having 75 days a year, including ~12 weekends a year with ballpark induced reductions in revenue is tough to recover from.
It you want to succeed in off hours, you need to be a bar, first and foremost. Worcester is nowhere near close enough to being an 18 hour city.
Business owners have repeatedly said parking is an issue, specifically the 2 hour limits on street parking without renewals and stringent parking enforcement. Businesses have said that their staff struggle to find parking, and face a lot of tickets.
The lack of parking in the neighborhood was an issue on weekends before the park, and it’s made far worse by adding in~9000 fans 75 days a year. The city closed a municipal lot on Green Street. That’s something that should have been addressed since the planning phase of the park. Building one garage in the second year of operations is a developer and city failure. Placing the burden on business owners to petition for basic levels of competency from developers and the city is incredibly myopic and condescending.
Scholarship has repeatedly shown that tax payer funded ballparks are a black hole, and not the economic saviors people think they are. Worcester just chose to ignore that and gave away millions of taxpayer funded bonds to the millionaire owners of a AAA team.
The only way out of this is a massive investment in public transport, walkable neighborhoods, and a series of parking options to help with the influx of visitors for games. Also, we need to kill the idea that outside developers have our best interests at heart. Build up and invest the community we have, not the outside investors the Chamber of Commerce has always tried (and failed) to help invest in our city.
thatguyonreddit40 t1_iy8f1jb wrote
Thats not accurate. Went to 7 or 8 games last year. Ate lunch/dinner outside the park for all but 1. Plenty of fans around too
teddygrahamdispenser t1_iy8qcvo wrote
Green Street was actually one of the few areas in the city that was already doing well before the ballpark was built - it was happening organically without the need for intervention from the city. This is one of the things that makes the choice of location for the stadium so heartbreaking and puzzling.
Notfromcorporate t1_iy8bsdn wrote
Let’s not act like that area was thriving before the stadium arrived.
saintsandopossums t1_iy8cs9n wrote
I think it was though. You had a bunch of shops and restaurants on Green St. and it was honestly the place in Worcester that felt most like an actual city block. When my cousin came to Worcester to look at colleges, I took them to Crompton/Smokestack/Dive Bar, because that was a good representation of the area. Now two of those 3 places are closed because of the ballpark
The_Mahk t1_iy8j85x wrote
And the impact of the pandemic alongside increase cost of goods/energy.
saintsandopossums t1_iy8k9dv wrote
Dive Bar closed specifically because the property's landlord wanted to make a "family baseball destination" that never ended up happening. And Smokestack closed because the building was sold, probably to become parking from what I've heard. COVID and inflation make for good scapegoats, and they definitely play a part, but most of the closures seem to be from greedy landlords thinking that they can make a quick buck before everyone wises up to the ballpark not really helping business in the area
metacomet88 t1_iyen6tm wrote
So none of the places you mentioned closed due to a downturn in business because of the park…
New restaurants close all the time. Maddis was pretty mediocre. Hangover/broth had a bad reputation and were banking on fading food trends.
I’m not saying the park is all good, but looking at a few restaurants in the neighborhood closing within 6 months doesn’t necessarily say anything about the role the park is playing.
985thesportshub t1_iya27zh wrote
Interesting you mention greed.
Since you clearly have some connection to these places, do tell, what's Smokestack Inc's plan with the $400,000 they got in PPP loans that were forgiven before they decided the big bad ballpark took all their customers? I'd love to hear it.
HighVulgarian t1_iy8khmj wrote
I mean, look at all the good the stadium did for Pawtucket for all those years. There’s your due diligence
Shvasted t1_iy9elvw wrote
Haha! That’s what I was saying during the initial debate. My question was, “Do we really want to be just like Pawtucket? Not a high bar guys.”
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