What UAB football decision means for downtown and the dome

Dec 5, 2014, 3:07pm CST Updated: Dec 5, 2014, 3:17pm CST

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When the University of Alabama Board of Trustees declined to approve an on-campus stadium for the UAB football team in 2011, the city of Birmingham offered the team another option.

Birmingham could build the new multipurpose arena- or dome - that has been talked about for nearly two decades to replace the Birmingham Jefferson Convention Complex, and UAB could play its home games indoors rather than at the aging Legion Field.

It seemed mutually beneficial for both until UAB President Ray Watts announced this week the institution is ending the football program, effective immediately.

"We have been talking to a number of entities about an indoor sports facility, commonly referred to as the dome, to be built at the BJCC site," Mayor William Bell said in November. "When the board of trustees rejected UAB's request to build an on-campus stadium, we then went to the previous administration to talk about maybe UAB coming in with the city, as well as several other entities in participating in building the dome facility at BJCC."

Bell was also in talks with boosters about helping UAB build an indoor practice facility with a projected investment of $10 million.

The decision to eliminate football was met with outrage and protests by student-athletes and the community at large. The business community has not shied away from weighing in on the controversial decision either.

Derek Waltchack, principal at Shannon Waltchack, doesn't believe the decision will be devastating to downtown development, but he said it could be detrimental.

"I feel sick to stomach about what could have been," Waltchack said in a statement to the BBJ this week. "I know for a fact that there was at least one football stadium project being studied using public/private dollars. That stadium could have been leased to UAB and be used for other events. If that had happen, Birmingham would have had another economic engine in the CBD spurring growth."

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Bryan Davis covers real estate, retail and manufacturing for the Birmingham Business Journal. Click here to follow him on Twitter.

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