One thing that comes up in sports management education is how sports development works to drive tourism. We know that sports aren’t only for people who live in the city or community, they’re also about people who are traveling there, either for business or pleasure. One thing we see happening with sporting venues that’s been happening for a long time is that it isn’t enough to simply put the venue in the middle of a location, and assume that people are going to come.
We know from history that there also needs to be some retail there. There has to be some commercial, and maybe even residential development that goes into it. What we’re really talking about is building small communities around these sports venues. This is essentially sport-led development, where we see sports as the centerpiece to growing something much larger that benefits the community as a whole.
One interesting example is in the Tampa, Florida, downtown area, which had previously been almost exclusively used during business hours, without much else going on outside of that. But then, the Tampa Bay Lightning NHL team took new ownership by Jeff Vinik, a financier from Boston who had come to Tampa. When he showed up, he decided that he would not only infuse money into the franchise and venue, but he was also going to use it as the centerpiece of growing the downtown area, making it much more vibrant and active than it had been in decades—or longer.
That growth in Tampa has continued to happen. There is now $3 billion worth of investment in the downtown area in partnership with Bill Gates, which demonstrates that something big is indeed happening there. Additionally, just in the span of a few years, hotels are already going up and the entertainment district is flourishing. Even a major medical school is moving its main campus to the area. So, there has been this incredible growth coming from this sporting venue, and in a way really re-growing and re-imagining the city. Though we do have to keep an eye on this type of growth and make sure it’s happening at a sustainable and manageable place, but overall, it’s really great to see.
For more information on how local venues can help grow and energize a community, as well as sports management concepts, global sports, and much more, think about taking a step towards online sports management education.
