Sports landscapes are playing an increasing role in urban development in the United States, remaking central cities as economic activities like manufacturing have declined in recent decades. Since the early 1990s, a stadium building boom has reconstructed urban environments to emphasize tourism and entertainment. New sports facilities have contributed to filling a post-industrial economic void, modifying city skylines and promoting positive urban identities. In general, political leaders and urban planners across the United States hope to (re-)create dense, walkable cities that are home to unique neighborhoods full of independent stores and unique restaurants. They argue that new sport-anchored developments can transform and revitalize their host community (Austrian and Rosentraub 2002; Turner 2002; Turner and Rosentraub 2002; Friedman et al. 2004; Hall 2004; Silk 2004; Duquette and Mason 2008; Friedman 2010; Rosentraub 2014; Koch 2017; Podair 2017; Friedman 2018).
Only infrequently have geographers attempted to interpret sports landscapes. As geographer Peirce Lewis observed, “we need to know much more about the way that Americans have subdivided and allocated geographic space for recreation and games” (1983, 255; see also Bale 1988). However, because they are recognizable landmarks full of cultural meaning, sports stadiums have recently become the focus of geographic study. For many urban residents, stadiums are sources “of civic pride and a symbol of victory and accomplishment” (Raitz 1995, 5). Others have compared stadiums to cathedrals (Novak 1976; John 2002; Trumpbour 2007) as well as to Greek agoras and Roman forums (Jackson 1984), gathering places that foster place-making and help form the collective cultural identity of a city (Bale 1988; Gaffney 2008; Gumprecht 2008; Zelinsky 2011; Gaffney 2014).
Stadiums are not isolated, stand-alone facilities of course. At their best, sports infrastructure can connect to their surroundings, enhancing the sense of place and boosting the economy of their host city through sports-related entertainment. Scholars have assessed baseball stadiums, in particular, for their place-shaping abilities. Recent studies have argued that Wrigley Field in Chicago (Gripshover 2008), Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles (Podair 2017), and Busch Stadium III in St. Louis (Hurt 2018) have altered their adjacent neighborhoods, shaped new images of their host cities, and potentially benefited the public since games offer opportunities for unifying social experiences. As architecture critic Paul Goldberger argued, stadiums are significant public spaces and “the ballpark is one of the greatest of all American building types, as it reveals as much about how we treat our cities today as it ever has in the past” (2019, x).
In many ways, St. Louis, Missouri, is a quintessential Rust Belt city. Through the first half of the 1900s, readily available manufacturing jobs attracted immigrants from Europe as well as rural-to-urban migrants from Missouri and the Mississippi River Valley (Primm 1998; Sandweiss 2001). But by the 1950s, increasing disinvestment, a declining corporate and personal tax base, intensifying racial segregation, as well as the depopulation of the City of St. Louis led to the national perception of pervasive urban decay (Bradley 2013; Gordon 2014; O’Neil 2014). Since then, city leaders have attempted to reimagine downtown on several occasions in order to reverse the now 70-year long trend of economic and population decline (Sandweiss 2001; Laslo et al. 2003; Gordon 2008; Gordon 2014). Although the specific plans have changed over time, typically planners propose enhancing transportation connections to the suburbs, increasing the number of white-collar jobs, as well as encouraging suburban residents to return to the city for entertainment, sports, and other consumptive activities (Cowan 2005; O’Neil 2013a).
In St. Louis, use of sports infrastructure to modify the city’s urban landscape has intensified since the early 1990s, shaping an evolving sports entertainment district (Figure 1). In 1994, the Enterprise Center (formerly the Kiel Center, Savvis Center, and Scottrade Center) opened as the new home for the St. Louis Blues of the National Hockey League (NHL) (Figure 2). The next year, The Dome at America’s Center (formerly the Trans World Dome and Edward Jones Dome) was completed (Figure 3). It was constructed as part of the plan to attract a National Football League (NFL) team to St. Louis. In 2006, Major League Baseball’s (MLB) St. Louis Cardinals moved into retro-style Busch Stadium III (Figure 4). As part of that project, the Cardinals developed adjoining Ballpark Village, a sports-themed entertainment district. The current project altering the St. Louis landscape is construction of a stadium for a Major League Soccer (MLS) team (Figure 5).
Supporters argue that the stadium building boom has enhanced the urban landscape of St. Louis, forming an L-shaped sports and sports entertainment region from the Dome southward to Busch Stadium before turning west to Enterprise Center and ending at Union Station and the MLS stadium complex. Although this region is currently in formation, the St. Louis Sports Entertainment District is currently shaping the landscape of St. Louis. Four sports facilities comprise the core of the region (see Meinig 1965 for his core-domain-sphere model). They are surrounded by an irregularly shaped sports entertainment domain of businesses (including bars, restaurants, and hotels) that directly benefit from sports events as well as parking lots and structures that provide necessary infrastructure on game days. Adjacent to the core and domain areas, a variety of other (non-sports) urban land uses is typical. Government buildings, a large transect of railroad lines to the south, corporate headquarters, gentrified housing, businesses that do not specifically cater to a sports clientele, and non-sports tourism (including the Gateway Arch grounds) surround the St. Louis Sports Entertainment District.
In order to better understand the making of this region, I sought to interpret the historical evolution of the four current St. Louis sports facilities. My site visits to the area began in 2006, on both game and non-game days. I looked for visible urban patterns and the flow of fans (both in transit to the region and on foot) on MLB, NHL, and NFL gamedays. Field work was supplemented by interpreting textual information found in the media, historic photographs and postcards, government reports and planning documents, as well as a synthesis of secondary source material.
Professional hockey in St. Louis was first played in the St. Louis Arena, a large multi-purpose facility that opened in 1929 (Figure 6). Once St. Louis was awarded an NHL expansion franchise and the Blues began play in 1967, the Arena (also known as the Checkerdome) hosted games, as well as other events including conventions and concerts (Ballparks.com 2018; St. Louis Post-Dispatch 2019). The cavernous building closed in 1994 and due to a non-compete clause in the financing agreement of the newly-constructed Enterprise Center, the Arena remained vacant for several years (Ballparks.com 2018; St. Louis Post-Dispatch 2019). After the City of St. Louis demolished the Arena in 1999, the large empty lot was redeveloped by private interests into The Highlands, a business and residential mixed-use development featuring loft-style apartments, a Hampton Inn, radio station headquarters, and various businesses (St. Louis Post-Dispatch 2019) (Figure 7).
The Enterprise Center opened in 1994 and is a 12-story glass and concrete building with 18,000 seats in the Downtown West neighborhood (Figure 8). With assistance from tax-exempt financing (more than $62 million out of a total cost of $170 million), a group of local corporate leaders contributed private funding to construct the facility near Union Station (a historic train station renovated into an entertainment destination) (Miller 2002; Laslo 2003; Faulk and Addo 2017; Enterprise Center 2019). Although the City of St. Louis owns the Enterprise Center, the St. Louis Blues operate and manage the building. The arena characteristically hosts about 175 sporting and non-sports events (including college basketball tournaments and numerous concerts) attracting almost 2 million people to the facility each year (Enterprise Center 2019). During the 2019-2020 season, 35 Blues home games drew approximately 18,000 fans per game, for a yearly total of 633,000 (Hockey Reference 2020).
In 2017, a three-year, $150 million renovation of the Enterprise Center began in order to modernize a facility that civic leaders and team officials argued was obsolete when compared to other arenas in the Midwest (Durando 2017; Faulk and Addo 2017; Enterprise Center 2019). Phase one included infrastructure upgrades including heating and cooling, improved lighting, renovations to the ice plant, replacement of some lower-tier seating, and a new high-definition video board (Rubbelke 2018) (Figure 9). Phase two focused on increasing fan amenities including new premium seating and entertainment areas, a beer garden, plus a significant expansion to the team store. Upper-tier seats were also replaced (Rubbelke 2018; Kelly 2019). Finally, phase three replaced the remaining original seats, remodeled fan gathering spaces, and upgraded the kids’ zone (Kelly 2019).
When the Enterprise Center was completed, it was part of a hockey arena building boom (Sports Business Journal 2017). With these arenas now reaching advanced age (for a sports facility), team owners are requesting publicly-funded upgrades to infrastructure and new fan experience amenities (such as private boxes, all-inclusive areas, expanded shopping and dining choices, and designated zones for children). Arguments for economic viability are typically coupled with calls to enhance the place-making ability of sport structures as increasingly fans want to watch a game accompanied by an amenity-laden experience involving food, shopping, and sport. In St. Louis, team officials argue that renovations to the Enterprise Center will make the building the “town hall of St. Louis,” serving as an urban landmark and community gathering place that reflects unique regional characteristics (Kelly 2019). Coupled with the recent success of the Blues and their booming attendance, the renovated Enterprise Center and Union Station in Downtown West are gaining momentum as sports-entertainment destinations, enhancing the western core of the St. Louis Sports Entertainment District.
Situated at the northern edge of the Central Business District, the Dome at America’s Center is connected to the city’s convention center (America’s Center, built in 1977) (Figure 10). America’s Center is owned by the City of St. Louis while the Dome is owned jointly by the city, county, and State of Missouri (Faulk and Addo 2017). The Dome is an expansive indoor multi-purpose space that hosts concerts and conventions in addition to sporting events. Best known as the NFL’s St. Louis Rams’ home from 1995 to 2015, its 66,000 seats include 120 luxury suites as well as a private club seat level (Stadiums of Pro Football 2019). During their last year in St. Louis (2015), the Rams averaged more than 52,000 fans per home game, a yearly attendance of approximately 420,000 (Pro Football Reference 2015). Due to the ample space required for a football field and a large seating capacity, the Dome’s footprint is sizable and the sheer extent of the facility makes for an awkward relationship with the surrounding region.
Built for $280 million (all publicly funded) as part of the plan to recruit an expansion or existing NFL team and to counter the perception of St. Louis as a second-tier sports city, at the time of its construction the Dome was promoted as a state-of-the-art facility, and its combination of renovated convention center and domed stadium “were considered leading models of a contemporary multipurpose structure” (Laslo 2003, 1080; see also Miller 2002; Click 2016-2017; Stadiums of Pro Football 2019). Renovations completed in 2009 replaced the video display boards and expanded premium seating areas (Click 2016-2017). Additional amenities and new field turf were added in following years (Figure 11). Still, media and fan reports widely characterized the Dome as a poor place to watch football offering a limited number of fan experiences in a lifeless atmosphere that contradicted the festival-type spectacle that ticketholders expect during gamedays (Rooney and Davidson 1995).
City officials increasingly became concerned about their lease with the Rams. Under the 1995 agreement, the Dome had to remain in the top quarter of NFL stadiums (measured at 10-year intervals) in terms of fan amenities and stadium infrastructure. If the Dome was not ranked as one of the top eight stadiums in the NFL, the Rams could break the lease and relocate (Click 2016-2017; Hunn 2019; Stadiums of Pro Football 2019). When the Dome fell below the top quarter of NFL stadiums in 2005 and 2015 and team officials and government representatives could not agree upon needed renovations, the Rams terminated their lease and moved to Los Angeles after the 2015 season ended (Click 2016-2017; Hunn 2019). Without professional football the Dome continued to be utilized for conventions, concerts, and a variety of sporting events.
According to tourism advocates, America’s Center and the Dome need approximately $350 million in renovations (Faulk and Addo 2017). Leaders claim that St. Louis no longer attracts competitive bids for large conventions, since rival cities including Nashville and Indianapolis have recently invested millions in upgrading their facilities (Barker 2018a; Bott 2018; Lloyd 2019). In 2019, the city and county agreed to fund $175 million of improvements to the Dome, adding exhibit space, meeting areas, loading dock access, and creating a green space for outdoor events (Bott 2018; Lloyd 2019). During their campaign to secure funding, officials argued that America’s Center is “the front door for St. Louis,” the initial point of contact for many first-time visitors to the city (Lloyd 2019). Still, its long-term impact on the sports landscape is questionable due to the lack of an NFL team, a decreasing number of conventions (even prior to COVID-19), and the imposing design of the structure which acts as a monolithic concrete island surrounded by few businesses serving game day customers. Although the Dome is a core facility in the St. Louis Sports Entertainment District, it is a prime example of poor design impacting place-making abilities. Closed-off from the adjacent city, lacking commercial options at street level, the underused Dome at America’s Center makes a limited contribution to enhancing sense of place in St. Louis.
Of the recent sport-related projects, the city’s baseball stadium and Ballpark Village have been the most successful at altering the urban landscape of St. Louis. The current baseball stadium, Busch Stadium III, replaced (not surprisingly) Busch Stadium II, built in 1966. A multi-sport structure, Busch Stadium II was promoted by city officials as an urban renewal project intended to revive the southern Central Business District (City Plan Commission 1960; Primm 1998; Sandweiss 2001; Laslo 2003; Gordon 2008; Bradley 2013; O’Neil 2013; Hurt 2018) (Figure 12). Although the stadium was functional for 40 years, it was an excellent example of a placeless late-modern era baseball stadium designed for mass audiences, constructed outside of existing neighborhoods, and visually closed to the surrounding city (Neilson 1986, 1995; Pastier 1995; Fairfield 2001; Ritzer and Stillman 2001; Cowan 2005; Cowan 2016; Goldberger 2019). Worse, Busch Stadium II did little to reverse the economic decline of downtown St. Louis (Sandweiss 2001; Laslo et al. 2003; Gordon 2014).
Encouraging functional neighborhoods, employment stability, and vibrant downtown mixed-use districts became part of a larger campaign to project new, positive images of St. Louis. City leaders again used sport to fuel this effort. The current, retro-style $411 million baseball stadium was designed by noted sports architects Populous (formerly HOK Sport) and opened in 2006. Busch Stadium III was mostly privately financed (nearly 80 percent), although the project received multiple real estate tax abatements, other tax waivers, as well as government assistance with infrastructure costs (Hunn 2010; Click 2014). The baseball-only ballpark features a natural grass field, has more than 44,000 seats, and was designed with an outfield that opens to the city (providing memorable views of downtown and the Gateway Arch) (Figure 13). The traditional red brick construction and use of other historical architectural details including repeating arches (referencing both the Gateway Arch and the wrought iron spans on the nearby Eads Bridge) reinforce the enhanced sense of place created by the ballpark—fans attending games are constantly reminded that they are in St. Louis. Busch Stadium III has been a popular destination with a 2019 season average of more than 42,000 fans per game, a yearly attendance over 3.4 million (Baseball Almanac 2019). (Due to COVID-19, the abbreviated 2020 baseball season was played without fans.)
Architects modeled Busch Stadium III after Baltimore’s Oriole Park at Camden Yards and Cleveland’s Progressive Field in the Gateway District, retro-designed baseball stadiums surrounded by revitalized central city regions focused on sport, tourism, and entertainment. Baseball-only stadiums with natural grass fields, unique architectural details, downtown locations, and a design open to the city characterizes these ballparks that attempt to link with the urban histories around them (Neilson 1995; Ritzer and Stillman 2001; Chapin 2004; Ponder 2004; Rosensweig 2005; Goldberger 2019). Increasingly, retro stadiums combine a safe leisure experience for fans with enhanced revenue-generating streams for team owners. Luxury boxes, restricted all-inclusive areas, as well as opportunities for consumption inside the ballpark including shopping, fine dining in luxury boxes, and play space for children are enclosed by a stadium that looks historic (Pastier 1995; Fairfield 2001; Ritzer and Stillman 2001; Rosensweig 2005; Gordon 2013).
The agreement that provided limited public funding for Busch Stadium III mandated that the Cardinals create Ballpark Village, an entertainment district and neighborhood situated on a 10-acre site immediately north of the stadium (Figure 14). Original proposals by the Cardinals called for a two-phase project, with commercial space scheduled to open in 2007 and the entire $650 million development completed by 2011 (Ponder 2004; Crisp 2012; Click 2014; Bryant 2016). However, the beginning of the Great Recession in 2007 delayed the project and the property unbecomingly housed a dirt pit, then a softball field, and finally large parking lots (Figure 15).
The Cardinals and their development partner (Cordish Companies) revised the original Ballpark Village plans, broke ground in 2013, and completed phase one, a $100 million, two city block area devoted to sports-related entertainment, in 2014 (Logan 2013) (Figure 16). The team promoted the destination as the first sports-focused entertainment district in the United States (Goldberger 2019). The 100,000 square foot space featured abundant consumption options with Fox Sports Midwest Live! (a large restaurant with an enormous 35-foot wide television), a three-story Budweiser Brew House, Cardinals Nation (home to a team museum and rooftop seats looking into the stadium), and a live event plaza anchoring the space (Hartwig 2014) (Figure 17). Ballpark Village quickly proved to be popular destination even on non-game days with nearly 7 million visitors in 2015, giving the Cardinals a new revenue stream to complement ticket sales and concessions at Busch Stadium III (Bryant 2015).
After a multi-year lull, phase two of the Ballpark Village project began in 2017 (Figure 18). This $260 million project (with at least $65 million in public subsidies) emphasized mixed-use development along Clark Street (Ballpark Village 2017a; Ballpark Village 2017; Barker 2017a; Brown and Barker 2017). New Urbanist design was applied to office space, a 29-story amenity-laden residential tower with more than 300 units, an eight-story luxury hotel, and retail space that replaced surface parking (Figure 19). Completed in 2020, the Cardinals hope to generate a pedestrian-friendly, mixed-use “dynamic, vibrant, 24/7 neighborhood” that complements fan amenities at Busch Stadium III (Barker 2017b, p. B1; see also Barker 2017c; Ballpark Village 2017; Brown and Barker 2017; Ballpark Village 2019). Creating a functional neighborhood with a sense of community is the team’s primary goal (Barker 2017c, Barker 2019a).
The Cardinals have tentatively indicated that a future stage is possible, with planning beginning as early as 2022 (Kukuljan 2021). This third phase will potentially include three office buildings along Walnut Street on the remaining open space, with the goal of creating a corporate campus for a company willing to relocate to downtown St. Louis (Bryant 2016; Barker 2017a; Barker 2017c; Brown and Barker 2017). Expanding potential revenue streams from Ballpark Village will increase income for Cardinals owners as well as allow for greater control over the space surrounding the ballpark. Sports studies author Michael Friedman calls the places created by blending revenue-generation opportunities and sport, mallparks (2018). Designed to be a combination of a ballpark, shopping mall, and theme park, mallparks represent a new type of urban place in and around stadiums that maximizes the economic activity of sports fans and promotes positive images of the host city (Friedman 2018).
The (re-)transformation of the southern urban core is, to this point, the most successful sport-related component reshaping the urban landscape of St. Louis (Figure 20). Numerous home baseball games (81) and a long season (six months) provide many opportunities for fans to frequent nearby shops and restaurants. In addition to constructing new landmarks, the current Busch Stadium and Ballpark Village project overtly seeks to shape a new, post-industrial image of St. Louis as a revitalized city and regional tourist and entertainment destination.
The most recent attempt to use sport to re-energize St. Louis is an ongoing campaign to receive a Major League Soccer expansion franchise. This effort began in earnest in 2016 and started, stopped, and restarted due to debate over public funding for the project. The ownership group was awarded an MLS franchise (St. Louis City SC) in 2019 and is building a privately-financed stadium west of Union Station (Barker 2018b; Rishe 2018; Barker and Frederickson 2019) (Figure 21). The investors plan to complete the $400 million, 22,500 seat, open-air, natural grass stadium in 2022 and participate in the 2023 MLS season, although construction groundworks did not begin until early 2020 (Barker 2018b; Frederickson 2019; Frederickson 2020a). The architectural design calls for the pitch to be located below street level, surrounded by two decks of seats under a partial covering that will reduce the impact of weather and increase crowd noise. The project contains minimal public funding, with more than $5 million in state tax credits, a property tax abatement, and multiple special sales tax districts (Barker 2019c; Barker and Frederickson 2019; Erickson 2020).
The MLS project is furthering the national perception that St. Louis is “a traditional soccer market with a downtown that’s on the rebound” (Straus 2019). Even though soccer stadiums have not historically been prominent features on the American landscape, the unnamed St. Louis facility will be an instant landmark and visible sign of urban vitality (Bowden 1995). City leaders and the prospective ownership group hope that a new soccer stadium hosting 17 home games each year will create entertainment synergy with adjacent Union Station and encourage new economic activity in the neighborhood known as Downtown West. Historically, the development of Union Station area as an economically sustainable tourist destination has been difficult, due in part to its separation from the tourism-focused Central Business District (Cowan 2016). However, hoping to recapture tourism relevancy, Union Station recently completed a $187 million rebranding with the addition of a large aquarium and 200-foot observation (Ferris) wheel on site (Hahn 2019) (Figure 22).
With a new stadium and a reimagined Union Station, the MLS proposal advocated that the area will “become a centerpiece of an energized downtown experience” (Frederickson 2019, p. D12; see also Barker 2019c). Artistic renderings indicate space for restaurants and other commercial activities to be included in the stadium project, in order to encourage year-round visitation to the area. A plaza featuring a small soccer pitch will provide attractive outdoor space for public use, even on non-game days (Barker and Frederickson 2019). Construction will add minimal parking, contributing to the goal of encouraging a dense, urban landscape.
From the beginning of the campaign to attract an MLS franchise to St. Louis, city leaders and corporate proponents argued that constructing a soccer stadium district west of Union Station is part of the larger effort to create a sports, culture, and entertainment corridor in downtown (Faulk 2016; Frederickson 2020a). This project pushes the region further west, connecting Downtown West to sports facilities and sports-related entertainment in the Central Business District. However, team owners hope that the soccer stadium project will transcend the St. Louis Sports Entertainment District. They are advocating a more ambitious goal of using soccer (and the branding of St. Louis City SC specifically) to reinterpret and redefine St. Louis as a city and region united by diverse cultures, iconic neighborhoods, economic growth, and cultural renaissance (Frederickson 2020b).
Increasingly, politicians, developers, and team officials are reallocating space to stadiums and sports-related entertainment. New stadiums, proponents argue, will attract tourists, encourage new businesses and jobs, expand the income base, and make central cities places to work and live once again. This is particularly true in cities where teams are aggressively remaking the areas around their stadiums, creating sports entertainment regions (or mallparks). In St. Louis, four stadium projects built over the course of three decades have contributed to the formation of a St. Louis Sports Entertainment District, an evolving area where sport and sports entertainment dominate the economy.
The momentum of sports-related construction development has encouraged one CEO to state that St. Louis is “a city of the future,” with the potential to undergo sustained growth (Barker 2019b, p. B6). Cardinals officials support this contention, arguing that Ballpark Village, coupled with the newly renovated Gateway Arch grounds and ongoing tourism-focused rebranding at Union Station is revitalizing downtown St. Louis (Brown and Barker 2017). Blues team officials note the ability of the Enterprise Center to serve as a community gathering place, enhancing the emotional bond between the team and St. Louis (Kelly 2019). Even national observers have noted the synergy between sport and the St. Louis community. During the Blues’ improbable Stanley Cup-winning 2018-2019 season, an ESPN reporter judged that the success of the team helped to improve the collective morale and give momentum to urban renewal efforts while reducing national perceptions of high crime and racial inequalities in St. Louis (Wagoner 2019).
However, assessing the economic impact of St. Louis’s sports projects is complicated. Detractors argue that little additional spending has been created. Instead fans have realigned their consumption from elsewhere in the region. Multiple downtown restaurants and bars have closed since 2014 and their owners have attributed that loss of clientele to Ballpark Village—the “Ballpark Village Effect” (Click 2014, 32; see also Bryant 2014; Pistor 2015; Barker 2016; Johnson 2016; Barker 2017a). More specifically, critics argue St. Louis redevelopment “mega-projects” have not provided economic benefits to underfunded neighborhoods (Pistor 2015, p. A1; see also Miller 2002). The sports core and domain comprise only a tiny percentage of the land area in St. Louis City, leading to questions of how far the impact of sport extends beyond each stadium. The Dome at America’s Center, in particular, has a minimal influence in the region as it is underused, does not reflect regional architecture, and is a closed structure that is physically isolated from the surrounding urban fabric.
Criticisms aside, since the early 1990s St. Louis political and economic leaders have embraced the trend of utilizing sport to promote entertainment and tourism. Due to their larger scope, Busch Stadium III and adjacent Ballpark Village are currently the best example of the transformative power of sport in St. Louis. Numerous baseball fans frequent the new Ballpark Village neighborhood and leisure space. As time goes on, the potential synergy between the Enterprise Center, Union Station, and the new MLS stadium may also strengthen the western end of the St. Louis Sports Entertainment District. All four structures are within four blocks of a MetroLink station, the (currently underused) regional transit system, allowing for quick movement of fans in and out of downtown, particularly on gamedays when multiple teams host home games.
The long-term impacts of COVID-19 economic restrictions are difficult to predict. Since spring 2020 teams and fan-dependent businesses in the St. Louis Sports Entertainment District have struggled to maintain their consumption-based business models during an unexpected economic disruption. One downtown bar reported a 40 percent drop in business in 2020 while other bars and restaurants have reduced their operations to weekends only due to the limited number of fans and tourists (Graves and Heffernan 2020). The extension of COVID-19 attendance restrictions into the 2021 sports season continue to limit team and local business revenue. However with other economic development options in St. Louis limited, the transformation of the St. Louis’s landscape through sport and sports-related entertainment will continue.