Last night, the Santa Clara City Council approved 6-1 to begin negotiations with the San Francisco 49ers to finance a new football stadium across from Great America. Those negotiations, which are set to start as early as today, are for a 68,500 seat NFL football stadium at an estimated cost of $916 million. The City of Santa Clara would publicly finance $136 million of that proposed amount. So what does this all have to do with real estate and downtown San Jose? Well, everytime I hear or read anything about the 49ers potentially moving to Santa Clara or, more specifically, the Oakland A’s moving to Fremont, I can’t help but think what a huge boost it would have been if the A’s moved to downtown San Jose.

Sure, there will always be the debate about using public funds for essentially a private entity and how much public benefit accrues in terms of public revenue. But its hard to deny the public benefit that occurs when a venue such as a baseball or football stadium is built that eventually revitalizes a blighted area. Jacobs Field (now Progressive Field) in Cleveland, Petco Park in San Diego, Coors Field in Denver, and AT&T Park in San Francisco are all great examples of how a sporting facility helped to reinvigorate and revitalize a community. That revitalization and redevelopment effort is currently underway in downtown San Jose. But just think what a ballpark in downtown San Jose would have done for the community.

At least 81 days out of the year, the downtown San Jose core would be booming with fans attending the games filling the air with excitement and pride. These same fans would be customers for all the downtown restaurants, bars, and shops. This is what its like in downtown San Jose when there is a Sharks game or a big concert at the HP Pavilion. Maybe the A’s moving to downtown San Jose is a dream long gone now that they are negotiating for a stadium in Fremont, but then again, maybe there’s still a glimmer of hope if they are still negotiating.