Kansas City’s empty arena

There’s a modern ghost town in Kansas City. Efforts to attract a major league basketball or hockey team came up empty, and the Sprint Center stands empty. Then NBA and NHL have been looking to smaller cities for expansion opportunities, according to an article in The Atlantic, because they won’t have to compete with local baseball or football teams for fan dollars. Since Kansas City has both, filling the Sprint Center has become quite a chore.

Since it doesn’t have the 200 events a year that were expected, the Kansas City Sprint Center is just hanging around and operating at a loss. One hopes this does not splash over to the surrounding businesses – such as restaurants – that were opened in anticipation of 18,500 asses in seats for hockey games, concerts and whatever else they can drag into town.

The arena is an architectural marvel but, for now, a commercial disaster. How else would you describe an attraction that there’s no reason to visit?

The Sprint Center is even empty on Twitter, where it has only 102 followers.