Tuesday, November 1, 2011

MSG Looking sharp

Madison Square Garden's $850 million second renovation will take place mainly over three offseasons. The more significant portion of it was set to begin after the 2009-10 hockey/basketball seasons, but was delayed until after the 2010-11 seasons. New features include a larger entrance that will include interactive kiosks, retail, climate controlled space, and broadcast studio; larger concourses; new lighting and LED video systems with HDTV; new seating; two new pedestrian walkways suspended from the ceiling to allow fans to look directly down onto the games being played below; more dining options; and improved dressing rooms, locker rooms, green rooms, upgraded roof, and production offices, among other upgrades.

The in-arena walkways will be eliminated, and portals will be installed between each section. The lower bowl concourse (to be known as the Madison Concourse) will remain on the 6th floor. The upper bowl concourse will be relocated to the 8th floor, and will be known as the Garden Concourse. The seventh floor will house the new Madison Suites. The upper bowl will be built on top of these suites. Existing 300 and 400 level seating will be combined to create the new upper bowl.

Construction of the lower bowl (Phase One) was completed for the 2011-2012 NHL and NBA seasons. An extended off-season for the Garden permitted some advanced work to begin on the new upper bowl, which is scheduled to be completed for the 2012–2013 seasons. This advance work includes the West Balcony on the 10th floor, taking the place of sky-boxes, and new end-ice 300 level seating.

 Plans are underway to relocate systems in the periphery of the arena to permit city views. Renovation will be done in phases with the majority done in the summer months to minimize disruptions and will remain operational throughout the NHL and NBA seasons. While the Rangers and Knicks will not be displaced, the summer-competing Liberty are playing at the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey during the renovation. Because of the renovation, the Rangers will start the 2011-12 season with seven games on the road before playing their first home game on October 27.

I just copied that from Wikipedia, because I just wanted to get it out there. I did notice some differences about updates that I knew about. Just the atmosphere is better on TV. I remember watching Lightning games and the arena just seemed bleak. Here, compare last night's video
To this game last season.
So lets see, they redid the lower bowl, fixed the lighting, and redid the concourses!

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